OwntheNight

SWEET! Our troop will be able to upload their photos to our troop website for all our families to see. Good News!

Our troop and pack both do term limits for our Scoutmaster and Cubmaster(3yrs SM, 2yrs CM) This is my first year in the troop and our SM is starting his final year, so I'm interested in watching the vetting process take place. I've been with the pack for 2 years, so we just went through our CM change, and all is going well as our new CM puts her mark on the program. Watching the new CM take over has been a seamless transition since we prepared for this a year ago and were able to identify the new CM quickly. Next year we'll start the process again for tabbing a new CM. (Full disclosure alert)

"If you build it,they will come" I agree with Eagle92 that you're doing a great job trying to change the culture and tradition of your pack. It's not an overnight thing, you're seeing the results of your efforts so far. You've mentioned you have a good size pack, how is your district's day camp program? Is the pack active in day camp? What about Webelos resident camp? With the numbers you talked about showing up for these 2 events, it sounds like you have some scouts and parents who are interested in keeping the boys active with scouting throughout the summer. You have a great opportunity, may

Gem, Fun,Fun,and more Fun. The wolf year is a great year! This is the year that boys get to put their hands on a lot of things, and there is still plenty of time for getting requirements completed. This is my second go round with a wolf den, and I look forward to this year a lot. Think outside the box for activities, you've been given a lot of good resources so far, use them all. These boys are like sponges, they can't get enough!!Good Luck this year.

Right now we are at about 50 active boys. Our pack covers the boys from 4 of the 5 elementary schools on our side of town. That's actually how I found this pack, I was the CM for a pack that had just graduated 3/4 of the boys and parents into Boy Scouts, so our numbers dropped to about 5 boys spread out over 3 age groups. I ended up being the Wolf and Bear DL, plus the CM...Not a good situation to be in. I knew I couldn't deliver a quality program myself, and found this other troop surprisingly, through our CO, of all places. It turns out our CO had 2 cub scout packs and a troop. Same meeting

Fish, Create the page as a "GROUP" page, not a business or fan page. You have much better control over how much content goes out to Facebook land. I created a group page for our pack and I am the admin for it.If anybody wants to see the contents of the page, I get a request for it and approve it as needed. You can limit the amount of information being sent out on general FB searches by the settings. As I find "Friends" within the pack, I can send the Group page info to them. Our CC set up a fan page through FB, but she wasn't thrilled with it because of having to log out of her FB acct to ge

Ed, We just talked about this at our pack planning meeting last week. We are going to have the incoming Tiger partners take YPT since they will be with all the boys in the den. We are also going to strongly encourage all parents to take YPT so they have a better understanding of what we are doing as leaders. Hopefully, we can recruit some additional leadership out of this or at the least , get some more parents involved in Scouting. If we can get everybody on the same page, it should help us grow stronger as a unit.

Just posted to my facebook page. Thanks for the article.

Nicky, First and foremost, my thoughts and prayers are with you and your family. Nobody should have to endure that amount of pain. I applaud your efforts to rise up and honor your family in this fashion. It takes courage and strength to stand up to adversity and turmoil. Hopefully your crew mates and leaders are giving you all the support they can. As far as the pins on the uniform go. It only matters to YOU! (caps for emp)You honor their spirit on your uniform, that's how you choose to. The uniform police are not going to come and take away your uniform because you choose to remember your m

Eagledad You're onto something! Where did the art of conversation go? Some of my best times in scouting and just growing up were the chats with my buddies about random useless knowledge. It's those conversations that led to other questions or arguments for that matter. Marvel vs DC, Ford vs Chevy vs Dodge, John or Paul, F-14 vs Mig 29,Earl Campbell vs Jim Brown, etc...I would spend hours reading books, magazines, album covers and sleeves just so I could have a spirited conversation with my buddies. We didn't have the benefit of googling a topic on our iphone to find out who was right or wron

Is it so much "taking the summer off" or trying to cut back some activities throughout the summer? It's been discussed here before about the over scheduling of kids and how we're competing with other activities. I used to play baseball in the spring/summer, basketball and soccer in the fall. I can now sign my sons up to play ANY sport year round if I choose to and if I include the numerous amount of "camps" i.e. basketball, baseball, football, hockey, etc. I could literally schedule my sons entire summer vacation if I chose to. Thank goodness I can't afford all those camps.I told the parents i

It's moments like that which make you believe you're doing something right with these boys. Thank you for that great story!

Got to agree with NC. Donate them to the pack, let the Webelos use them on the Web only campouts. Remember, you are now transitioning them to join a boy scout troop where they will be in a tent with their patrol mates. How empowered will they feel when they get to set up their own tent and sleep in it without Mom or Dad in it? Save the competition stuff for the program year. A good pie in the face of the DL for beltloops or activity pins earned can be a great motivator for the boys. They'll remember that moment more than winning a tent for scout spirit or attendance. Have them create a den fla

A few things jump out from this that raise some flags: How does the pack leadership feel about this situation?, Are they aware that one of their den leaders is changing the rules for his benefit? It sounds like Scoutnet will catch the age, but what happens when the dad spends the next year working with his younger son on Wolf activities and then Scoutnet rejects those entries because they should be Tiger Cub entries. He's taken an entire program year, just to have it rejected by Scoutnet, and then the boy misses out on the opportunity to earn his Tiger Badge legitimately. I'm sure

Was coming home yesterday from the troop meeting with my son, and I noticed he was more subdued than usual. After some coaxing and prodding, my son tells me he heard one of his patrol members tell another patrol member when we came in the building, this other scout pointed to the both of us and said " Those two are idiots". Knowing the scout who said this, I dismissed it as an 11 yr old trying to show off to his buddies, and began explaining to my son the whole "sticks and stones" theory. I was then greeted by an emphatic "That's not FAIR, Dad!" I finally ask my son what he would like to see h

BSA has issued the requirements for the new Heritage MB today. Here they are: Requirements 1. Discuss with your counselor the life and times of Lord Baden-Powell of Gilwell. Explain why he felt a program like Scouting would be good for the young men of his day. Include in your discussion how Scouting was introduced in the United States, and the origins of Boy Scouting and Cub Scouting under Baden-Powell. 2. Do the following: 1. Give a short biographical sketch of any TWO of the following, and tell of their roles in how Scouting developed and grew in the United Stat

It's not on your list of activities, but our troop decided they wanted to go Ziplining for a fun campout. You have Lake Tawakoni listed as a campsite, we stayed there for the weekend. We drove to Canton (about 30 min. from the state park) and spent the day out at the Zip line course. It was an absolute blast. They have the tallest and longest ziplines in Texas. The owners and staff out there were great to work with, everybody has to go through safety training and if somebody is uncomfortable, they do not pressure that person to get on the line. Do a google search for Wired Zip Line, Canton, TX

Swimming and First Aid at my first summer camp. Swimming was my favorite because I was able to qualify for Lifeguard training and then spent the next summer sitting in the tower working on my tan.

E92: Our theme this year is CSI:Cub Scout Investigations. I was thinking I could do the David Caruso glasses with dramatic pauses and cheesy one liners in between announcements, maybe a little "WHO" in the background? We've got a costume store down the street, I was going to see if they had a Sherlock Holmes hat and overcoat. One of our running jokes between camps is that pirates always show up trying to make it a pirate fest, usually in defeat, but the boys get a good laugh out of it. Love the Star Wars idea..."Try not, Do you must"

Whichever one I can find, since I'm usually running out the door trying to get Tigerson or Scoutson into the car to head out without being late But seriously, the rotation right now is my new FOS hat (our council is doing special editions, with each year being dedicated to the 12 pts. We're on friendly now)A baseball cap I picked up at Philmont, My Wood Badge patrol hat, with Philmont brandings on it, or a CSDC hat that resembles the state flag of Texas. For the troop, I wear the official troop baseball cap. For COH and B/G, I wear my official Wood Badge Resistol straw cowboy hat. I am lookin

Thank you for that truly moving story. Thoughts and prayers from North Texas

Took my Woodbadge course last Summer out at Philmont, It was a week long course. Our project took place on Thursday after we hiked from Tent City to RMSC. We knew going to the "outdoor" portion of Woodbadge, that we would be presenting our project to the troop at that time. With that in mind, we knew we had to make our project mobile and easy to set up, with all patrol members carrying parts of the project in our packs.Nothing was done to accomodate us because of the shorter time to prepare. Our patrol figured out real quickly, after the first day, that we were in for a time crunch. We decided

First off Axe, I raise my Nalgene, and give you a hearty, HERE,HERE! Congrats on finishing your ticket items, very well deserved. This is a great achievement and you should be acknowledged for it, not just passed out with membership cards and training materials. What I was told during my course, is that after the TG approves the items, the TG contacts the SPL who then contacts the recipent to arrange for a proper beading ceremony. If it was important enough for you to take Wood Badge, it should be important for somebody to properly acknowledge your accomplishments. Ron Always a Beave

Looking forward to our B/G this coming Sat. Catered BBQ (including cleanup )All of our cubs have been decorating birthday boxes for the table centerpieces, they have the filled those boxes with age appropriate toys and toiletries. Local dentists have been donating toothbrushes and toothpaste to us. After B/G, we will be delivering all boxes to a local charity that assists underpriveledged and homeless children. Everyone deserves a birthday present, even if it's not their birthday. We will have the obligatory rank advancements for all dens. Our Web II DL is pulling out the OA headdress and the