MattR

More adults to help.

Congratulations!

@ParkMan, there's some training I took, whose name shall not me mentioned, that covered how to do this. It's more about people than any area. @SSScout is interested in marketing and has good ideas. I'd try to pave the way for him to succeed. @Cambridgeskip wants to help promote units on the internet, so I'd ask him if he'd be willing to give a talk at roundtable about that. @Eagledad likes the patrol method, so I'd ask him if he'd be interested in developing some training for patrol leaders, SPL's and SM's. I'd ask each person on the committee what their ideas are for their area. Creating an encouraging, successful environment for volunteers is probably the key. The dynamic at our district committee meetings is there's a ton of stuff to do just to keep up with awards, filling empty positions, dealing with rotating DE's, etc, that asking people what they'd like to do more of always runs the risk of "you can't ask that person to do more because his spouse is already annoyed with the time spent on scouts." I'm not saying don't do this, just understand the real world issues people are up against. So, I would not focus on scout numbers, I would focus on volunteer numbers. BTW, 10 years is too long (Timely goals?). I'd set a goal of increasing the number of volunteers at the district by 30% in a year. Make it a welcoming place where people are successful. Have enough people to cover the basics and do the extra things that will start helping units put on a better program. Believe in that and the scout numbers will take care of themselves. That's the vision I'd promote.

Lots of good ideas here. Other ideas: The first campout, if there's snow about, can be a hike instead. Rather than leadership, I'd start with teamwork. The idea is you do something for your patrol and your patrol can depend on you. If everyone does that then things are sweet. Once everyone understands teamwork leadership is much easier to grasp. The scouts don't know what they don't know, so when they're coming up with ideas add some that they can choose from. Or help them find them. Another important idea is to review how things went after the event. In particular, if there were people problems then that is a good time to solve them. Most kids think solving people problems involves going to an adult. In scouts we want the youth to understand how to do it. Don't solve problems that they know how to solve. Corollary: If they don't know how to solve a problem, help them learn. Finally, have fun. It's important to develop a good relationship with the scouts so that some day, when you have to tell them something they don't want to hear, they'll listen to you. Let us know it works.

Then start writing. Seriously. You know it. You enjoy it. You want to share it. I mean this in the most respective and appreciative way I can. Write something that we can point people to. Write something that will not only explain how to do patrol method but why. One of the problems with the usual writing is the authors are trying to keep things short and not get into too much detail. The result is overly vague and not useful. It also has no emotion. We all get goose bumps when a scout first conquers his fears and starts leading his patrol. That needs to be conveyed in order to get someone to understand why. It does not come across in a description of ethical decision making. You have tons of stories and those stories are what grabs people. It's passion that turns people, not claptrap written my committees. And don't tell me that it's all out there because if it were then we wouldn't see someone, like NotEagleDad, write something like: I knew this other guy on the forum, I forget his name, but he always used to end his posts with "I love this scouting stuff." That's what we need more of. There will always be bad stuff, there's little hope in ending that. But it's the good stuff that will change things. In fact, I love this scouting stuff would be a great title, rather than something that contains the word manual.

This scout won't listen to scout leadership or adults. In other words, he just doesn't understand teamwork. I don't know his age but my guess is he's 11 or 12? One option is, on the permission slip, have a copy of the scout oath and law. Explicitly state that if a scout does not follow this then they will be sent home. Since grandpa is there it won't be a problem. The important part is that you follow through. Another option: I've never done this before but you're welcome to try. Before the next campout tell everyone in the patrol that without teamwork they may as well be in cub scouts. Ask them who wants to be in cub scouts. Hopefully none of them say they do. Tell them that there are problems with this patrol not acting as a team. Stop the scouts if they point fingers or mention the problem scout's name. Explain to them that you'll be watching along with the SM or SPL or ASM or just someone outside of the patrol. Then tell them if there are any scouts that aren't team members carrying their share of the work then they will be put in a troop den. They will camp with the adults. For this campout the adults are going to eat something special. Breakfast is hard boiled eggs and a slice of cheese. Lunch is split pea soup and white bread. Dinner is canned spam and white rice. Hopefully you'll never get to dinner. Oh, and the cub scouts will be washing all the dishes. The cub scouts will also be working on advancement. That's the bad cop stuff. Find a good cop that tries to encourage encourage this scout. Show him how to have fun while washing dishes. Talk to him about what happens when nobody wants to do their part. Tell him all the adults really want to see him succeed and move back to his patrol. Hopefully, when he does, congratulations from all the adults is in order. As far as grandpa is concerned, that's something the SM has to deal with. Grandpa needs to learn about how scouts is done in your troop. I hate to say this but when the parents aren't in the picture then maybe grandpa is part of the problem? Sounds like a guy with a heart of gold that has trouble setting boundaries. Just a hunch, though, I don't know the whole story. Either way, someone has to talk to him and you're not that someone.

Our CO made a new requirement that any adult that does any event with us that requires a permission slip (just about everything but meetings) has to have a background check. They pay for it. It's easy to do. That's how you keep the CO's comfortable.

Those that make a big deal of refusing to say God in the pledge of allegiance bother me as much as those that say I'm going to burn in hell for not accepting Jesus. I like my spirituality, my religion, my sitting on a rock and just soaking up the beauty of the outdoors. And I also believe it has made me a better person. So I think it is important and yet it has to be done right. What is it about religion that encourages better character? For me it's time spent praying/thinking/discussing what the best of mankind can be. I have no idea why but when I spend the time doing this it just makes everything better and calmer, makes me more empathetic and wanting to help others, makes me think about situations I'd rather not. This, more than anything else, encourages me to be a better person. I think of character as a muscle group and the term use it or lose it applies. Training is important and we have to put time into it. I see the person that meditates daily as being more empathetic than the person that goes to religious services twice a year and calls it good. So rather than ask what is your duty to God I'd rather ask how do you practice and train your character. Yearly? Weekly? Daily? Reps and sets? We can't really tell a scout he's doing it wrong but with all the other points of the scout law it's simple enough to prove to a scout that he can improve. The other day I saw something on the internet about a "dopamine fast:" For one day, no food, no work, no entertainment, no hard exercise, but you could write and think about your life. The guy that wrote this and all the comments sounded like he had invented the greatest thing since sliced bread, but this is surprisingly close to what Yom Kippur is. Take out the no food part and it's surprisingly close to the Sabbath. I suspect this guy has no religious beliefs, based on some crudity in his descriptions. But he independently found what people have known for a long time, character takes time.

We've tried high adventure as bait and it didn't do what we'd hoped for. Another thing I have noticed is scouts that don't have a couple of good scouting friends by the time they're 14 won't last. And those friendships take time to develop. I don't think the scouts are so much against the OA as they just don't see making friendships. Walking into a new group of scouts when you have friends in your troop that you're used to is a hard sell. My guess is that when the OA was highly respected a scout would just suck it up and make it work. Then the friendships had time to develop. I have no idea how to raise the level of respect for scouts in the OA. My troop is brutally honest about who they elect. The scouts that are elected do have the best character. It is not a social thing at all. But once they're elected, something is missing.

Just a thought, but does part of the demise of the OA have to do with poor leadership skills of the scouts? I look at my local chapter's OA and the scouts that show up are good scouts, but they're all shy, timid, not ready to take charge. If they had confidence in how to get things done there are adults that would like to help them out. Instead they're kind of waiting for someone to tell them what to do. The result is any other scout that comes to check it out doesn't really see a reason to stick around. Would leadership development within OA help?

If your treasurer is any good it's possible to have multiple accounts under the same bank account. A troop should likely have multiple accounts anyway so adding another set for a different troop shouldn't be too hard. We have an account for HA, summer camp, gear, etc. It ties to our budget.

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."

Our story: We have some girls and parents that will bridge to scouts in a year. Some of the moms really do a lot of outdoor activities. We were worried about a split troop until we heard that last part. We have time but the current thinking is essentially EDGE for the parents and the scouts. A temp SM/ASM's with an expiration date while the moms get up to speed and take over. We'll teach them our program. Shared gear and committee. Separate PLC, separate calendar, with the hope that weekends mostly line up. If we go to the same area there's no reason the two troops have to do the same thing. If the girls want to canoe and the boys want to backpack, so be it. I'm hoping this encourages the boys to understand that their patrols can do different things on a campout.

Unless they owe you or you work at national I don't think this will change anything. This is about restructuring debt, which is code for owing less. I doubt national actually owes much they could sell, otherwise they would have already sold it. Restructuring the leadership at the top might be a good thing, though. But I don't know who would do that. We should volunteer!

Kind of a long shot, but if the boat is mostly used for personal use, then figure out the ratio and say it's fair for those that used it for their own use to pay that share of the $4000. How many scouts are in this troop and how much does the troop have in the bank? ($4k is huge for any troops I know of.) Also, what percentage of the families are upset about this?

I was worried about that, as was our troop when asked about starting a girls troop. In fact, there are a number of moms of web 1's that do a lot of outdoor stuff and are very interested. They're all younger moms, though. (When I meet parents in their 30's it really makes me feel old.) Anyway, I said I'd help start the troop assuming that there would be a mom taking over as SM after a year and wanted to do the outdoor program. We have a half year or so to figure things out. I think it will help the patrol method and I can't think of a better way to illustrate different patrols doing different things then having different SM and SPL as well as patrols with different calendars. They might drive to the campsite together (or to different campsites) but they'll be doing different activities.

If you're clever you can also creates something like http://boys.troop123.org and http://girls.troop123.org assuming you now have http://www.troop123.org.

Welcome to the forum, @epiieq1. You just made two great decisions. First, you're helping out your son's den. Second, you're asking for ideas. I haven't been a den leader for a very long time but I would say, go to round tables (monthly district meetings of scouters) and get training for being a den leader. I never did these things and that was a mistake. One more thing, stick around the forum!

Oh my! Welcome to the forum. The two best days of owning a boat: The first and the last. That's likely your best option. I don't think you have much claim to that money. It's a sunk cost that's best forgotten. One thing you might do is set up individual scout accounts, make sure there's a policy that says if you change troops you can take your money to the new troop, and then leave. Not sure what the odds of that working are, though.

In Judaism there are many terms for God (which is also not a proper name). Lord is just one of them. Father, King, Adonai, Elohim, Elohai, Adon Olam, Hashem, .....I don't know how many there are. Also, Adon is Hebrew for Lord, Adoni is my Lord, and Adonai is literally translated as my Lords. If you're getting confused as to why the plural of God is used then good for you. However, it's treated as God. There's a famous prayer/song that uses the words Avinu Malkeinu, which translates to Our Father, Our King. Two words, same God, but different views. Father is someone that looks out for their children while a King just makes decisions and, in this case, some people live and some don't. It's an intentional paradox. But to get back to your intent, the use of Lord does not bother me at all because I use it all the time. However, since you asked, let me try to politely explain what does bother me. It's the phrase "in your/his name" at the end of a scout prayer. I only hear something similar at Christian services and my understanding is it's similar to saying amen. So, when I hear it at scouts it sounds as if someone wants to end their prayer as they usually do but figure if they just drop the word Jesus then it will sound right to everyone else. To me, it doesn't.

Welcome to the forum. To answer your question, a position of responsibility for one rank has to start after the completion of the previous rank. So, if after 4 months as being Den Chief a scout becomes Star and keeps on as Den Chief for another 6 months, then yes, it does count. If, however, the First Class scout does a year as Den Chief, waits some more, and then becomes Star, he would need to do 6 more months in a POR.

The original question of this thread is whether there should be a forum on faith and chaplaincy, not what BP's intent was.

@Sablanck, but tomahawks can be used (with the correct certification.) It's still a sharp object that you can throw.

Humility always bites me in the butt when least expected. A long time ago I read a book about some famous Buddhist and he talked about beginner's mind, where one is both unsure and willing to jump in and try. This was in contrast to those that had been around for a long time and knew all the answers. It just seems to apply to this thread.

Is the quality of a camporee any different than the quality of a troop? Doesn't it depend on how it's run? I'm the district camping chair and the key seems to be to keep mixing it up. It also has to be relatively inexpensive and work with 200+ scouts. This is a lot harder than figuring it out once and then getting into a rut. All of the bad stories that have been mentioned seem to stem from people looking for a quick easy plan, and that means doing what has already been done before. Advancement is super easy to plan. But doesn't every single troop have the same problem? It takes imagination to come up with a new program and that's a fine balance between crazy and diving down into the details to guess how it will play out. There's a lot of massaging required to take an off the wall idea and make it work for hundreds of people. To be honest I don't see many people, scouts or adults, that are willing to take the time to come up with fun ideas. There are some and when I find someone that wants to run with an idea I give them whatever they want. But the vast majority of people want easy, simple, and what's been done before. Back in 2002 we had the OA running camporees and it was horrible. It was the worst type of advancement possible because the scouts were running it and that's all they knew. After that someone from my troop said he could make it more fun and he just took over. Things got much better. There is never advancement just for the sake of advancement. There are always events that involve outdoor skills. And yet, at one point a few years ago while I was SM I asked my troop and they said they weren't interested because "they just sat waiting around to do the next 10 minute event." A year ago I volunteered to run the camporees and I made a few changes. First of all I started asking scouts for ideas (this is where zombies came from). Next, I made sure we had enough throughput to handle all the patrols so there are no lines. It's simple math but it took some time to get it across to people. Next I added patrol vs patrol competition. I also push for events that last between a half hour and an hour. The schedule is also flexible. While all the scouts participate in the morning, in the afternoon some would rather hang out at their campsites and some want to do every last event. It's up to them. We also put the patrol competition as the last event, around 3pm. It tends to tie the day up nicely. The scouts also get super into the competitions. I don't think they'd like to do it all day but an hour seems to work well. Lots of intensity. Next fall we're going to have a cardboard canoe event. I'd like to figure out how to do a simulated disaster with a steam punk theme (UFO crash site, old West, semaphore for communication). Another idea is create a framework and ask for troops to take on creating an event based on certain criteria. I just want to force some scouts to see that imagination can be fun. It also takes imagination to solve problems, so it's a good skill to have. It's also really fun when it works and I see a bunch of scouts and adults having fun.