nolesrule

The unit leader is permitted to announce the winners to the unit as soon as the election is completed, regardless of when the call out ceremony is. I was visiting a unit last night that happened to be having their OA elections, and the call out ceremony was performed by the election team immediately afterward. Might as well considering candidates have one year from the date of the election to go through the ordeal. Our lodge's next ordeal is just before summer camp, so the boys will have all 3 opportunities to attend an ordeal rather than wait until after summer camp and only have 2 possi

"after I get him his eagle" [shakes head]

YKYBWTMB5AHBISTL (You Know You've Been Watching Too Much Babylon 5 And Have Been In Scouts Too Long) when you start thinking about how the Drazi would issue special purple or green ghosted CSPs at random to all their members every 5 years and that they are such a restricted item they are worth fighting over.

Siblings, whether boy or girl, should not be on any scouting trip (unless specifically designed to be a family event). As for the parents, I would use this as a recruiting opportunity. Explain to the parent that unless there is a desperate need to meet the needed adult requirement for a given trip, we limit the adults to those that are registered with the troop. Hand the adult an application and give them a list of openings that need to be filled (along with the responsibilities for each of them) and let them choose which one they would like to take. During my 7 years as a scout, I

The only things more mysterious than the Grey Council are Vorlons and the Order of the Arrow (tongue planted firmly in cheek).

I never touch the score sheets, except to score the SPL. I leave the rest to the SPL. I also don't talk to anyone other than the SPL during inspections and that's just to make sure he hasn't overlooked anything. It's his troop, not mine. I'm just a UC and I'm asked to be there to "make it seem more important" as one adult put it (and to follow the annual unit service plan for commissioners).... but I do let them inspect me as well, just to be fair.

Guess I'm not the only one here familiar with B5.

No SM recommendation needed. The youth need to take the initiative to complete the Brotherhood requirements after having been a member for a minimum of 10 months. I have found that in our lodge the units with the more active OA youth also have active OA adults. Are there any adults in your troop that are members of the OA? If so, they can help motivate the OA youth by attending events and providing transportation. If not, perhaps the unit should nominate a troop adult for OA membership.

I was just answering the question. If I met ReneScout in real life, I wouldn't say anything. The only time I ever turn into any kind of uniform police is when I'm helping an SPL carry out an official uniform inspection.

"The other has been to the '89 Jamboree" You went to the '89 NSJ? So did I, but I was 12 so my shirts only lasted a couple more years.

"Yah, nolesrule, I hear yeh. I just reckon it's overstating things to think about three months of scouting fun and activity and leadership as being "wasted." We do have 7 other methods. Some units just aren't as advancement-focused, eh? Boys are in scouts for 7 years, the year and a third of mandated time doesn't need to be a race. " Beavah, I agree with that and perhaps "wasted" was a poor choice of words, though I was only applying it to the advancement process and not the rest of the scouting experience. But just because advancement is just one of the methods of scouting doesn't mean a

Roasted pineapple is absolutely fantastic. Sometimes when I'm grilling at home I will quarter a pineapple lengthwise, so the leaves can be used as a handle, and marinate in honey for a few hours prior to throwing them on the grill. The whole pineapple though is much more conducive to camping.

John, I think you can get a pass for historical purposes, especially since you earned the right to wear the flap from the now defunct lodge. But in the original poster's case, it's just not his flap to wear. I collect flaps and CSPs from the 1989 NSJ, which I attended. But I wouldn't wear a neighboring lodge's special event flap (as nice as that pink Aal-Pa-Tah flap looks) just because my lodge didn't produce a special issue for the event, even if some of them had been in the same jambo troop as me.

You should only wear a lodge flap for the lodge in which you are actively registered.

"All you watching out for well worn uniforms please don't judge me to harshly because I just got a new shirt and I often times have the legs zipped of my switchbacks so the knees are not very worn. " Same here. I had an unfortunate leaky pen incident a few weeks ago.

" I worry about the delay a bit for da youngest lads (though it's manageable) and I think it teaches the older lads to plan better and not expect adults to be at their beck and call. Just different. " I hope you're referring to monthly scheduled board of review dates. Monthly is frequent enough that it won't have much of a long-term effect on advancement. On demand (as in within 1-2 weeks) is ideal, but if you are already holding monthly committee meetings, then everyone needed to hold a board of review is already assembled. But quarterly is just not right. It forces 3-month waits on

You know, the really silly thing of having a rigid board of review schedule like this is that the troop already knows there is a 6-month requirement (and that it's possible to complete the requirements in that 6 months). They knew the exact date that your son earned Star when they scheduled the dates for their quarterly board of reviews. So why are they holding the board of reviews at 5 months and 3 weeks? They are effectively forcing a 9 month period on any scout that has met all the requirements except the 6 months because of some adult who couldn't bother to count out 6 complete month

I've said this before and I'll say it again. Boards of review should be held as soon as possible once a Scout has completed all other requirements for a rank. I can understand if a unit might have a monthly board of review night on the schedule in order to be able to get the needed people together, but 4 times a year is just too few and unnecessarily holds up the advancement process. All that is needed to hold a board of review is the Scout and 3-6 committee members and 15-20 minutes in the same location. I've even seen them held during some afternoon downtime on a camping trip.

Thanks for taking my comments at face value. I hope it didn't come across as a rant, as that was not intended. I am going to follow responses in your other thread you started based on my post. It's one thing to be able to accommodate a few large minority religious troops in urban areas. But when you get to the suburbs and rural areas, you'd be hard pressed to find the same. We all know that most boys do not ever become scouts and not all cub scouts become boy scouts. Take that same regression and apply it to a small segment of the population in a non-urban density area and you become hard

"The BSA has become much to much dependant on churches as sponsors, so if a jewish boy wants to join a catholic troop odds are he will at least be exposed to that faith more than his parents would want and thats where the trouble begins. " Oh, it can get pretty wacky. Being Jewish myself, I was part of a troop chartered to a United Methodist Mens Club. Thanks to me, my brother, a cousin and a few friends, about 20% of the troop was Jewish. My dad was an ASM with the troop for about 10 years, and when I was 17, the troop even signed up a Jewish SM for 3-4 years (and he's still an active me

I didn't see this mentioned, but the term "tap out" is used in one of the scenarios in the current online youth protection training.

I'm not sure what the "perfect example of the current philosophy that is more concerned about recordkeeping than actually doing the program." My comment wasn't about being obsessed with record keeping, but rather how do you enforce a policy of manditory training when the data you rely on to make the policy determinations is in error? As for your other comments, yes having motivated adults is very important. Not scaring them off is important. But even the most motivated people will have issues that could have been answered by the basic training for their positions when they don't get

"Training should be mandatory! " Of course it should. It's the best way to provide the proper program. As a UC, I get questions all the time from my units where the answer is in the training. But the bigger problem of requiring a trained leader in order to recharter is the record keeping. How does that get resolved once and for all when a very trained cubmaster can't get his ScoutNet record to reflect he is trained after 5 years.

The previous cubmaster of the pack I serve as a unit commissioner was trained, completed Wood Badge, served as Cub Scout Roundtable Commissioner and was on the distrcit training team (just mentioning this to point out that he wasn't some obscure scouter). The offical Scoutnet records never reflected that he was a trained leader. We tried to get this fixed all the way up until the time he stepped down as cubmaster, but it never happened.

Can't do much about the lettering, but if your scout shop still sells the flag patches or you have an older uniform in the closet that is retired, you have a source for flags to sew onto the shoulder when the plastic one falls off.