meschen

You didn't indicate which Council your son was in. In Pacific Skyline Council, the appropriate procedure is to have your Scoutmaster (SM) request the names of the merit badge counselors from the Council office for the badge your son is interested in. Each District maintains its own list. That list is not to be distributed to anyone except the SM, and is not available to the public.

1. Eagle badge. 2. SPL badge. 3. 1983 Jamboree. 4. Wilderness survival MB. I'm now in my third year of four as a Cubmaster. When all is said and done, think I'll be able to add the CM knot I have recently picked-up to that list.

Who isn't familiar with this old quote? I can't say as ever I was lost, but I was bewildered once for three days. Daniel Boone

I like your idea Eagle Island idea. I'll love to have any information on how you ran that program.

I'm real curious what the retention rates are for boys based on when they joined - as 2nd graders, 1st graders vs. Kindergardeners. I don't think in the long run Lions will be a good thing - we're going to burn out too many boys in Webelos before we can get them into a Troop if they are in a Pack for 6 years.

I try and remember that Cub Scouts is a family program. Pack activities are planned to be age appropriate (i.e. entertaining for 1st - 5th graders) Any sibling, regardless of whether they are brothers or sisters, are encouraged to participate in those Pack activities so long as it is age appropriate. While uniforms advancement and recognized BSA awards are strictly for the registered Scouts, "participant" recognition such as temporary patches for completing hikes, attending overnighters and participating in community service projects are awarded to everyone.

Don't make the mistake I made and cut the ropes too short. I followed the instructions someone gave me and cut them into 2 foot lengths. I really should have made them 4 feet long so the scouts could tie a decent bowline.

On my son's first campout with his Troop last year, my son decided that the no food in tent rule wasn't really a big deal. He had trail mix and candy stashed somewhere in his tent. A squirrel ate its way through a corner of a troop tent and found the stash. When he got home at the end of the week, my son complained about the fact that he had picked-up the nickname "Squirrel Boy" as a result. I told him he was luck his nickname wasn't "Bear Boy". I just kind of hope he's learned a leason.

Unless Dad is cutting the hull in two and building a catamaran, the RGR isn't nearly as depend on quality construction as the PWD is. The most important thing to remember to the glue the sail in place so that it doesn't spin around when the Scout blows on it. Best advice I can give is to fil up the tub at home beforehand and have the Scout practice a little in advance. Otherwise, just follow the directions in teh kit and have agood time.

One thing I haven't seen listed: A good hammock!

Custom unit number patches are available with both the two or three digit troop number and the gold veteran's bar included on a single patch. Its a special order item, but I've never been able to find information about it on the Web. I know I can get them at my local scout store. I'd suggest you check with your council store for more info.

I was presented with a similar question related to the "other" cub scout awards. For the outdoor activity badge, a Bear is required to earn his Leave No Trace award, which requires a service project. Can that service project also be used to meet requirement 5 or 6 of the Outdoor Activity Awards?

Local cleaners was charging $2 / patch until recently. Word got arround, drove up the business, and they raised the price to $5 each. Needless to say, they're not getting any more business.

"We have two new unit positions coming out in September, Parent Coordinator ,PC, and Parent ,PA. The PC is a fee position, the PA will be similar to the Tiger Cub Parent registration and is free. The PC is going to be a required position and a member of the units committee. This is a part of the National Parent Initiative, see http://www.scoutparents.org" What type of units will require a PC? Only Troops? Or will all units including Packs be required to field one also? (This message has been edited by meschen)

Actually, we are not looking to incorporate ourselves. We will be filing as an association. Regardless of this fact, all charities in CA are required to register with the state in California. (Familarize yourself with http://ag.ca.gov/charities/faq.php#registration) While article of incorporation are not required, bylaws are required to register, or we could lose our tax exempt status. Until this year the state had no way to track you down, but expect that change. Before this year CO's didn't need to file with the IRS (assuming your CO made less than $5k / year in revenue, but beginnin

We're doing an initial filing with the state for a long standing CO. They want $25 and a set of bylaws for us to be "official". By including the bylaws, we'll be filing as an "association", which is a (significant) step short of filing for incorporation.

I am looking for a sample set of bylaws for a "Parents of ....." chartering orgnization. Has anyone ever seen such a thing?

I can't speak to CA state regulation, but I dissagree with packsaddle that for or charting organizations it is difficult to attain 501©(3) status. As outlined on pages 18 and 19 of IRS Publication 557, if your chartering organization (including a "Parents of . . . " entity) has annual cash receipts of under $5,000 and only participates in charitable activities (running a Pack qualifies as such) then it automatically qualifies as a tax-exempt organization. Based on the guidance in Pub. 557, the parent's organization is not required to obtain an IRS determination letter to achieve tax-ex

My Son's Troop does their fundraiser the first week in July. Not Popcorn, but sales were well below normal this year. The economy was certainly a primary factor. Our Pack has already planned to increase the number of PC show-and-sells this year from two to five becuase of concerns over the the economy. If things go badly at the first show-and-sell we'll need to do even more. We're also unhappy happy that the price of the best selling item was increased from $9 to $10. That extra buck often found its way into the donation tin when we were told to keep the change. Now, we won't get tha

For our Pack, it is done at the last Den meeting before our "bridging / advancement" Pack meeting where the Bears are promoted to Webelos. This year we handed out Den patches to the boys at that meeting. The only rule we have is that the boys can't use Tigers, Wolves, Bears or whatever the two Webelos Dens ahead of them used.

I am a strong believer in consistancy in meeting schedules. The official program of rotating meeting locations is weak in that regard. I think you are on the right track here. Plan you meeting location adn date at the start of the year so everyone knows when they take place. Just don't overload a location with to many boys. Also, don't go with a one meeting a month schedule. If you do, when a family misses a Den meeting, they'll be two whole months between meetings, feel like they're "out of it" and be much more likely to drop. Lastley, plan your Go-See-Its together. Its too much work to

File this under "whatever you do, you can't win" I sent out two e-mails about a week apart reminding everyone in the pack of an upcomming pack event. After the second e-mail, one parent complained that I was spaming them. After the event, another parent compained they were never informed of the event. And yes, they were on the distribution list. As for the original post: I have a very clear statement in our pack parent's handbook that our primary method of communication is e-mail. I reinforce this when I meet new parents. Maintenance of the pack e-mail list is cruicial. After that,

eisely, Here is the link to Marin Council's summer camp: http://www.marinsierra.org/ Tamarancho is primarily a Cub Scout / Weekend fascility. They don't offer a weeklong Boy Scout summer program. Yes, the San Francisco Bay lies between Marin and the the larger San Francisco Bay Area Council (SFBAC). But let me point out that the SFBAC aready spans the Bay, as it covers both San Francisco and much of the East Bay. So, I think its safe to say that geograpghy is not whats keeping Marin apart from the SFBAC.

ScoutNut wrote "If you read thru the Cub Scout Leader Book, it specifically states that if a boy has not earned his rank award by the end of school, he may take some extra time to work on it if he wishes. The only stipulation is that he can only work in ONE program at a time, so he can not do any work in his new handbook, until he has finished with his old one. Also, this extension is for the RANK AWARD ONLY, not electives, or other level specific awards." ScoutNut, I just took a (very) quick look at the Leader Book and didn't spot this. What section is this in? I would love to make this

John-In-KC, I'd say those instructions are definitely not "pretty darn clear". It doesn't really provide clear guidance on classifying a boy during the summer when he has completed one grade but hasn't yet started the next. This is further complicated by the fact that our council does not accept rank advancement after May 31, so there is technically a two week window at the start of June where the boys aren't allowed to work on any advancement for example, boys who are still second graders until June 15 can't do Bear work yet since theyre still Wolves, but the ship has sailed on workin