BadenP

OGE The OA is irrelevant to this topic. Venturing is a COED organization and this is about fraternization between male and female members over 18, your scenario is totally unrelated.

SP Since there were many cases where the BSA council execs knew the person was a suspect or guilty of committing a violent criminal act on a minor or minors and did not turn it over to the authorities to investigate then they were violating the law, reporting rules become irrelevant. Instead they chose to keep these secret files which now they have been forced to make public and you just watch the fallout as a result. The Roman Catholic Church also thought they were above the law with priest pedophiles trying to deal with all the cases internally and we have all seen what a worldwide

emb021 Yes and we all know what kind of "experts" they are at National, lol. Venturing has had problems with acceptance and growth from the beginning mainly because it was poorly and hastily designed by a bunch of armchair scouters at National whose primary motivation was to create a coed older teen program without regards to the scenarios we Venturing leaders encounter on a regular basis. emb021, just because these two guys wrote this program doesn't at all mean they knew what they were doing, just like the cub scout soccer, and urban scouting programs from the past that came out of Nati

The reality is if the BSA had handled these cases quickly and tranparently instead of keeping secret files and not involving the proper authorities this would never had become an issue in the firstplace. Now it shows the BSA was inconsistent and violated the law by not reporting and turning these cases over to the proper authorities. The result is the BSA has lost the TRUST of many people, including parents of potential scouts. Only the passage of time is going to heal this mess, until then expect to see numbers continue to drop and the BSA lose even more support financially and from CO's.

emb021 I agree with you except for the dating part, because that is not specified in any literature, and outside of the crew activities is not even enforceable by the BSA or anyone else. I think your source was just putting his own interpretation into the mix. For some of the rest of you your own outdated and puritanical interpretations are really amusing to say the least.

pack I agree with your post 99.9%, except for the part "the BSA is not a cult". I think these days with many units, especially troops, getting smaller and volunteers becoming scarcer that is exactly what it has become for too many leaders. Whether it is from having an unfulfilling job or trying to recreate their childhood scouting experience, scouting has become an all about me, look at all my patches, awards, and WB beads aren't I special type of thing for many leaders.

This situation happened in my crew as well, however the adult leader was 21 and the fiance was 19. The Venturing rules are quite specific in this regard, no way no how, no matter how unrealistic they may be. So rather than having one leave and after a lengthy discussion they agreed to on crew outings not to share the same tent, and no PDA's in front of the crew. The next year they were married and she took off a year to have a baby. Now she is back and both are active as adult leaders. Personally the Venturer being considered a youth until 21 issue really needs to be re-examined by National.

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Woaplanne I just have to ask, did you do this because you thought it would make you a better scout leader and would help your troop program and the kids or was your motivation purely self centered to get a new dodad for your uniform so that you could show it off to others? Too many scout leaders these days are really in it MAINLY for their own interests alone and usually their program, their boys, and their unit suffers as a result. Unfortunately this also results in more kids dropping out of scouting each year.

This site is far from cleaned up, it is still full of viruses, it has in a word been masterfully hacked. I upgraded my antivirus/malware software to the max. I think the active user number is greatly exaggerated with only 3-4 active topics. This site needs some major work done so it is not a hazard to the users.

This issue comes up in here a whole lot, and it always seems to happen only at the EBOR, why do some leaders wait to question their boys. Why not at every BOR when the scout is asked about his scout spirit is he not also asked about his Duty to God? IMO this kind of negative publicity could be avoided if the troop leadership tackled this issue early on instead of saying nothing and allowing the boy to finish all the requirements for Eagle and then deny the award. Yes in this case the boy had a big mouth and challenged the EBOR but is the failure only with the scout, doesn't the leaders share p

These posts point out several common problems in troops and some good points. In a large troop it is not a bad idea to rotate the SM position among the ASM's every 2-3 years. This helps prevent burnout of a SM and it makes the ASM's more knowledgeable and efficent, just like in the patrol method. The problem is too many adult scouters once they become SM refuse to give it up, a power/control issue for most. If you look at the big picture though giving the ASM's the chance to take the reins with the support of the rest of them makes for a healthier/fresher program, develops a core of leadership

Hey SP My cub scout days were long ago but I really think you are underestimating your boys skills and desires. The fact you let the dads help with the car, as we both know, really means dad builds the car. I have seen it happen, the boy gets upset with dad and throws a tantrum or goes off by himself and daddy becomes the real racer. From my experience letting the boys do almost all the work invests them in the project and the PWD. As I said some of the ugliest cars these cubs have made themselves have wound up the winners, and that is what PWD is all about IMO. By the way that old pack o

Even with all the pros and cons the BSA has lost AP Hill forever so they really need to make the Summit work or it could be the end of the National Jamboree. There are going to definitely be some problems that will occur, hopefully minor, and hopefully National is better prepared since they will not have the Army backing them up anymore. I have been to three National Jambos, the last in 2010, and I agree they have become more of a circus sideshow than a showcase of what the scouts are all about, but I feel they serve a purpose of allowing the youth to experience scouting at a level way ab

SP Competition is really the heart of the fun in a PWD, if you neutralize that factor then the race becomes rather dull with no real motivation to succeed. In my old pack we had a seperate race for all the dads who wanted to build a car and the best part of that was they let the boys do the majority of the work on their own car, while dad concentrated on his. The result was the boys cars and races were much more equal and fair, and the dads races were much more cutthroat against each other and isolated from the boys races, a win win situation for the pack. Best part we had no more argumen

Outdoors I think you are being way too fatalistic over parents leaving because of the "gay" issue. The truth is that the numbers leaving over that particular issue alone is extremely small on a nationwide basis. People are not as out of touch as you seem to think, the news media covering pedophile cases in the BSA, and National's position with the issue has made sure of that. I think you really are tilting at windmills here. Realistically this is not even a make it or break it issue with the vast majority of scouting parents.

Yea Beav "Nutters" sums up that piece very well, including the site as well.

With Nationals new tool restrictions for cubs you gotta wonder if the PWD is just gonna become the best dad made cars, which in some packs it already is or has been for a long time now. If the boy can't even make his own car anymore from beginning to end then what really is the point? As a WDL, years back, I owned some old hand woodworking tools that the boys used to create some great looking and sometimes odd looking derby cars at our den meetings, but they were all so aerodynamic my boys always took first or second in their heats. The engineer dads were so confused when they looked at and e

To kind of answer ghermannos question, whoever is going to do this job in your troop a great resource would be the Trust Award Venturing handbook which gives a good synopsis of most of the major religions of the world, what does it mean to be religious, why study other religions, and respecting the religious beliefs of others, and provides resources and websites for more in depth study. I gave my copy to a newly appointed troop chaplain and she uses it as the foundation of her discussions with the scouts.

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This debate about kids leaving the BSA because of its discriminatory practices is really quite humorous and inaccurate. The reason most families leave a scouting unit is because the units program is very weak and the kids are not having any fun. The discriminatory excuse and sports excuses are really just smokescreens to the reality that too many scouting units are doing a lousy job with their programs, have lazy untrained leadership who give less than minimal effort to their position. If your unit is shrinking it is time for your leadership to get together and discern what you are doing wrong

SP Once again you jump to the wrong conclusion, our district is not wealthy at all and come from all walks of life from blue collar to college educated but we all pool our resources and talents to deliver an awesome program to our teens and a fun time for us adult leaders. Besides Seattle isn't exactly the Dust Bowl you know, lol.

BD I am quite surprised by your story, that whole incident is inexcuseable to say the least, and I am saying that as both a scout leader and a former DE. The scouting profession continues to get more and more callous and cutthroat, providing less and less services and facilities to their members and demanding more and more money each year in FOS, camp fees(if your council still even has a camp), and practically forcing units to sell their overpriced popcorn. The unfortunate results are more and more well trained leaders running excellent programs are leaving each year out of disgust

Latest news on the internet this morning "There will be NO bacon shortage." apparently the announcement by a British source was premature to say the least