Momleader

Sorry Sydney - you weren’t a registered Scout prior to completing the work and ‘earning’ the badges.   How are you any different from a friend or little brother who tags along but never joins - they don’t automatically get The rank & patches. 

 You wanted to have an equal opportunity, worked for it, and things got changed - here you go now you’re equal in the eyes of Scouts BSA. 

You do get the extension and you should have an easier time cranking through the eagle required MBs and getting your eagle paperwork done as you advance from Scout to Life Rank you’ll just have to be determined and focused on not missing deadlines just like any young man that joins at 16 years old and hears the message from guidance counselors in school or college essay coaches “Eagle Scout looks good on college apps”. And those young men exist.  

Don’t try to cheat the system - you worked to change it and succeeded. When you try to game the system for your own reward, you could look spoiled.  Work to earn the Eagle Rank - but follow the rules while earning it. 

Our Pack has their first girl join last week. 

Her dad is her younger brother’s leader. We currently have no ladies as leaders besides me.   The dad is a single dad too. Can he Lone Scout her through since dens need to be single gender?

Sorry, my internet of saying to let aethists and Jehovah witnesses join scouts wasn’t to group them as the same. I know they are vastly different in their beliiefs. Just put them in the same sentance because they are both groups of people that don’t usually have their children join Scouting one because of the Duty to God and the other (as told to me by a JW - it’s the pledge of  allegiance more than anything) which honestly I thought was odd since that persons husband was also a member of that church and active career military at the time. But what ever career they chose thats Their business  

there are lots of very good people that are atheists and agnostics but it might be difficult for a youngster to understand what duty to god means if they don’t believe in a higher power  especially at the very young cub age  

Gimme a break!  All this PC stuff is getting to be too much. We are all being told to focus on the hot news byte of the week, atheism, Christmas songs & tv specials....

whatever. Let the atheists and jehovah witnesses join - but remember part of being reverent is being tolerant and not judging how and what others believe. And that goes for ALL  - that means NO religion/lack of religion bashing as it would be unkind and discourteous. 

Betwteen this and the WSJ article and fallout, no communication has come from our council other than a regurgitation of CSE’s message. It’s been a rough week answering parent questions about the news. 

I’m sure this family is in turmoil.

As frustrated as you are, this is still a child. Please remember that part about “ A Scout helps other people at all times. “ - it applies to us adults too. Maybe this young man needs someone to give a damn to be sure he can get back on track to “keep himself physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight”. An ounce of kindness can go a long way. Kids don’t get involved deeply with drugs because everything else in their life is hunky dory. It usually starts out as something to try and then mushrooms or spirals into something more difficult to get out of - add in any other issues (educational/psychological) or familial problem.   Kids can be hurting in so many ways adults don’t always see. Just like the Charlie Brown Christmas Tree - maybe he just needs a little love. Remember kindness. 

In recharter hell today. And got notification our council program fees will increase next year (rumor says another $10). If the rumor is true  It will actually cost more than national’s fees. Welcome to the new math. 

Thanks for asking. We showed up. There wasn’t room for the derby track so it stayed in the car.   Basically the folks who set it up asked us when we got there to make sure kids weren’t running around like crazy (their parents were there) and stayed in the program area of the gym not roaming the halls. So they wanted security. It was a flop as a recruiting opportunity. The high school club sent kids to work an activity table. 

Thanks!!!!  We are going to bring a section of track and legos to build derby cars with. 

A giant checkers set (painted blue and gold) and some cub word searches 

and I have a box full of old boys life magazines that were headed to the library sale (when you have 2 boys in at one time you always get 2 BL - glad I saved them)

You first 2 sentences are your answer. In his old pack. And now they are part of your ‘newto them’ Pack.   This is a lot of grief over a toy/prize that might not be worth the $$ amount difference. 

I swear sometimes parents get wrapped up about the smallest things.  

I would love to see a story about how a pack or troop takes all the prizes earned from popcorn and donates them to a children’s hospital toy cupboard or to the local social services toy drive at the holidays. Purposely selling to benefit their pack/troop and give joy to another child in the meantime. 

We have one parent that has been difficult to say the least.  All of a sudden they want their child to bridge up because they don't want them to be a part of our pack and they want it done by the end of the year.  They want to move on to a troop (that their other boys are in) because they do not like our troop or pack, apparently they do not like what we are doing.

You do what you can for the biggest number that will benefit - some folks are never happy with anything.  It’s a shame they waited until now to voice their displeasure  have they offered to help make it how they think it should be?

We had a Webelos who’s parents wanted him fast tracked to be able to hang with the AOL boys since he likes them better.  Apparently boy has done Most of the Webelos requirements on his own over the summer. Father was adamant this happen for his son. Even though the kiddo is just in 4th grade and young for grade. “Very advanced. academically” in dads words. 

After much consideration and talking with the 2 den leaders who would be working with this boy - we talked to the dad and showed them the timelines involved for rank. And said we would like him to stay with the age group that corresponds to his grade and since both groups meet concurrently we thought it would be best. Dad disagreed strongly so the Dad was also offered that I as CC would talk to other area packs to see if they would fast track son so that he could advance to a Boy Scout troop at the end of 4th grade with the boys moving from 5th to 6th.   I gave him contact info for all the packs too. The dad agreed and NO pack in our area would touch this idea with a stick - they were using the timeline as their argument. 

The key is to let them see you’re trying to work with the parent to solve their problem. Because it’s probably more the parents issue and not the child’s.  Some things just can’t be fixed or the solution they want to happen.  

Ours didnt come back, after being told NO by 2 other packs stating the organization doesn’t accommodate a very advanced child.  Next step would have been to suggest they talk to the Scouting with special needs people to see if they could help their child get the accommodation the parents desired but it didn’t get that far. 

The local PTA phas asked for help at an event. Basically offering activities for siblings who don’t want to participate at the event but were brought because the parents brought them with the kids who did want to participate.   

They suggested having a story time & craft available. The leaders and I were thinking something more Scout like but without giving away our program. 

Anyone have any ideas?  What about picking some elective adventure activities that works well across rack ages and doing that?  

They balked at us bringing our banner/table cloth but said it would be ok for us to have leaders and Den Chiefs in uniform but absolutely NO passing out paperwork. (I have super basic business cards made already if parents ask how to get more info - it’s basically a QR code to our website and the logo). 

We like the idea of helping the community - even if they have restrictions we pushed back on, like the uniforms issue. Explained to them it’s important for us as we wear uniforms on community service projects (field and activity uniforms depending on service type)

anyone have any fun fast ideas?  Of course it’s our ideal target age range too. We won’t have use of the Gym just a corner of the multipurpose room where the main event is happening. 

Our troop has everyone invited to help. Not everyone can make it. Also, when a Life Scout is planning his project he is reminded that there can be plenty of work for all. Even the youngest members, who are always eager to help and part of leadership is inclusiveness and still helping others to learn. Not to mention the lessons learned by leading those not in your immediate age group of peers. 

Sometimes the adult leaders/helpful parents are the hardest to lead🤣

Our pack divides the cost of adult leaders out amongst the Cubs. Never an issue until year before last - one family felt it was unfair for everyone to pay for the adults.   They were confused and thought the parent volunteer/DL and their Cub were free. When it’s just the leader. Every kid pays. 

That same family also felt there should be a family discount (we told them they didn’t need to get 2 BL subscriptions) but national & council fees and insurance fees are per person and we didn’t have the funds to offer that much of a discount but had recycled uniforms if that would help at all.  

They didn’t return last year - the new pack they joined called and asked if we gave them a 2 for 1 price since they wanted one there. (Guess they didn’t know it’s a small community of volunteers)

When I was helping eagles thru the process with my sons’ troop I suggested that they include printed copies of all the go-fund-me reports or screen shots for their Eagle Scout books if they were ever asked for it.  The scouts weren’t told they couldn’t use GFM as a method to raise money. 

Hope you find a new troop. There is no such creature as a Webelos III

On 10/26/2018 at 5:33 PM, MattR said:

@Momleader, I suspect you can safely ignore this. Here's another DE story just to amuse you. I'm the district camping chair. We made reservations for our winter campout and have, since the 70's, always looked for the coldest, snowiest place we could find. Yesterday our DE said our reservation was cancelled and we had to do it at the council camp, where it has never been. I made a few phone calls today. Turns out the council is broke, has not paid last year's bill, and is just trying to stiff these people, the neighboring council. We're going to ignore the DE and have all troops write checks to a 3rd party that we can trust to make the payments. There are several companies that won't do business with our council anymore.  If anyone in the council complains we'll open up the books, so to speak. 

As I said, just ignore them. You're providing a great program for your pack. Keep up the good work. 

I would be sooo steamed if our DE tried that. They used to tell us we had to camp at council camp which is 63 minutes away from our charter org/meeting location. Oh and to cabin camp it was $100 for the weekend. Our pack can’t afford that nor do the parents want to drive 63 minutes (more in Friday night traffic). So, we camp in the state forest youth camping sites $40/2 nights.  And we try to do camp-in at museums or aquariums - we’ve gone out of council. Our council has to add their administrative upcharge and it’s making some events too expensive. 

I’m so frustrated I could spit!  I’m Pack Committee Chair (have been with the pack for  12 years and done all but cubmaster Job) 

I took up new leader applications to the council complete with YTP certificates. Then I get a call that one dad cannot be a den leader of the dens his sons are in. Because - there needs to be a different den leader for each den on the recharter!  I’m like “wth?  He has a lion son and a tiger son wants to be involved with each equally and is willing to run meetings for each den.”  DE tells me it’s about the overall number of adults to kids ratio!  

Has anyone ever heard of something like this?  This guy is more than a warm body - he’s an ultra-involved parent!  

When asked why someone can be cubmaster and den leader without issue there was no answer.  

Why would they be trying to make this harder on people? Or is it that they only get 1 adult registration fee per person rather than fees per job?

We have 2 girls who want to join the pack as Arrow of Light scouts and are upset there isn’t a Girl Troop set up for them to join in town. (We struggle to get parents to be leaders for the all Boy Troop as it is).  

The parents of the girls feel it isn’t fair that a plan hasn’t been made to create a girl Troop yet 🤦‍♀️  Can’t even imagine what February will be like. 

Oh sorry. I didn’t mean to offend. In our part of the country that’s the acronym used at my kids school. That way they aren’t saying 504/IEP accommodations since all those kiddos (mine included fall under that department)

i do still I’ll stand by the statement that the volunteers do the best they can with the training/experiences they have though - and for a council to expect them to deliver the same services a school might without providing assistance or resources isn’t good for the scout who needs assistance or for the troop who needs support in the giving of that assistance. 

Is there another trusted adult that can attest to your beliefs in something greater than yourself?  Reverence also includes respect for other folks beliefs as well - are you tolerant of others religious views even if they don’t match your belief system?  

This is where councils should be offering more support to leaders who are in the trenches. 

Our leaders in my district have been told to  “ do like the schools and follow the SPED accommodations”. However they don’t give any resources and what they forget is a lot of (volunteer)leaders don’t naturally have that kind of work experience in that area.   Would it be detrimental for you or the dad to become involved with the troop so if they run into a problem you can help both your scout and the leaders through it?

Does your council have a scouting with special needs person who could maybe be an ally with resources to the leaders in your son’s troop?  That way everyone could learn to work together for the benefit of the boy and any others thy have challenges in the future?

I’ve seen stuff in the past about this and now can’t find it.

we are super small - who has a great resource for multi-Rank den meetings?  Ones where say lions & tigers could work on similar enough material to cover for a activity loop  

also need stuff for a combo wolf/bear den. 

Thankfully the Webelos/arrow of light guys sorted it out already. 

Our ur biggest issue is we have a lion leader with 2 lions and only 2 tigers (1 boy and 1 girl) and no tiger parent will be the leader. 

I asked our DE and he responded with “you’ll need to recruit more kids”. Ummm yea, like we haven’t been trying that?  School has sharply declining enrollment. 

What do you all have????

I’m getting too old for this (my own eagles are aged out). But we try to help keep the program going on our town. 

Got a request that we fast track a Webelos.   Scout is a young 4th grade student with a late summer birthday. Dad says he doesn’t feel close to the kids in the den. Wants to hang out with the kids in the arrow of light den. (They’ll Meet concurrently - on separate side of the room after opening - to ensure 2 Deep we are that small).   Dad thinks son is much more mature and academically advanced and started reading thru the Webelos/AOL requirements feels son can complete with the AOL den and cross over. 

My concerns are:

son wont be 11 by cross over and will not have completed the 5th grade.   And it sends a bad message to the others in the den.  Could this derail a potential eagle application down the road?  

Mare we on the Committee going to be harsh if we say - stay with your age group it’s set up like that for a reason?  

We had Joining night (not one girl came or joined). and some of the leaders heard it too expensive from a few families and they didn’t join. 

Makes us wonder are we all that expensive?  

We are In New England and it costs the pack $69 per Scout/leader to recharger before any pack dues are paid or boys life ordered. I’ve gotten good at asking area businesses for help and for asking/begging parents to participate in fundraisers - but they refused to sell popcorn for the last few years  (cited quality wasn’t worth the cost).  The nearby elks already sponsors a pack and a troop, the Lions club is small here, school PTOs won’t help because Cub scouts wasn’t always as includive as they have been the last couple years. Plus when the high school band started selling pre-popped fun flavored popcorn it killed our market.  We are really stuck for ideas.  This area is pretty much saturated with school fundraisers too, which aren’t always successful  

For the $69 we pay at recharger this is how it breaks down:

24 to National + 16 for the insurance + 29 as our council’s  activity fee (FOS substitute every Scout must pay)  we charge $11 for the pack dues for the year because honestly the market won’t bear more but we have to buy rank patches and belt loops at least. So we are asking parents to pay $80/Scout per year  when it costs about $125 actually.  When national and our council raised their rates last time in the same year after we held Joining Night - we were stuck.  

how are your packs charging?  What part of the country are you in?  Are parents balking?    We are shrinking at an alarming pace. And all the leaders are busting their rears to deliver a fun, inclusive and safe program.