NJCubScouter

I don't think Venturing is really the issue here. This young lady wants to earn Eagle. If she was male, whether age 11 or 15, in order to earn Eagle she would first have to join a Boy Scout troop and earn the ranks through First Class in the troop. She would then have the option of earning the rest of the ranks, through Eagle, in the troop or in a Venture crew. So you can't earn Eagle without being a Boy Scout, and as we all know, the current policy is that girls can't be Boy Scouts. So in other words, maybe this young lady would enjoy being in a Venture Crew, and maybe she will be. But under current policy, she cannot earn Eagle. I have expressed my views before that there is nothing wrong with having separate programs for boys and girls at that age group. I would not have a problem with girls earning Eagle, if a way can be found to do that.

I guess the question is, what is an "activity"? An "activity" can mean an entire outing, or it could mean a game or contest at a meeting. It seems clear from the context that they mean the latter. So the "activity" could be 15 minutes long. I also notice it says "planning" the activity, it does not say "leading" the activity. Maybe the "leading" part is implied? A Webelos should be able to lead a simple game or contest for his fellow Webelos.

Somewhere, somehow, I sense someone looking in the Index to the Guide to Safe Scouting, perhaps under "Face, Pie in the"

So, ok, to be fair: Cubmaster35, you should not accuse Beavah of saying something even worse than what he actually said. Nobody can say I'm not evenhanded.

Someone else said that. I never said that. I never thought that. I fell into no trap. I read Beavah's post very carefully, and reacted to exactly what he said, and my reaction has not changed.

I gave you a break by not deleting or redacting your post, this time.

Asking for more information is one thing. Filling in the gaps with speculation - or to put it more bluntly, making up facts - is another thing. Beavah is not the only one in this thread who has done that, and we have had many threads where someone (often a new or new-ish forum member) comes into the forum and asks a question, and they are greeted with speculation about what may be their own role in creating or aggravating the problem that is being discussed. It is possible I may have engaged in that to a mild degree once or twice in 14 years when I thought it was obvious that there were crucial facts being left out or that the forum was simply being scammed. But rarely, if ever, have we seen a post where the speculation went so far afield to suggest that someone had been accused of (or investigated for) possible criminal behavior, when there was absolutely nothing in the original post that even came close to suggesting that. If it weren't for that one sentence in Beavah's post, I probably would not have said anything, except maybe for a general statement not directed at any particular poster, that we should limit our speculation about situations we know nothing about. That one sentence crossed the line, in my opinion. More generally, and not just for this particular thread, I do think we should be more careful about speculating about what is going on in another unit based on one or two posts. We like to talk about how this forum is a "virtual campfire" where we invite everyone to pull up a log and discuss things. But I don't think we make the virtual campfire very inviting when a new Scouter or Scout-parent, or just a new forum member regardless of Scouting experience, sits down and tells us his/her story and is immediately met with speculation that the whole thing is their fault. It isn't very "Helpful". It isn't very "Friendly". And sometimes it is worse than that. I am editing this post and reorganizing it a little to specifically respond to this sentence. I think your sentence suggests that Beavah was required to respond to the original post, and therefore did the best he could. I would point out that there is no requirement that any of us respond to anything. It is not like this is our job and we have to say something, so we do the best we can. Sometimes the best we can may be to say nothing at all. Sometimes the best we can may simply be to ask questions. Perhaps on occasion the questioning may take the form of some mild speculation. But there is a line beyond which that speculation becomes unreasonable, irresponsible, unhelpful, and unfriendly.

Our troop pays the registration fees for adult leaders. We have sort of an unwritten policy that if a leader is inactive but wishes to remain on their charter, they have to reimburse the troop for their fees before the recharter is submitted. This has come up a few times with Scouts who age out of the troop, register as ASM's and then go off to college and don't really do anything with the troop. Usually it is their parent(s), who continue to be an adult leader(s), who wishes to maintain their son's registration, and pays the fee. I think it has come up once or twice with an "older" leader who wishes to be inactive but registered, but most often they are simply taken off the charter. This all results from the time, more than 10 years ago, that the SM and CC looked at the charter and realized that we were paying registration fees for almost as many adults as Scouts, and there were a number of adults who weren't really active, so it was decided that those adults would either get taken off the charter or pay their own fees. For regular camping trips, the adults pay the same fee as the boys. Generally that is $10 for the weekend for food. If something more is involved such as a ticket to get into something that is part of the trip (football game at one of the military academies, battleship museum, etc.) both the adults and boys pay that cost as well. The troop does pick up summer camp fees for adults. Generally that boils down to one or two of the adults who are going to camp because the camp throws in some (I don't know how many these days) adult registrations. One year I noticed that there were something like 6 adults registered for camp to go with about 20 Scouts, and the troop was probably paying for 4 of those adults at more than $300 per. I questioned whether we really needed to be doing that, and the rest of the troop committee looked at me like I was the Grinch. I think this year we only had 3 adults at camp so the troop probably paid for 1, which is fine.

If I were leading a bunch of Scouts on a trip where they were going to stay in any sort of "formal" accommodations, I would see that as an opportunity to remind them to "look and act like a Scout", and probably add in some details as suggested by eagle90. Staying in a hotel/motel as a group (as opposed to a trip where their parents are in control) is a situation the boys are not accustomed to, so a little assistance in dealing with that unusual circumstance is reasonable. On the other hand, in 25+ years of experience in Scouting (youth and adult) I do not recall any situation in which we stayed in a hotel or any similar setting. I remember a lot of sleeping on floors with a sleeping bag, both as a youth (like on the stops between the Denver airport and Philmont, and a number of cabin camping trips where there were no bunks) and an adult (like the camp-ins at the Liberty Science Center museum with the Cub Scouts.) Maybe the closest I have ever come to sleeping in a hotel on a Scouting trip, just to show how far it was from sleeping in a hotel, was when we went to the Battleship New Jersey (now a museum ship in Camden NJ) and we slept in the same spacious accommodations the sailors used back in the day: Bunks stacked three high, three or four stacks of bunks in a room. I think my face was about 6 inches below the bottom of the bunk above me, and there wasn't room to sleep on my side, so comments about my snoring were heard from some of the other men the next morning.

Beavah, this time your speculation really does seem somewhat damaging. You have no clue what is going on in this particular unit, and yet in your wild fantasies, somehow the police are involved. To use a modern turn of phrase: Really? Your reckless speculation is spectacularly unhelpful, especially where a new poster is concerned. Having said that, in this forum, the deletion of posts (or portions thereof) is an "honor" that is reserved for only the very worst and most offensive posts. (Not counting advertising/spam.) Those posts are very few and far between. If you exclude posts in the Issues and Politics section, or posts that should be there, there have probably only been a handful of such posts during my time as a member of this forum. (14 years.) This particular post is close to that line but does not meet this moderator's standard for deletion. That is, of course, not binding on the other moderators. I have, however, said what I think of Beavah's post, and I gave it that red down-arrow thing, which I seldom use.

It would, but let's not look a gift horse in the mouth, as the saying goes. For the low low price of joining this forum (that is, nothing, except for the half-second it takes to glance at an ad and then move on to the posts) we have the national director of health and safety coming on here to post updates for us. I'm not sure you would get that with other organizations, or other BSA executives for that matter. (We don't have the national director of advancement on here, probably because he knows what's good for him. )

Usually posts like this appear on April 1. I would have put a smiley face at the end of that sentence but unfortunately I realize that this is real. I think that if they did that in our district, most of the district would vanish in a puff of smoke.

That's funny, but it doesn't apply here.

I know that's a swipe at me because I said more people see posts in I and P. I only said it because it is true. The statistics are right there in front of us. Nevertheless, if it were really about health and safety it belongs in Open Discussion.

And on that reasonable note, and with neither DavidCO nor Stosh really having had the last word (at least that is how I choose to look at it), I am locking this thread. It has really become counterproductive and unduly personal and I think has gone over the "Scoutlike" line a few times. If anyone really thinks there is more to say about this that has not been said in this thread, they can start a new thread.

Yeah, yeah. I know about Leonardo. I also know about Descartes, who combined science/math with philosophy. So are we going to add philosophy in there too? And economics is traditionally referred to as the "dismal science". So what are we up to now, SATMEEP? My point, if there is one, is that ultimately, everything connects up with everything else, but if you are going to make an effort to focus on improving and promoting education in a particular area, you need to divide things up a little, even if the boundaries between the subjects may not be so neat and clean. I think STEM stands on its own as one focus and the arts (music, visual and performing arts) stand on their own as a separate focus. Both are very important. I just get concerned that when you get to the point of "STEAM" what you wind up with is a muddle that distracts from getting anything meaningful accomplished. Maybe my attitude is partly a result of my past service as a school board member. Every year we would set, or approve, various goals for improvement of the school district. Most of these goals cost money, real money that people pay through their property taxes. The natural human reaction is to improve everything to perfection, immediately. But the real world doesn't work that way. You have to say, we're going to do this, and do it this much, this year, and in future years we are going to do these other things, this much. This requires dividing things up.

I have been married to a Catholic woman for 35 years, and have been to church with her a number of times (though not regularly), but I have no idea what any of you are talking about. It's ok though.

I first saw STEAM rather than STEM about a year ago. I understand what they are trying to do by joining the two, but I am not sure it really works. And I have nothing against art. I minored in Art History oh those many years ago. (In retrospect, I guess it was partly a way to get around the fact that they wouldn't let me minor in History, because it was in the same "category" as Political Science, which was my major. And if you really got into Art History, which I did, there was at least as much history as art involved.) That's off topic, but it seems to me there is barely a topic here to begin with.

Just out of idle curiosity, have you ever had a patrol with a Tenderfoot PL and an Eagle Scout who was a member? It seems incongruous to me. We tend to have Eagles and almost-Eagles forming their own patrols when there is the opportunity.

In our troop I believe any Scout who is Star or above can sign off on any T-2-1 requirements except for those that are specifically designated for an adult. (That would include the First Class requirement to discuss with an adult your rights and obligations as a citizen.) I am not sure whether First Class scouts can sign for lower ranks but I am pretty sure it doesn't go below that, even for patrol leaders. Generally all requirements for Star and above are signed off by the adults. At some BOR's it has been clear that for some requirements, one Scout signed off for another without an adequate demonstration that the requirement has been passed. We do not penalize the rank candidate for this. We have, sometimes, spoken with the SM and SPL about the subject of making sure Scouts who are signing off requirements actually make sure the requirements have been passed. I think I once suggested changing the rules so that a more limited group of older Scouts could sign off on requirements, but as far as I know that did not go anywhere. Having Scouts sign off on requirements is how it should be done, but there needs to be "quality control."

When you say "unsolicited disagreements... on the street", so people just came up to you on the street and started arguing with you about religion? How did they even know you were a Christian? Were you wearing a cross or something and people just felt it was appropriate to start a religious debate with a complete stranger?

SSScout, I think you mean NYLT, not NAYLE. NYLT is given at the council level. After completing NYLT a Scout may then take NAYLE, which is offered only at the BSA's national high adventure bases. Also, at least in our council, there are limitations on who can attend NYLT. There is an age requirement, a troop can send only a certain number of Scouts, and the SM's approval is required for any registration. Our troop decides which Scouts are going to go (between 1 and 4 per year) and picks up the cost.

It's "Reform", not "Reformed". Feel free to go back to your regularly scheduled bickering.

This: is on this official BSA web page: http://www.scouting.org/advancement.aspx That sounds like your answer right there. Given how difficult it often is to find an answer on the BSA web site, that was amazingly easy.

Stosh, please don't drag lawyers into this mess. Your analogy is way off base.