BadenP

Using the Red Cross for first aid is a great idea our crew has 2 adults who are Red Cross instructors, and an MD who also has specialized certification in wilderness survival medicine so we are set. The youth get basic training indoors and then practical advanced application training on outdoor excursions. It really is too bad that the BSA has lost support of the military since our local Air Force Base hospital personnel used to love putting on emergency first aid training for our scouts, using very realistic looking moulage wounds with squirting fake blood and boken bones. The AF hospit

qwasze No conspiracy on my part friend but an evaluation of the GROSS INCOMPETENCE that has permeated the halls of National for at least the last two or more decades. If scouting is dying it is because of National dumbing down ALL scouting programs and the new leaders in the field that buy into that vision from severely watered down training from Basic through the new WB21C, and your value to the BSA is now measured solely on your financial support instead of mastering skills you can pass down to your youth. If the BSA was a regular corporation, instead of relying on extorting funds

Brew It is not scouting that is doomed it the the heads at National without any vision or sense of direction that are undermining it by taking it further and further away from its original concept and purpose. It is time for Wayne Brock and his entire National staff, and the National executive Board to be sent packing for good. Scouting works the best when it is administered on a local/regional level, instead of a bunch of disinterested, business failures who only care about their obscenely large salaries and pensions.

It is not just the Methodists who will be pulling their charters when all these CO's find out just how much their potential risk truly could be sponsoring one or several scout units. Service clubs, lodges, businesses, churches, etc., will all be taking a real hard look at their next charter and will have to make a decision on the question Is it really worth the risk financially, or alienating members of their organization? The sad part is that National is doing absolutely nothing in trying to answer CO's questions or putting their minds at ease. I guess we have some idea why Mazzucca was ver

As I have said before National does not even understand what Venturing is supposed to be all about, and has done a lousy job deseminating the program to those in the field with poorly written manuals and horrific training syllabi. Our crew is now up to 80 very active youth and is showing no sign of slowing down or fading away. Our current Advisor and many of the Asst Advisors were members of our original crew of 1999. Our council has been graced with a good assortment of venturing crews all with solid programs, and we all work together to support and train each others adult and youth leaders w

WCS The awards I mentioned in my last post have always been awarded at every annual district dinner and at every council, five total, I have ever been affiliated with. Yes they are commonly given to recognize district leaders contributions, are they official, as far as the districts are concerned they are but they are not council or National awards. As Nike's theme says "JUST DO IT!"

WCS District Award Dinners also include SM, CM, WL, DL, Advisor, Pack, Troop, Crew of the Year Awards, awards for committee members and others.

Eagle92 Aren't you a former DE like myself? Then you should know NEVER give the DE any registration forms, except as a desperate last resort. They seem to misplace paperwork if it is not part of meeting their goals. Your DE will probably blame the council registrar. Thats why I always walk all our crews paperwork into the council office and hand it directly to the registrar, as well as keep a copy for our records, just in case. Good Luck on this one!

OGE is correct almost all the customs we associate with Christmas come from pre Christian Pagan tribes. If you are a devout Christian and study scripture you would know Jesus was not born Dec 25th or even close and the "wise men" did not even see Jesus until after he was well over a year old. The point is when you mix the sacred with the profane you do not create a "holy day", Christmas celebrates the winter solstice alone and the fact that the early church adopted and changed it to convert these so called pagan tribes to Christianity does not automatically change its origins or make it h

Beaver How about Baden Powells book Scouting for Boys, you could show him how exciting and outdoor oriented boy scouts used to be.

Pere If parents have to show/prove their authority over their children by beating them then they really are not very good parents to start with. Your own Catholic religion teaches violence is never the answer especially in dealing with your children, and hitting, beating or slapping your children around is doing them violence, morally, spiritually, or legally. Showing parental authority NEVER justifies violence to children in any form.

Beav BSA losses are currently decreasing at an ever increasing rate each year, especially in troops and boy scouts, and if something isn't done and done soon the BSA will become like Twinkies and Hostess Cupcakes, a fond relic of bygone days. The BSA is trying to reinvent the program to conform it to what they view as current societal norms because they think thats what the kids today want, and nothing is further from the truth. Pretty soon it will just be us old timers talking about an organization that just faded away called the Boy Scouts of America and arguing about what happene

Beavah and dessertrat pretty much said it all in a nice neat package. Our scouts are so overly protected the current BSA program turns them into a bunch of mommas boys, afraid of the outdoors, trying something out of their comfort zone, has turned the program into a classroom oriented instead of an outdoor oriented one, constant book and paperwork. Then leaders get upset when the boys tell them they are not having any fun and drop out, and the frustrated leaders soon follow suit. In my experience as a leader for 25 years and a scouting professional for 5 years IMHO the main problem lies mainly

F Scouter Maybe now you can finally understand the point, if you do not like my views then Beavah,Joe Bob, and desertrat have all done excellent jobs articulating in great detail the same points we have all been discussing and which you seem to have a problem either understanding or are in plain denial as the reality of scouting today.

SP The problem with F-Scouters view is that more and more troops are doing less and less outdoor activities which is becoming more the norm than the exception,and the deemphasis and dumbing down of the "official" outdoor requirements just reinforces the problem. The boy scout program sadly has become more sedentary in nature in many troops in my council, and in many others as well according to my scouter friends in other councils.

F-scouter No coverup or conspiracy at all, the government routinely decides on a daily basis what and how much information to release to the press and the public, and what is in the best interest of its citizens to know or not to know. It has always been that way from the beginning of the country. Homeland Security, FBI, CIA, DOD, etc., all keep top secret case files on events and people that we will never be privy to see and are not covered under the Freedom of Information Act.

Nancy This is just another example of how the National BSA has lost their way and has no logical reasoning behind this move. Maybe it is time for for Irving, Tx to start trimming all the deadwood that exsists with their current staffing, and put in some people with true vision about what the BSA is truly supposed to be. Instead lets get rid of all those pencil pushing desk jockeys there now with all their moronic ideas in a pathetic attempt to save their jobs.

Fscouter Once again you totally missed the salient points of Kudu's post and instead offer your usual irrelevant and inane off the issue reply.

Kudu Well Said! It is truly sad to have to witness the continuing deterioration of the BSA outdoor emphasis by National and the growing number of SM's and ASM's who have all but eliminated the outdoor experience in their troop programs.

OGE The truth is we will NEVER know the whole truth about what happened to JFK, certain government agencies have made sure of that. It is time to stop dwelling in the past with the many cornball conspiracy theories that have been offered and instead work towards making our country today the best it can be. Dwelling on these kind of things serve no real purpose and are counter productive.

Ntrog is correct in that the SM's have an obligation to give their boys repeated opportunities to apply their scoutcraft skills. With a greater deemphasis in many troops these days on the outdoor experience one and done has now become the norm instead of the exception. Which is why IMHO in too many troops these days this dumbed down-easy pass methodology has produced generations of scouts who really never master or even be competent at anything concerning the outdoors. Now with all the bad PR the BSA is going through, scouts who are not truly deserving of the rank they wear, a program being du

second class The only problem with your scenario is that you think there are SE's who really give a cr*p about the council, the camps, or the volunteers. The SE is there only to put their time in order to qualify to be promoted to a position at National, all of them are gunning to be the next CSE. Granted there are a very few who truly care about their council and its welfare but they are the exception rather than the rule. As someone said in another thread those scouting professionals who do really care generally don't last long in their climb to the top.

Beav I think you paint way too broad a stroke in your assessment. After being on both sides of the of this scenario I can tell you from personal experience that many FD's or DD's or ASE's really could care less about individual leader or unit problems themselves, they all have their own little niches of responsibility and the typical unit/leader problems are always delegated to the DE to solve, since they usually will not get involved. I have seen five SE's tell complaining volunteers to take it up with their DE. So unless the problem deeply affects the councils FOS/money income, is a se

When I was a DE twenty years ago we were required to meet with each COR or IH in our district at least once every year, I guess the times have changed. For me it was a great pleasure to meet with these people to answer their questions and encourage them to be involved with their units. It also helped in dealing with any major problems that might come up in a unit.

fred The troop or pack does not have the authority to and can NOT assign the COR, only the IH has that authority. The COR is indeed a registered member of the BSA and receives a membership card, as I do as COR/CC of our crew, while the IH is not. That seperation gives the IH the ability to quickly override or replace the COR should that ever become necessary.