qwazse

I guess this is where the rubber hits the road: if there is an opening with an across-the-board "this is how it's done", I'm against it. Troops need the latitude to ogranize in ways that work for them, then compare notes about what works and what they'd do differently. To manage the middle school age challenges, troops might rely on venturing as a "stick" for their best behaved kids. Or some folks have told me that they envision a move to rovers for 14-18 year olds. Again, that's the kind of across-the-board change that I would avoid.

@@Stosh, in recent years I've found myself at adult campfires thinking "I specifically avoided the ministry to be spared from conversations like this!"I'm not talking about what BSA proposes to offer, but what young parents come expecting ... Especially at the cub level.

@@NJCubScouter, thanks for the faint praise of us Advisors ... How do we do it? A lot of crazy mixed with a little stupid and an inability to say no to teen girls who want to hike and camp. Here's the actual secret: that goofball behavior ends when there's real work to be done. The boys still manage to be boys and the girls girls after about four miles on the trials rough rocks and bogs or when someone needs toilet paper for the latrine or the shovel to dig one. Co-Ed scouting doesn't look anything like those troop picnics. When it does, it may be the scoutmaster insists on segregating patrols by sex. When it looks like the youth want to get over themselves and work together, reassign patrols accordingly. Thus I have no problems with extending membership. But, I also am not all that bothered if it never happens.

We need to recognize that we are a post-modern nomadic culture. Previously, In modern agrarian and industrial society, Church and neighborhood used to be the family program. Gender and age specific organizations filled in the cracks. That worked because folks had a sense of permanence and little junior could be sent out to play until the street lamps came on or mild hypothermia set in. And if the tyke wound up eating at some other families house that was fine. There was plenty of trust that they'd be brought up right ... At least right enough to till land or roll steel or keep house for your mate who did. After school one day a week, we'd walk to our den leader's house and she'd give us an activity ...herself. No other parent's in the vicinity. All that has eroded for many folks. They bring their tyke to scouts looking for that community who will help them to raise their little tykes. They are hungry for human interaction because everyone is sealed up in a tin can walled off from their neighbors hours at a time each day. They are hungry for a space that recreates that neighborhood feeling ... Even for a moment. BSA has this reputation for building tent cities in nowhere, so they fill that gap by replicating it in as many families who are willing. Thus, the program we have today in Cubs, which is a little incongruent with what we are trying to do with Boys and Venturers.

Yes, I think so. It's called the trail to first class ... And then eagle.Challenge parents to walk their kids are being asked to walk. Those few who do might just be your next leaders.

So, let me get this straight ... We complain that female leaders are coming in 3 years behind in training. Hmmm I wonder what we could do to get females trained three years earlier in first class scouting skills? We complain about adults who never get trained in scouting skills. Hmmm, I wonder if there is an awards track that adults could follow to know for sure they understand what a youth in our program learns? We complain about mindless once-and-done beureaucratic poppycock requirements that boys know are dumbed down for them. Hmmm, I wonder if there's a group of kids who would love the challenge of these requirements and add life to the troop? We complain about kids getting dumped in the woods, and about them not getting dumped enough. Look, there's always going to be something we are doing wrong. But the big question is: can we open up access to some simple things that will allow some more people to do something right!

I have one relative who does yoga instruction on a paddle board. Whales and dolphins seem to be quite amused by the sight! The rest of my family, when they rent watercraft, only grab the paddleboard maybe 1 once for every 5 times they opt for kayaks!

They wouldn't have to, that's for sure. I suspect about half would mix at the unit level, and half would be unisex (most of those male). Same for patrols within co-Ed units.

This ain't confession ... so anything specific rattling around in my pre-teen head will be left unwritten! But, seriously, it's been a while since I've seen a scouting PSA that works so many angles in so quickly... Youth want to see themselves as heroes/heroins. This clip tugs on that string pretty solidly. Youth want to grow up right. So the transition to an adult plays into that desire too. Definitly the tug on the parent is well played. And, for us life guards, anybody else's heart skip a beat over a boy "going" without support?

First, who is gonna tell my SM how to organize patrols in his own troop? I'm the sort who leaves the room and tells the youth to segregate with the thought that they will be a team who has to hold together for at least a year. If I come back and a patrol has older+younger scouts or life+tenderfoot or girls+boys (under some hypothetical rules change) or maybe one of each of those categories ... I'm working with it. Who's gonna make me change? If my SM would rather do a little micromanaging, even though it's not how I'd do it. I'm assisting him ... that's what the patch on my sleeve says. If some other SM wants to toss youth-lead out the window and create the older-life-girls, older-life-boys, older-tenderfoot-girls, etc ... patrols with the youth in each having roughly identical characteristics, nobody's gonna revoke his charter. Second, I don't broker in hypothetical's from armchair quarterbacks. So unless that member of the "against" crowd is hiking 4 miles into bear country with my supper in his/her pack, I'm not likely to accommodate the anxieties of his/her constituents. The reason why Venturing works when it does is not because our youth have naturally shed that boyish or girlish behavior by age 14. It's because advisors won't let the crew officers put up with such shenanigans, and that get's sent down the chain. I suspect something of the sort would happen in the younger divisions of scouting.

Adult focused?I'm pretty sure 11-year-old me would think "I wanna be that guy."

Well, paperwork is a huge difference. You're not beholden to report your venture patrol to council. Crews have a separate charter, so if your boys want to join one, it's another application (youth until age 18, adult age 18+). Plus, the separate unit pays a rechartering fee every year Also, networking: your venture patrol does not have to touch base with anyone besides the patrols in your troop and they answer only to you. A crew is responsible to provide representatives to the council venturing officers association. Then the council VOA is supposed to recommend youth for Area and Region VOAs, and ultimately the national cabinet. The president of the latter is asked to report on scouting to Congress and POTUS. Needless to say, advisors often pitch in to help transport these dedicated youth. (A similar structure can be seen in O/A.) I think this is especially relevant to the sister who wants to talk to you. You should ask how involved she or anyone in the crew is with the council VOA.

Interesting comments at roundtable tonight: One scouter returned from World Jamboree and concluded "If's all about scouting, not boy scouting!" Another scouter said, "That's why I [didn't volunteer in a direct-contact position with BSA but rather] pushed paperwork for everyone. My daughter and wife wanted me to take THEM camping."

My observations concur. But these are problems that can only be solved if more girls are brought in on the same education track as boys. By the time scouts who enter the program at 14 (summer camp at probably 15) have sufficient skills to mentor another youth in outdoor living, they are on their way to college or war. The only solution that I can think of that doesn't involve BSA going full-on co-ed is granting Venturing and GSUSA to use the trail to First Class as part of their training program for young women. And as @@pargolf44067's pretzel-ignition anecdote indicates ... this is a problem many parents of young women have no interest in solving.

My comeback: STREAM ... Gotta put some recreation in there for the phys ed. guys!

We've learned that "quickly" is the only way to handle these things. I've known young female staff to be hesitant to speak up in those situations. This is especially true when they've had to tell us about one of our boys. (It's actually hilarious. They walk into camp and before they even open their mouth the, SM says, "Let me guess, [insert problem scout's name here].") And her reticence is for good reason, I am more than willing to haul home a troublemaker if he crosses that line. She doesn't want to be responsible for that cascade of events. I point out that it's the first week of summer and a long way to the end of session, and staff deserve to work in an environment where it's not made any longer on account of ill-mannered boys. I suspect; however, that many of those boys would have "sanded away" those kinds of behaviors in their units if they were brought up co-ed. So life as a female staff might get a little easier. But to make sure we are "sanding" smoothly, most of us would benefit from some coaching from our British counterparts or maybe the Campfire USA folks on what to look out for with co-ed Webelos and middle-schoolers.

@@Sentinel947, you and I have be brought up to think of this as a "kids award" in a "kids game". Those are working assumptions that came along in the mid '60s, about the same time as the "pencil whipping" required elements of the award began to increase. Just keep that in the back of your mind as I ask us to mull this over ... Several reasons: not the least of which is the increasingly maddening bureaucracy of the age 18 deadline for this award and the age 21 deadline for venturing silver. But, beyond that: Adults should learn scouting skills ... but does that "trained" patch on their sleeve actually mean that they've done it? Different training tracks are expensive. How about one consolidated training track administered continuously at the unit level by seasoned SPLs and PLs that applies to both youth and their direct contact leaders ... rather than an adult training track on a district level. Boys seeing adults learning things = inspiration. Does it make Eagle a bigger part of the program? Let's just say every SM and ASM manages to earn it over the course of 15 years ... that's maybe a 10% bump in awards. Look out central supply! More 18 year olds are postponing entering college or the military. We all know about the boys who turn 17 and realize that they really would like that bling after all. Maybe one or two of them would make great ASM's ... if only we had a hook that would make them feel like they were accomplishing something while they served. If advancement is available to girls, that means more female adult leaders .. all of whom will have never been on the trail to Eagle. The increase in "armchair quarterbacks" could lead to more troops with poor advancement programs.

The new guy brings up an old discussion, but maybe there are some fresh opinions ... Well, like @@desertrat77 I know of one sister who, in spite of some good years venturing, was resentful of her brothers (one older and one younger) going off camping every month. That said, @@T2Eagle, for every one of those young women I know of dozens who are more than happy to hunker down in their GS troop. GSUSA will hardly feel the dent. So don't think of it as providing benefits to "the other half". Maybe opportunity (assuming that all scouters would welcome such a change with enthusiasm and announce the open door to every girl and sonless mom in their community -- a big ask), but for a very long time the program will benefit boys more than girls. The handbook would need a rewrite to address things like peer pressure etc... from both sex's viewpoint. A simple minded example: my most involved older venturers learned to skimp on the prom dress. @@Eagledad, we might want to consider other things that lead our volunteers to continue scouting in ignorance. Foremost might be removing the 18th birthday deadline on earning Eagle. And requiring all direct contact leaders to be 1st Class Scouts. My Czech scout informs me that of the four troops in his "entity" (he couldn't find the word for it, but it sounds close to what we would call very small districts), two are co-ed, one is all male, one is all female. I suspect something similar would happen here, as has happened in venturing. But, as I mentioned earlier, AHG and TLUSA may beat BSA to the punch as they are working from the top down to devise common awards and representation at national activities.

@@MattR, my one peeve about being a parent and advisor is that everyone in my crew refuses to call me by my 1st name. Same-aged youth in other crews ... no problem! And this is after years of E-mails without "Mr. Q" anywhere in the by-line! One more thing: Venturing Officers' Association. Find out if your council has one. You'll want your lead youth to commit to contributing to it.

I don't know if it aired on TV anywhere. I found it on a Facebook link to Buzz-feed or some such sight. The friend who shared it was not a scout.

@@blw2, cut the callers off at 50 sessions a week. That'll leave plenty of free time.

Scouts South Africa going viral:

@@MattR, this is a complex situation that needs a lot of untangling. If you personally know of some female adults who buy into how you've applied the patrol method, you could encourage them to get together with your CO and start a crew. If you have an ASM who can step into your role so you can be an Advisor, that would work. If your committee was willing to let these girls use the same location and times as troop meetings so that you would be an available resource, that could work too. The BSA's patchwork system makes for extra paperwork so you would need a committee member dedicated to making sure this works for these girls. A crew needs a couple of extremely flexible adults willing to get training network and ask for help at every turn. Clearly these girls need someone who takes "youth led" seriously enough to let them fail half the time. The gear depends on the adventure. Determining and procuring it is part of the adventure. Maybe the current crew needs a unit commish or someone to ask "Why the iron fists?" Or, maybe they need these girls to move on to greener pasture. No way to tell. Look in the mirror and ask yourself "how crazy are you?" If it talks back, you might just be it. It has been someone for me to see a handful of young women go from naive to ready to hike into and bed down in the wilderness. I'm having a hard time getting that cycle to repeat, but even if it doesn't outlast my time as advisor, it will have been worth it.

I dunno, I can be surrounded by an entourage of scouts, and still feel those miles. Frankly, I kinda wish every candidate for the office were required to do this instead of those horrific debates. I would far rather judge a person on how they handle a dinner of grubs and lichen than how they doll up for a camera. In fact, Mrs. Palin won my heart with a picture of her fishing some coho salmon. She lost it when she wore some high fashion outfits that GOP staff had bought her for the convention. So, is POTUS trying to impress guys like us? Well, yes. Is it narcissistic? It depends on if he thinks his message is for the sake of our legacy vs. his own.

I'm jealous.