NJCubScouter

For some reason, "Spriral Scouts" seems to still be using the word "Scouts" in its name. I do not know whether the BSA has ever taken (or threatened) legal action against them. I find that odd because the BSA seems to be pretty good at getting other groups not to use its trademarks, and not just "Scout" or "Scouting". I have a vague recollection of one of the newer groups using at least one of the BSA's rank names (maybe Tenderfoot) and the BSA apparently sent a letter and the group changed it pretty quickly. I do not remember which of the groups it was. I am pretty sure it was discussed in this forum and I did a search but cannot find it. I did find a discussion from 2008 about whether the BSA can prevent another group from using a words like tenderfoot, troop, wolf, bear etc. in the context of a youth organization, but nothing about a specific group doing so.

It does look strange, especially since it mentions employees and you are not an employee, and it is coming from a private company rather than BSA national or council. If it were me, I would call council and tell them about this.

Our pack meetings were actually pretty good, or maybe it would be more accurate to say they varied in quality and probably averaged out around "more than adequate." We tried to get the dens involved in doing skits at the pack meeting, with mixed success. We tried to have guest speakers and/or demonstrations at the pack meetings 3 or 4 times a year to keep the kids and parents interested. The only one I remember after these many years was the drug-sniffing dog who worked at Newark Airport and his handler from U.S. Customs. They were a big hit with both the kids and adults. (Thinking about it some more, I vaguely recall one other animal visiting one of our pack meetings - on purpose, not just one that wandered in from outside - but I don't remember what it was.) Which I guess ties in somewhat with the original post: The more that is going on at pack meetings, and the more that dens are involved in the pack meetings, the more the pack leaders and the den leaders have to communicate with each other. (Edited: I fixed "3 or 4 times a month" to "3 or 4 times a year". That would have been a LOT of pack meetings.)

I think the degree of interaction among the Cubmaster/ other pack-level volunteers and the den leaders varies from pack to pack, and maybe how things are generally done in the district/council. This is a long time ago now, but in my experience as a den leader and then Assistant Cubmaster, I think all the leaders and committee members met together once a month to plan the next pack meeting and whatever else was on the horizon (like the Pinewood Derby). The den leaders definitely had more interaction with the other leaders than just showing up at a pack meeting once a month. But whatever the differing experiences of people in this forum may be, we are dealing with the particular person who started this thread and his/her experiences. He does not believe he is getting the information and resources he needs from the pack leadership in order to do his job. (I used "he" there to avoid "he/she" every time; I don't think the post indicates gender.) There also seems to be an unreasonable amount of secrecy in the pack. I know it would irritate me (and it has, when it has happened in a unit in which I was a Scouter.)

I don't think Venturing is a viable option for providing a coed program with the same age range as Boy Scouts. I'm not even sure it was a good idea to lower the age for crews from 14 to 13. If there is to be a "coed" program that has the same age range as Boy Scouts, but is not Boy Scouts, I think a new program would have to be created. But I don't think any of this is going to happen, including making Boy Scouts itself coed. Of course, I think I predicted in 2012 that any changes to the membership policies would not happen for about 15 years, and it didn't even take one year.

As I said before, Venturing is a program for older youth. That's the point. The "mission" is not simply to have a coed program. Before young women were admitted into Exploring in the late 60's/early 70's (it was a two-step process according to what I have read so it didn't happen all in one year), there were Boy Scout troops and Explorer posts and every single member of all of them were male.

Is the pack leadership actually preventing your den from doing the things it needs to do for the advancement requirements (or whatever they are called in Cub Scouting these days, it's been a long time, despite my out-of-date user name)? If so, how? And when you say "field trips", are you talking about trips that are part of the advancement program, or other kinds of trips?

This assumes that the "point" of Venturing is to have a coed program. I don't think that's the case. The reason there is a Venturing program, and before that the old Exploring program, was/is to have a program geared to the interests and abilities of "older youth". The BSA has been struggling almost from the beginning with the issue of how to provide different opportunities for "older boys", and then for "older" boys and girls. (There is some interesting history here: http://www.seniorscoutinghistory.org/seniorscoutsite/overview.html ) The point is, there were Explorer posts (and specifically posts geared to outdoor activities) when the program was boys-only. A decision was made to admit young women of the correct age, so now the successor program, is an "older youth" program rather than just an "older boy" program. So lowering the age for Venturing for the purpose of making it "parallel" to the Boy Scout program, but "coed", would defeat the whole purpose of Venturing.

Here is the statement Trail Life posted yesterday, which seems to confirm (but also provides some more perspective on) the information in Stosh's post: http://www.traillifeusa.com/blog/214-Boy-Scouts-Christian-Alternative-Sees-Tremendous-Response-After-Transgender-Decision It says they moved "a few" part-timers to full-time to accommodate the increase in interest since the BSA announced its transgender policy change. It also says they have 12 employees and 26,000 members. Maybe as a result of this they will have more, but I hardly think they are in any danger of overtaking the BSA. And if they did, well that's the magic of the marketplace. They are kind of irrelevant to me anyway since I do not meet their adult membership criteria, one of which is that you have to be a Christian (and specifically a Trinitarian Christian.) But if that's where your interest lies, well, there they are. (And yes, part of the reason for this post was that I thought there should be some mention of something other than latrines.)

That may be your message, for which you are to be applauded. But I think the general message from team sports, especially at the more competitive levels, is what Matt says. And even worse is what kids and, especially, their parents often take away from whatever they are told about competitive sports. Which is something like "We'll make your kid into a star who will make the pros and support you in lavish style in your middle and old age." Whatever is actually being said, I think that is what is being heard. Of course, it is almost never true. (As far as I know, one (1) graduate of our local high school went on to big-league professional sports, specifically the NBA. But that's one student in a school where the average population per grade is around 700. So add up all the students in the school over the past 40 years, and one is a pretty small number.) But some parents want to believe it, and in their starry-eyed wishful thinking they steer their kids toward more and more sports and away from things like Scouting. I have seen it.

Locked at topic-opener's request.

Um... you seem to have quite the imagination yourself there, Stosh.

Most of the world also doesn't have a local-option policy where the option may only be exercised by a religious organization, and probably not by a fraternal organization affiliated with a religion. That statement is not intended as a criticism. I am a fan of the local option, and if CO's/units need to be reshuffled a little to make it work, I'm all for it.

Does every single thread in issues and politics have to turn into a discussion about gender?

As much as we (collectively) revere B-P as some sort of semi-deity (or at least a prophet) whose words were handed down on stone tablets, the fact is it often seems like for every quote from him, there is an equal but opposite quote on the same subject. The same is true for George Washington.

It looks to me like an anti-racist comment. As well an an anti-gender-segregation comment. I get the analogy, though I don't necessarily agree with it. There is no shame is being a Girl Scout. There was shame involved in being relegated to what everybody knew was the second-class water fountain, even if it did work as well as the other one. (Which, I suspect, it probably didn't, just as the "separate but equal" schools were not really equal, but that's another discussion.)

Well, "most important" is a matter of perspective. The BSA does not really emphasize the charter to us out here who are toiling in the fields. We don't have the equivalent of a RichardB talking to us about the charter all the time. But they sure do tell us when there have been changes to the Guide to Safe Scouting, as that is one of the documents that guides our everyday activities, along with the handbooks, the Guide to Advancement, etc. My impression is that the main function of the Charter is in trademark infringement cases.

With the "gay issue", it was more than just a "minority opinion." It was actually a majority opinion in parts of the country, including the Northeast. The SE of my council was in favor of the change (both for youth and adults) and I suspect the same was true for the surrounding councils. I think the BSA did not want to become the "Boy Scouts of Parts of America." One of the councils next door to ours had already gone under financially. The units (what was left of them) were absorbed by the neighboring councils, but that can only happen so many times before there are no councils next door to absorb the units.

Prayer, I get it. But seriously, I think it would depend on what the CO is.

This page says there is no longer any grace period: http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/Commissioners/newsletter/resources/05_2014_business.aspx

I don't know you interpret the 30-year confrontation over the "gay policy", in which the BSA was actively involved on one side, as "avoiding confrontation." I don't think it's correct to look at the ultimate resolution of the issue, in which (in my opinion) the BSA made the correct decision, as "avoiding confrontation". Another example is the BSA policy on religion. It seems LESS likely than it did, say 10 years ago, that the BSA will expressly make belief in a higher power or a religion "optional", despite the fact that it continues to be a subject of "confrontation". I think the actual policy of the BSA is to take these issues in a case-by-case basis and pick their battles. The most recent example was when they decided that a person who identifies himself as a boy, whose parents and school accept him as a boy, can be accepted into a program for boys, in a unit that wants to accept him. Despite the reaction from some in this forum, it is not that big a deal. It does not necessarily mean Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts will become coed. They may at some point, but not because a kid from Secaucus NJ is allowed to be a Cub Scout.

Oscar de la Renta and Ralph Lauren would like to know which of them you are referring to. Well, ODLR is no longer with us, but you know what I mean. And he's the one you are referring to. We weren't wearing his uniform in 1972-73 though. It was not introduced until 1980, several years after I was out of Scouting, and long before I got back in.

In one of my troops as a Scout, we had a very good bugler. I believe he was a trumpet player in the high school orchestra/band and it was easy for him to transfer his skills to the bugle. In my son's troop there was one kid who was given the position of bugler, but using a saxophone. He was a very good saxophone player (played 2 or 3 different kinds I think) but the idea of using the sax in place of a bugle did not work out very well. I think he ended up bringing the sax on only one camping trip. It was sort of a novelty that wore off quickly, especially for him.

There has been a lot of speculation and reporting of rumors in this forum over the years on some reasons why the BSA might be unable/unwilling to simply open the doors of all its programs to females, having to do with the GSUSA. Some people say there is an agreement between the two organizations. Some say the BSA is afraid of a lawsuit from GSUSA. (This could conceivably be based on the GSUSA charter. Stosh quotes the BSA charter, but I think the more relevant one, if someone is going to sue someone, is the GSUSA charter. The GSUSA might claim that the BSA charter is relevant to the intent of the Congress in granting the GSUSA charter, but it would be the GSUSA charter that is the basis of the claim. Just speculating here, no legal advice being given.) All I have ever heard about this in "real life" was when I was a Scout, probably around 1973, when some of us were speculating on why the then-new uniforms no longer said "Boy Scouts of America" over the pockets but now said "Scouts B.S.A.", and someone (who that may be is lost to history) responded that "Oh, the Boy Scouts is going to merge with the Girl Scouts." That was about 44 years ago and it hasn't happened yet.

There are actually a few other situations where that procedure would apply, though they are all in the same "family." The Guide to Advancement, bureaucratic numerical reference 8.0.3.2, says in part: (Emphasis added.) Of course in this case it doesn't really matter exactly why the Scout sought an EBOR under disputed circumstances. We need only know that he did, that the process apparently worked the way it is designed to work, that the council/district-level EBOR decided to approve the advancement, and that now his mother is seeking advice on how to handle the ECOH. I agree with the general tone of the advice that has been given so far. It's your son's ceremony. Those who are invited and wish to participate (both as persons with speaking roles and as members of the audience) can participate, and those who don't, don't. Hopefully none of the adults with negative feelings toward your son will try to discourage any of his fellow Scouts from participating.