qwazse

Depends on the state, I suppose. "Thousands of dollars" amounts to $70 - $700 in revenue, perhaps. Not earth-shattering to most treasuries ... even when multiplied by the number of units who take advantage of their CO's exemption. Scale matters. If it costs more to enforce a ruling (many of which have not held up in court) than the revenue gained, it is unethical for a government to pursue it. The tea just winds up being dumped in the harbor. Now if we were talking "Tens of thousands of dollars" of purchases annually, then the unit would have an ethical obligation to ensure that those purchases are tightly in sync with the CO's mission. Even so. Round here, municipalities who've tried to use the heavy hand of the law against large non-profits in court have come up short. They do better negotiating a settlement ... usually a contribution to the coffers in exchange for a little name recognition.

In practical terms, I could see a roll-out via "local option" ... CO's who want their BSA program in the form of a unit exclusive to boys would have "Cubs" unit exclusive to girls would have "Cub-ettes" a co-ed unit would have "Cubs-plus" This would allow the chips to fall where they may. It's consistent with what I've learned about Central European models ... which may have one unit of each type in a district. It could also allow councils to develop facilities for various types of day camps. The big question becomes this: Let's say that, with or without the BSA, @@maryread, the mom in the article that started this thread, and one hundred others form associations of girls (and their siblings) who build those PWD cars at age 8, learn flag protocol at age 10, camp monthly at age 11, master first class skills at age 12, hike and camp independently at age 13 ... maybe to the tune of 400 patrols in the next few years. Why wouldn't we want those 2400 to wear our 1st Class badge, O/A sashes, and be with us at HA bases and National Jamboree?

I think this requirement is geared toward training parents. We tell the Webelos this once (basically the your-parent's-don't-sign-your-book-anymore lecture) and then they pretty much get it.

LoL! You're still treasurer, it's just they want you to treasure some material stuff. Many CO's don't want to "own" trailers or other vehicles. So, troops find a leader to keep the tags in his name. (Usually the guy most likely to pull the trailer.) No leader steps up? Say "Fine, the trailer doesn't get on the road until one does."

To amplify E'dad's perception ... increased membership only matters if, in welcoming girls, we add boys. In other words, it doesn't matter if 20K girls sign on (in co-ed or unisex troops) if our losses in boys are to the tune of 10K or more per year. It doesn't even matter if growth stagnates. The citizens who we are chartered to serve remain under-served. There are American organizations who are claim to be successfully serving both sexes. They may be well worth a post-modern nomad family's consideration. But, their numbers remain unpublished, which is a good indication that they are not of a magnitude that would lead us to believe that the boys they've recruited could otherwise offset BSA's losses.

Regarding disclosure, your son is approaching the age where he can decide on his own if he should explain his disability. I've mentioned elsewhere that a person should not be commissioner of any unit in which his/her kid is a member. If the district wants to "fix" anything, they can hire another marshall. This SM is willing to run meetings on a day when very few will. You and your husband owe him. You don't have to like how he does things one bit. You just have to be on his side, because at the end of the day he's on your son's side. @@Stosh is right about the research. Your son might be the one boy out there who will read the SPL Handbook. Get it for him if he doesn't already have it. Tell him to read it. Then later, maybe at a campfire, after the other scouts are safely in their tents, he can talk to the SM about how his job differs from the handbook. Then simply ask "Should we change that?"

You're gonna get as many different opinions here as there are options + 1. BSA left it open. Your boys have crossed into a (hopefully) boy led troop. So they should ask their patrol leader (PL) what would be best to do. If the PL doesn't know, he can ask the senior patrol leader (SPL), who can then ask the (SM), who may contact the committee member (MC) who is the advancement chair (AC) who will write us on this site and share your misery. Then waste precious time with your committee chair (CC) at round table (RT) while the roundtable commishioner (RC) or district executive (DE) make up something on the fly. Welcome your boys to the land of obtuse abbreviations! Maybe you're one of those. In which case, bless you. Really, tell the boys who are interested that you are proud of them for asking. Let them and their patrol leader(s) sit with you and go over the options. Ask them which one they would like to do, making it clear that you will support them in whatever they choose. Then tell your district what your boys decided to do with the freedom BSA gave them. (Maybe let us know as well.) FYI - You're not alone in this quandry: http://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/forums/topic/2016-scout-rank-cyber-chip-and-new-crossovers/

Haven't you heard? Pedagogy is the latest "invisible" required merit badge.

That's a statement, not a question. The working assumption here is that the CO knows what facilities are at its disposal. That includes alternate facilities in the community that may serve scouting if the CO's own are reserved for special occasions. A good COR helps a committee sort that out. A bad COR says, "Room X is only available at time T. Go fish." Our Pack had an explosion in growth, so they still charter with the CO, but hold most meetings at the school cafeteria. From all accounts, that was a team decision.

@@maryread thanks for sharing. If those sisters are Mavericks, do your best to support it. That may include helping parents consider Campfire USA or the Baden Powell Service Association.

Just to keep on topic. I'm not after picking apart one troop's approach vs. another's. I'd fully expect Stosh -- with his strong emphasis on servant leadership -- to be more situational, an Krampus -- with his large numbers -- to be more responsibility focused. What I'm seeing in our troop is a little odd to me. But as a result, I would be inclined to skip some of the perfumeries in ILST -- if we were to have a training weekend for the PLs -- and move them directly into a wide game or service project with maybe some after-action review based on what they should have been picking up from reading the handbook at troop meetings. That is, if the PLC's involved knocking out selected reading from the PL handbook every month. I've typically have been very situational. But, with this new batch of boys ... especially if they multiple into our venturing crew ... a more structured approach might suit them better. @@Eagledad, your point about not aiming for the lowest common denominator is well taken.

@@Stosh, what we have is the SPL and Instructor directing patrols to present material from the book. (Note: this SPL got elected with a speech that simply recited the Oath and Law. "By the book" has served him nicely.) Sometimes, they put together a slide show: one presentation a night, maybe 10 or 15 minutes in length. Adults in the back of the room.

Now that you mention it, a couple weeks back, some parents were asking me what it would be like if their son joined the troop, and I started off with "Well, the troop operates with the boys in small groups called patrols ..." So, yeah, you all have had an impact.

How many of you start your troop leadership training (whether you devote a weekend to it, or sneak it in on meetings and campouts) by having your boys look up a concept in the Boy Scout Handbook and one of them read what it says? In our new troop, the boys do this regularly as part of their meeting. I find it to be mind-mumbingly boring, but they seem to be fine with it. One positive is they get past some of the ILST material with minimal fuss. Some of the threads have mentioned references about advancement and patrol methods in the BSHB. So, I'm wondering how much folks actually nudge the boys to interact with their book? I see the good sense in moving quickly from any book or slide presentation to some wide-game activity. I'm just wondering about that first step. How often you all direct boys to their handbooks when presenting a concept?

I'd like to think that 'back then' (when I turned down a request to a dance for very rainy and cold ordeal weekend) was not so far removed from now.

@@Chisos, is it find-able via the index? If so, then at least the boys get an exercise in referencing.

They didn't have the patches, but in their minds their SPL was a senior who had been PL, and a buddy of his would routinely assist him, so that was that. Then among the rest they picked their PL. Can't remember if the older two stayed out of it or not. So, when you get down to one patrol, it's kinda like quantum mechanics ... weird things happen. The BSA "small" troop chart has an SPL with 3 PLs. (Although one may debate the probability of you actually having a full-blown NSP if you only have two other patrols, one of which is a venture patrol. With good retention and steady-state recruitment, that would imply maybe two cross-overs per year?) I tried to discourage our troop from having an SPL when they got back down to just 3 patrols. They would have none of it.

If there's no reference in the new scout's handbook (not even in the index), have the boy read about the patrol method, pick four things from there, move on. BSA's lack of clarity is not your problem.

@@jpstodwftexas, my first reply included: Depending on the terrain, foot can be more damaging than motor traffic. A well-fueled vehicle can encourage boys to take the long way around and avoid ripping up sensitive areas. Regarding the "If you're questioning yourself ..." argument, I generally agree that you might be asking for one more person to say "No" in your place. But sometimes questioning yourself is a way of increasing the activities level of safety and benefit. For example, in advance of foul weather, we have a shake-down to review our next move. A "no go" decision is always on the table, but I'm not asking someone to make that for me. I'm asking what's our plans B, C, and (sometimes) D? Are we prepared to implement them? And, will they mitigate risk? I would also think of it this way: if you were doing an activity, who are the boys whom you would trust to safely execute that activity? I might not want my scouts pulling out a football or Frisbee (the source of most camping-related fractures in my experience), but might want them tying down gear and equipment for a back-country conservation project.

I'm wondering if this is a question for Bryan on Scouting or Scouting Wire. It sounds like someone once voluntarily purchased the license, but lacking positive reinforcement from the few scouts who used the frequency, decided to let it lapse without fanfare.

Red herring. No organizational chart exists for one patrol. Well,the closest we come is the last page of ILST, which has a "small troop chart" with one patrol leader, a new scout patrol leader, and venture patrol leader. It doesn't specify the minimum numbers for that organization, but we know that BSA allows as few as five boys. If those boys were all 1st class rank and, say 13 through 14 maybe a 16 and 17 year old, the logical inference would be that there is no new scout and venture patrol ... So trim those branches, but the SPL still remains with the ONE TRADITIONAL PATROL. And that's how boys who haven't even taken ILST generally conceptualize it! It takes a lot of adult intervention to get them to believe they don't have an SPL. I'm our case, we just stopped buying the patches.

As in, what happens in every patrol I've ever known.

A can't speak to O/A numbers. Our district's advisor seems to have a good number of boys at roundtable every month. Spring camporees in our district are hit-and-miss. Musical, track, and baseball season are the prime distractions. Come to think of it, I don't think they were done all that often when I was a kid. My patch collection backs that up (more from fall camporees and Klondike). Do you have crews in your district? I know many venturers are arrowmen, and many area summits are also in the spring. There are some young arrowmen across the nation who are put out that their no access is granted female colleagues who are first class scouts (the concept, not the patch). I can't imagine this having a big impact, but when your talking about that one rare talent for a ceremony team, who knows? Your best bet is for your son to call around and see if there are three more guys who can just come out for the evening.

In one sense I agree. It's already for a "select few", so why call it a troop thing? On the other hand, we're talking older boys who can probably get a hold of a vehicle and (like more than one scout I know) go off-roading with his buddies/girlfriends and break its axle in a ravine or get it buried in mud above the wheel wells ... then, to avoid getting the 'rents angry, radio his other buddy to grab the tow truck from the fire hall ... thus getting his buddy in trouble when the chief sees that one spot of mud that was missed ... but no entry on the requisition log. I'm just saying sometimes sheltering the boys can cause the harm you're trying to avoid.

Nobody's tying your hands, but I would strongly suggest you get everyone in the same room and decide what's best for the community. Just because most of the boys are not Roman Catholic, scouting still may be better served by that CO (e.g., space for meeting/storage, your families might rather not have the boys near a bar, etc ...). On the other hand, splitting might divide your scouters into two packs. That's not always bad. Right now the Catholic boys aren't among your membership, but maybe church parishioners might step up and do more to get such boys involved in scouting if one pack was more secular and the other had a more religious bent. Whatever you all decide, try to do it while maintaining the best of terms.