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Question: why aren't we talking about a Green Bar Patrol? I mean, if the boy's a "veteran" scout, then he should have a PoR or implementing a service project through which he may continue to develop leadership. That puts him in the Green Bar Patrol. Green Bar patrol wants some special training: to be better at teaching aquatics? Give them a plan for achieving BSA Guard. to master canoeing? Plan that challenging trip. to backpack better? Line up an extra week of hiking someplace rugged. Possibilities are endless. The boy can be doing the Green Bar activity one week and his patrol activity the next. Yes, leaders on a development track are perfectly capable of being in two patrols at once. I remember sitting in a back room planning stuff (like the yearly calendar) with the ASPL maybe once. The rest of the time, we were by a camp-fire baking pizza with the leadership corps, thinking up the current life-scouts' next crazy location for an Eagle project, or what we could do for an additional week besides troop leader training with those slow-on-the-uptake city boys. One of my goals as an advisor to a general interest crew is to give youth something to take back to their (boy or girl scout) troops.

Not speaking for @@blw2 ... however, I've crossed paths with a wide spectrum of such adults and youth. Moreover, their numbers seem to be burgeoning. And many of them do vacillate between their biological sex and the opposite (or novel alternative). The vision of any 8 year old's counter-biological desire (or teen's "self discovery") being fixed is it's own stereotype. @@NJCubScouter, this field in particular is finding unknowns faster than resolutions. So, we have policy wonks choosing their experts, and the very choice is laden with bias.

That would require letting any female-by-biology join the BSA. Maybe girls who want to be boy scouts should just come out as 1% trans. I'm sure there would be some way to work that into the birth certificate. We presume the unit is welcoming. But who is the unit? How did any professional get wind of this "misplaced" cub? Somebody's Akela started howling. @@tyke, have you been in a position of standing by a youth who other parents didn't want to be in the unit?

@@Beavah, mergers are never pleasant. I think the new troop did not really rely on the brain trust of the older troop's more seasoned adults. Son #2 had aged out of the old troop, so I had no "skin" in the game. I sat on a couple of BoRs to provide an example, but after that I directed my attention to outdoor program. @@TAHAWK, we can recite rules ad nauseum, but when adults think the rules are stupid, they won't be followed. At some point, I hope to be around a fire with these committee members, and then be in a position to warn them that they are skating on thin ice with their boys. @@Stosh, Mea culpa for not being on the troop committee and extracting an apology. But I have a crew that is barely holding itself together. Being litigious takes more time than I'm prepared to spend. So, there's nothing for it but to delegate it to the ASM, pinch my nose at the stink, and play a long game. At least, the boy knows he's in the right, he knows that he can choose another unit to advance under. Knowledge is power.

How "BSA comes across" exemplifies the rift between US "coastals" and "heartlanders". In some parts, actions like this are met with resounding applause. Whereas the conciliatory actions you suggest are met with notable membership loss or lack of enthusiasm for joining. Welcome one, serve fewer. Maybe with Brexit, the UK will have job openings for parents of transgendered youth who want to be part of a more inclusive scouting experience?

It is possible to overthink this. And, I think with the plethora of materials (trickled down to us from management consultants) scouters are encouraged to attempt "henpecking" boys into ace patrols by balancing skills, age, enthusiasm, etc .... The fact remains that the best favor adults can do for boys is to find the kind farmer or city park manager with the nice field for camping on the "back nine", give the phone # to the most mature boy to set a date, acquire a few spare tarps, some cheap rope, and give them the occasional weekend where the SM can guide them from a safe distance. Planning meals and procuring provision can be a fine adventure, and the less miles put on the vehicles, the more time spent on the perfect lunch, dinner, and breakfast. For many scouts, years may go by and that's all they'll ever ask for. So give them that, and you have a skeleton on which to build the patrol they'll cherish for decades.

Positive reinforcement without reward is not better than negative without teeth. Next example: Rank-sum (1 for scout to 8 for eage) of current patrol members + rank sum of last year's patrol graduates - last year's rank sum.

And a top-of-the-AFC-North to ya laddies ... As the Irish Pittsburghers are saying tonight.

JTE is supposed to help guide scouters going forward with concrete examples of what we all are and are not looking for. Let's talk carrots and sticks please. By way of example, let's try this: +1 for each SPL elected by the boys in the troop, or each PL elected by the boys in his patrol. -50 for each SPL appointed by any other means. +1 for every other troop PoR assigned by SPL. -50 for every PoR assigned by any other means (including troop-wide elections) ...

Maybe we all should just get participation trophies! I think it matters a lot. If someone sees I've had tons of posts that nobody cares about, they will take what I say with a grain of salt. Also, the topics we post are generally tough chestnuts, and often there is no perfect or best solution (as in my blindsided-by-BoR scout who then blindsided them back). But there are lots of really good ones. Maybe some that work for one person but not for someone else. So the +1's and -1's give a good sense of that. I guess if there were someone who was always spouting off really terrible ideas (but not so vile as to be censored by the moderators), a swarm of -1's might give everyone else a sense to take what was said with a grain of salt. But, most everyone here has something pretty interesting to say, so -1's are more often an indication of thumb size than approbation.

Because our troop has had neither Leadership Corps nor Venture Patrol for quite some time (and certainly the GS I've known have had no such structures) it seems like our venturing crew goes through cycles of being one or the other. Right now, I am squarely advising a Leadership Corps, who have no vision for big-ticket scouting (or even "small ticket, extreme/specialty challenges") but want to do be better scouts. (Thus the meetings with simple-minded knot-tying sessions.) At other times, its a group who comes in singing "I want to get away, I want to fly away ..." To which, our old bones sometimes scream for trying to keep up with them. I suspect the same things happens among older boys in troops not closely tied to a crew, there are different mixes at different times. So, the cross-overs' experience is going to be somewhat shaped by that.

No. You want them prepared so that -- as soon as they are in an open field of tall dry grass with a fire starter and time to kill -- they wont have to depend on an SM taking up the rear to come along and waste half his water securing the land against wildfire. We can certainly hope that they make rank promptly after cross-over, but my observation is that, the better the troop in terms of activity and youth leadership, the more sudden the spread between levels of advancement from boy to boy in the same class. It takes a combination of determination on the boys' part and setting aside time for individual review on a PL's or TG's to move a cross-over even one rank. But if you are available, especially to help chaperon if the boys decide as a patrol to have a special camping weekend, it will increase the opportunities to put all of those words into practice.

I think we also underestimate the desire of older scouts to mentor younger ones. My boys love the venturing stuff, but although they like it because it gives them space from the youngns, they like it just as much because it gives them stories to tell the 1st and 2nd year boy scouts.

@@TAHAWK, the colors are in the right order. Instant improvement.

Barry, at was meant to be a +1. Thumbs and iPads don't mix.

No sign necessary. No problem if you use one. (Remember my rule #1?) The goal is to get it into their little heads that they are to be clean in their outdoor manners and careful with fire.

Setting the record straight ... The boy bent the ears of his fellow scouts this week as well (so I learned). They were as important an influence as I was. This is one BoR in five so far. I don't think the boy will consider this habit of testing as one to take up as an adult committee member. It's not in his character. I hope we soon have a little more time to reflect on it. The hit-the-ground-running leadership that I'm expecting from venturers is not organizational skills. (They have a long way to go on those lines.) I'm looking for them to love one another enough to make things happen for the good of the group. Think of scout skills as a form of fellowship. You tie knots with your mates, build a gadget together, prep for a campout, build the fire that others want to gather around, etc ... that generates camaraderie around which one might practice leadership. PoRs and service projects attempt to codify some of that fellowship for the sake of leadership development. I'm not gonna come down so hard on adult leaders who mean well. Being blind-sided brings out some bad stuff. That's okay. I am concerned that there will be that able-bodied scout who gets tested one too many times and will grow to avoid advancement (or scouting in general) because they think the BoR is petty.

As long as there is a fair accounting of the wrath that was stayed by said beliefs, there is a conversation to be had ... preferably over a really good meal.

Suggestion (esp. to Christians, but can generalize to anyone): invite your muslim friends and acquaintances (random strangers too) over to dinner. Go through the effort of getting meat from a halal (or lacking that, kosher) butcher. This time of year, read the stories of the nativity from the koran as well of the gospel. (Suggestion: a gospel of Luke is available in English, but with the Islamic names of characters and places inserted, really makes for a great party gift.) Talk about Christmas traditions and where they come from. Love each other's kids. More time consuming than clicking some links ... but generally more satisfying.

I'm pretty sure you're not gonna find anything official, but you can ask Bryan to try to get one: http://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/contact/ However, my rule #1 is to never ask for a rule. You'll probably live to regret it.

So my venturers, while snacking on the coal I gave them, were working on the knots. The Italian would try to figure out which they were talking about. It didn't help that they started by saying "a noose that doesn't slip." "Noose?" Then a minute of futile pantomime ... at which point they decided it was best to actually tie the thing. Finally, when she saw it, would exclaim something like "Oh, bolino!" Beyond the translation challenges. They had learned it by different stories: Most of the boys used the "pretzel" method. I grew up with a "hole" in front of a "tree", and a "rabbit" coming out of the hole, around the tree and back in. The Italian had a "lake" and a "frog" jumping in and out of it. The Italian said, "Do you know this knot? We call it something like daisy." One boy said, "Maybe it's a girl scout knot." She said, "I'm not a girl scout. I'm a scout." I'm staring and staring, then I pick up both ends and pull and say "Oh, sheepshank!" One of my co-leaders then (knowing that my brothers were Navy men) smarts off "Daisy is probably what sailors probably call it!" Anyway, a knot by any other name still holds, unless it slips.

Follow-up: I laid out the various options to the scout in writing, and suggested he think kindly toward any adult who means him well. He opted to maintain his primary membership with the troop and master and demonstrate his skills, documentation, etc ... to the board. He now has Life rank. This process gave me time to explain that "Leadership Training" is a method of boy scouting, but "Leadership" is the method of venturing. (I.e.: Training's done. Time for action.) Going forward he wants to provide more leadership to the crew ... and has already started to line up events. So, I gave him rights to the mailing list and told him to get "the conversation" started. Likewise regarding skills, I'm not wasting time testing, but I expect mastery. He promised he will learn "all the knots". So, last night I had him go grab the rope box, give everybody some lengths to work on, and they occupied their time going over the various schemes they learned to help them remember. (I'll add another topic about that.) For their efforts, I gave them a pouch of coal (candy, from the cake-decorating shop).

My knee-jerk would be to ask if the Troop met their JTE goals, and if they did, keep sporting it. If they did not, put it in the patch-collection jar as a memento of how cool his pack was. If your scuttlebutt is valid, the patch might be a trade-able item years down the line.

Were they near the Cuyahoga?

The difference between a 1 patrol troop and a 4+ patrol troop are the dynamics. With a 1 patrol troop, the SM has at most 7-9 boys dissatisfied with a leader or one PL dissatisfied with his boys and it is obviously on them to fix it. The SM can provide some devoted opportunities like "Are you asking for change? Or are you asking for some pointers/practice on working with each other better?" Then, the SM can guide accordingly. That will happen occasionally. We can tell the scouts "He who does the work is holding a PoR ... patches on sleeves mean little." With a 4+ patrols, democracy lessons are more relevant because such formalities allow boys to see change in action. Maybe a patrol's okay (or, at least, flying under everyone's radar), but at election time they'll see if the Next Door Patrol decides to shake things up as a means to improve their scouting experience. On top of that, they see the SPL assigning PoRs and learn the importance of paying attention to who someone appoints for the good of the troop. This entire exercise should run independent of the advancement method. In other words, every first class scout (concept, not patch) will continuously take some responsibility for making the troop better. That responsibility should somewhat suit his time and talents. If that's happening, the advancement discussion may begin -- no bean counting involved. The tail should not wag the dog. So, a boy makes FC two months after the elections in a troop with a 12 month cycle. Should the SPL and SM find a position or project for him? Yes! But for advancement? No! He should get a position/project because responsibility to first class scouts (concept, not patch) is like water for crops.