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I'm in a symposium on health literacy of k-12 youth in distressed communities, and a retired doctor is approaching the problem of community health using after-school STEM clubs. I can see how a scouter might see how rolling out STEM scouts might serve the needs of his/her community.

NJ, the problem with your idea is that most venturers want to be different. There has never been a groundswell to earn Eagle among members who weren't already Boy Scouts. So making the award attainable by the few venturers who fulfill those requirements caters to special interests at the expense of the vast majority of Venturers who don't want a program bogged down by micromanaged rank advancement.

1. Lead a horse to water. 2. Drinking it is on him. Those instructions on the blue card? That's the process. The point of partials is to help a boy who wants to earn a MB do so at his own pace in multiple venues of his choosing. Meanwhile, if by getting a partial, a boy at least tries a new skill, he has expanded his horizons. Have your oldest scouts give tips on how they keep track of partials. When a boy earns an MB by completing a partial, while you're awarding it to him, ask him what he did to complete it.

At the Cub level, that may be. With older age groups, BSA has hyped the advancement method to the point that more than one or two Boy Scouts have told their Venturer sisters that their Silver (now Summit) or Quartermaster or Ranger or GS Gold means nothing compared to their Eagle (should either group earn it). This in spite of SM's and Advisors trying their darnedest to promote both equally. Now the Quartermasters and Rangers in our midst aren't about to be bothered by some runt poking the bear. But, I suspect that rhetoric gets under the skin of potential Silver awardees. So, I can see why "because we can" is as good an excuse as any for the girls who've been slighted this way to become a special interest. Fortunately, this is not a pervasive attitude among Boy Scouts. But the NESA marketing is enough to make target audiences gloat and unintended audiences salivate.

We always need to be clear about this: some girls are asking why they can't be recognized via the Boy Scout advancement program. The majority of gilrs couldn't care less. This is a matter of special interests. I personally don't think they are malicious. Nor do I think they are morally bankrupt. As far as I can tell, they are mavericks.They are principled. They often don't appreciate the loss of market share. This weekend, a family member asked what I thought of BSA's recent membership changes. I pointed out that 10,000 boys are no longer being served nation wide. She said, "Well, isn't it better to do the right thing? Those numbers wont be missed." As much as I think the "bastion of virtue" mentality held by unisex proponents has multiple shortcomings, I am more certain that the "scorched earth" mentality held by pro-inclusion folks will alienate more than it will ameliorate.

That puts us back on topic !

Sorry for your troop's loss. With all the catch-up from paper to digital, chances are you are going to stumble up some other missteps. As is often the case, what you could do (or as some would view: could get away with) will split in multiple options. But what you should do depends on the scout in front of you and the sharpness of your leaders. For most continually active scouts this would be a tempest in a teapot. It probably is for this scout as well. It can't hurt for the boy to know how to tie a sheet bend. One final strategy: talk to his patrol leader and see if his buddies are willing to go through these last few skills with the scout. That way the boys who didn't have to do the requirements can come along side and do them for fun.

Are we making our own rules? Or, are we reading the GTA as it is written, and proceeding accordingly? You seem to want to ignore all that verbiage about not holding up a boy because of adults' shortcomings. You also seem to want to ignore the experience of folks who've seen how this stuff has gone on appeal. Isn't that akin to cheating? Yeah sure, @@Stosh, but this isn't about the kid's 18th birthday and 7 years as a tenderfoot scout. Lacking other information, this is about the adults not getting their acts together in December to help the boy avoid this situation. Unless @, you all did tell the boy to line up his BoR, and he blew you all off.

Rule #1: never ask for a ruling.He had his SMC in December, right? The board is not a re-test. So ... Wrap it up. Get a few adults together and meet the boy wherever, find out from e boy what he thinks of your program, give him a few pointers .... Including the new FC rank requirements. Move on. In the three months of prevarication by adults the boy could have done those new reqs and more. If you do have council HQ call national about this, let us know what they say.

One could argue that lacking, the ethical tone of the last four points (thrift, bravery, cleanliness, and reverence), the first eight will fall flat.

FWIW, as a crew advisor, I keep with me for youth to read in their down time: The Venturing Handbook One or two back issues of Scouter magazine. A collection of maps and brochures of state/national parks. One or two other books or hiking guides, as space in the car allows. The occasional flyer and business cards from trainers and outfitters I've met along the eastern seaboard. It's pretty random. And I also model the behavior of looking at brochures and maps at rest stops. And ... talking to strangers. A good story from a local or from a former scout sometimes does more to solidify a vision than a dozen pamphlets.

Welcome to the forum! I would like you to consider that your are having the tail wag the dog here. The best people to choose their adventure are the scouts. The best people to determine the budget cap are scouts and parents. Now, the committee, if they are doing a good job of hearing from your parents, might have that budget in mind. So, if I were you, I would ask them how many dollars max they would want to see their older boys spend on an adventure next year. Then ask them for the go-ahead to have your lead boys brainstorm about the adventures they could do given that budget. Then with that financial constraint, the responsibility for developing and presenting the plan for adventure is on the SPL, or maybe your JASM, or your scout who is rallying for some big-ticket scouting. You can certainly tell the boys what you've learned from strangers on the internet. But also tell them to crack open back-issues of Boy's Life (including looking at ads in the back of the magazine) and the Boy Scout Field book to see if anything there interests them. Frankly, if you don't have a boy or two who are willing to do this "vision casting" work, your time would be better spent having them plan local patrol-based outings on extended weekends (or a few days mid-week) throughout the summer. Don't go any place further than a four hour drive away. I've found more plans for adventure that boys really want to do come about from spending enough time camping together that they grow a mutual vision for their next "big ticket" scouting. The real cost of these things, is the weekends needed in advance for preparation. So the committee has to be prepared to support the troop as the boys spend the necessary time training. They are either training for a specific adventure, or they are training for when they decide what their big trip will be.

This doesn't have to be an overwhelming process .... list when you're going, when you'll return, what you'll be doing and where, who will be helping you. Let everyone's parents know what's up. I assure my scouts that they will have arrived when that's how they operate.

Gotta say I'm not at all broken up about this. As it evolved, the process wrested the control of filing plans from my youth and dumped it on me. That undermined the only benefit I ever thought it had ... Training boys in organizing themselves effectively. Trip planning and preparation should rest squarely on PL's, den Chiefs, and crew officers. With accountability to parents via the unit leader. Until that happens, we lock our boys in a state of arrested scouting development.

No, because their most successful attacks thus far have not been through export of their loyalists hailing from rogue states. That's a rather expensive proposition, and if Da'esh is anything, they are cost-conscious. Their strategy has been and continues to be to recruit citizens (West or from Western-allied countries) to their cause through social media, interactive propaganda (e.g. video games), and inspiring revolution movies. (Anyone see Rogue One?) Then give them a menu of actions they could take, starting with praying faithfully, to relief work, to defending the movements "good" name, to studying infrastructure, to violence. Vetted refugees, -- especially those who have aided our operations in the past -- are the least of our worries. Our fellow citizens and the children of citizens from countries of stable states on the other hand ...

Different country, @@tyke. The working assumption is that kids (especially 14-20 year olds) will help themselves ... in violation of federal and state statutes. Therefore the property owners must take due diligence to secure all alcoholic drinks, or they will be liable for harm to the kids or caused by the kids resulting from their "helping" themselves. A litigious parent could file suit for negligence if a boy merely posed with a bottle or case that he never even opened. The suit would likely fall flat, but the time and dollars spent defending it would discourage further sponsorship of a troop. So, a club has to be very alert to that. Camps don't allow alcohol on the premises ... a challenge for some of our leaders. Unlike on your side of the pond, most parents prefer a culture where kids come nowhere near pubs, so the pattern is reinforced.

The tactical inefficiency of the executive orders can be debated. (With what little I can stand to read of our sworn enemy's tactics, I see no reason to feel safer with even the most comprehensive proposed travel bans in effect.) But the point here, is that rather than requiring troops to have contingencies for border detentions, Guides Canada has opted to execute an across-the-board travel ban.

You're not alone. I got the same prompt. Skipped it. Logged in the usual way.

What you are describing is an open-source development platform. It's not all roses, but it does set up this "buffer" between clashing personalities, so that work can get done if there are problems that can be solved.

Yes. They checked that box. At least our district gets that list and in a sense, it does save them time. No more checking if an MBC quit or died ... if they haven't completed YPT, they might as well have ... then off the list they go. But, the list we've been provided is still not sortable or filterable by badge or zip code. Essentials for a list that serves units in geographically diverse councils with lots of MBCs. That is, if the goal is to get back to something as user friendly as what we had in the 70s ... So we have a map of the on-ramp ... just no exits or intersections.

Well, your are in a no-man's land. From your district's perspective ... Who is the head of that organization? Right now, no man. Who in the organization has the signed copy of the charter? Right now, no man. So, you'll remained deadlocked until the person in charge of that organization makes a call to council HQ and says, "I am the IH for CO of unit ###. We would like to see our charter and assure that it identifies the volunteers whom we approved to run the program, starting with Mr. Runner as our COR -- with thanks to the professionals who got us started last year. We'll take it from here." Turnover does make it hard, but you need those couple of year-in year-out volunteers to go the extra mile, and the IH needs to believe in them. Because of membership churn, you and those one or two other people need to assure council that you'll see to it that new adult volunteers are brought on every year. Otherwise, you will remain at loggerheads with an overtaxed professional staff who see you all as fly-by-nighters. Keep that in mind when you make that call to the SE.

@Col. Flagg's strategy for building up MBC depth is excellent. Every unit should be doing this regularly for their district. Part of the problem, I think, is that some districts are now as large as councils used to be. That makes for a whole lot of MBCs for a district advancement chair to keep track of. I'm guessing our district (in the north of Pittsburgh) has an average of 10 MBC's for each MB ... that's at least 1,350 names, some repeated for multiple badges. Needless to say, YPT compounds the challenge, but I bet it also helps thin the herd down to folks who really "get" scouting. When I was growing up, there were maybe 6 troops in a small everybody-knew-everybody district with no more than a couple of counselors per badge. The list was typed up by some pastor or professor's secretary, copied, and pinned to the cork board of every scout house. A firm handshake guaranteed your name on that list for life (... and sometimes a few years afterword). That made things manageable, but did nothing for YPT which wasn't required for MBC's until this decade. I still don't count on that requirement for MBC's. And like Flagg, I think well-trained parents and scouts is the best solution. I don't, however, put more faith in in-house counselors over district counselors. Nowadays, the list is on a password-protected site. So, if a scout asks me about a MB, I print up the names listed for that MB, highlight the ones I recognize within a couple miles of the scout, then go over them with the SM/ASM's to make sure none of those have any red-flags. (Usually not YPT, but maybe someone's on vacation, counsels only at a particular high school, etc ...)

Sounds completely bogus. Every MBC is registered with a district or a troop within that district. The district advancement chair for the district should have a list that is made available to the SMs in that district. Folks. If your SM cannot produce a list of MBC names and phone numbers for any MB in the district. Something is broken. Scream bloody murder until it's fixed.

Welcome to the forums! I have two 6-man tents from Coleman. The price was right. They serve well for most of our family's open field, national park pads, and beach campsites. And from time to time they work for youth-group and troop or crew "plop" campouts where density is an issue. But, if I didn't have have repair kits and spare poles from scrapped tents and tarps, I wouldn't touch them. So, if you and your boys are handy with sewing, splicing rope, and cutting and finishing fiberglass and aluminum, they are cost effective. But, then again, if you all have those skills, and you can't get the units for a cut-throat price ... build your tents from scratch.

Post modernism, NJ ... holding things constant is a cardinal sin.