qwazse

Why else? To distinguish the boy who still is a Webelos and earned his AoL from the boy who is working on that Scout rank and earned his AoL once upon a time. It's not all about the epaulets! Bottom line: the only insignia a cub can carry over to his hour scout uniform is the AoL. (Okay, and service stars.)

So, just to boil the frog a little longer ... Say a PL gets his boys astronaut certified and they hitch a ride to the space station and spend a couple nights in one of these inflatable space habitats. (Just for the sake of argument let's say the tenderfoot installs and expands the thingamy using robotic controls. And let's assume that any of the survival training he would have gotten to be flight-ready was done before he joined the troop so those nights wouldn't count.) Campout? It is kinda-sorta canvas ... just like most land-base tents these days. The boy kinda-sorta pitched it. If they had spaced-walked to do it, the safety committee would have had a fit. (I'm sure there's some COPE regulation about climbing above 200,000 feet.) There's bound to be a cool patch for it. Not-a-campout? Technically, it's more over the open-sky than under it. There'd be a lot of engineers involved. The equivalent of helicopter parents ... except helicopters in microgravity are probably more like torpedoes! How many nights? Sun sets every 90 minutes. Maybe far-fetched. But fun. And let's face it, any six of them might make less of a payload than any three of us!

Your main concern should be the safety of the boys. If she is a woman of integrity, that shouldn't be a problem. Your second concern should be the maturity of the youth. It really is on the ASM(s) and SM to gauge this. If you have boys who are prone to talking mean and being rude they could give her a bad impression of scouting. Worst case, one of them might take advantage of the opportunity to make a false accusation. The best defense against that is to be sure she's taken youth protection and any other courses your CO might require of direct contact adults. But, if your direct contact leaders think they have a handle on this, and if you think she can "get with the program", then yes, let the SM have it his way. If I were you, I would suggest strongly to the ASMs who may also be on the trip to step up their game and tend the boys for a while so the couple can get some time to themselves. They definitely should honor the separate sleeping arrangement. It's a good thing to model for the boys. Needless to say, if she's any good with this outdoor stuff, give her an adult app and ask her to take on an official role. Will this wrankle some of your MCs? Yes. Will some crew advisor who's short on female adults one day be grateful to you that he won't have to turn down a group of young ladies on account of lack of co-ed leadership? I certainly would.

On the Bryan's forum, SMMatt revealed that his SPL/PLs were deadlocked and came to him for a ruling. Thus, his post. Well, my advice was based my standard "never ask for a rule" shtick. It's really hard in our metric-oriented society to come to a committee meeting with "Scoutmaster's report: This month, encouraged the PLC to keep the conversation going regarding FC requirement 4e. Would ask all adults to patiently sit on their hands while the boys sort this out."

So, Stosh, those Adirondacks that a patrol might cross-country ski to ... if a boy cooks up a beef stew with portabella mushrooms and brown rice followed by tiramisu made from scratch over the outdoor hearth for his mates ... just like he planned with his buddies ... should his PL not sign off on FC req. 4e? "Put your book away kid, Mr. Stosh says this ain't camping ... ... Hey, can I get another cup of that mulled cider before we tuck in for the night?" P.S. - Matt and I were kicking this around all by ourselves on http://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/forums/topic/what-constitutes-a-campout/. Thanks guys for promptly lighting things up here!

Here's an example of "without the patch" leadership: Our older boys want to amp up their cooking skills, and we've had surplus from the last couple campouts. So, we devoted a few meetings to cooking dinner. Son #2 is now the oldest in the troop, and needs to knock off cooking MB anyway, so this is a good synergy for him. I guess if we were making a "chef" patch, it would be on his shoulder. But last week, another scout suggested adding empanadas to the menu. (SM is a true meat-and-potatoes guy, so just watching the fellow look it up on the web was worth the price of admission.) Anyway that scout made sure Son #2 had a decent recipe and knew what additional ingredients were needed for this week. The boys cooked up a storm. Now Son #2 is no narcissist (most days), but he does want his last month as a youth in the troop to be memorable. The other scout didn't do much in terms of prep, but nudged in a direction that the other boys were excited about. I'd say one was filling a "POR", the other servant leading. Together, they made for a patrol of happy bellies (including mine and Mrs. Q's).

Props to your boys. And to you being foolish enough to listen to them. See if you can get them to work down that list of 43 invites! A signed invite and follow-up phone call from a scout could go a long way in earning your unit some street cred. About half of that list probably have settled on a troop, but not turned in paperwork. There is no way this should cause bad blood at RT. A district needs every troop to be casting a net.

Yep, that will discourage a boy in no time fast. I have to say that this is one of the tough nuts to crack ... helping a youth to be directive and not offensive. IMHO, there's no POR in particular that requires a boy to step out of his shell like that. SPL, maybe, but I've seen some of those stuck worrying about being seen as a drill sergeant. (I've seen others who could have stood to worry about that a little more than they did. ) The only routine situation where that kind of behavior gets driven out of a young person fast is life-guarding. The risk is too great for any of them to play "Mr. nice guy" for any length of time. I think a lot of boys who opt for scouting over sports have that "gentle soul" and don't quite know how to manage it.

Sorry, just playing on words. Your earlier post said "defiantly" instead of "definitely" -- auto-corrected, I suspect. Work with your boys for a while and they'll tease you for less. Sounds like nobody's holding your past against you, and you're on the right track. Have fun at UoS!

I hope you are compliantly in as a den leader! I think this was your last hurdle. Now get as much training and you can spare time for and help those boys have some fun!

On Bryan on Scouting's forum I wound up wasting words on a fella with a fear-based decision tree: I’d love to see an “ask the expert†response on how to let kids go off without adults and not see yourself arrested for child endangerment or abandonment.

I prefer to avoid the expression because it is no mere myth, but a Disneyfication: http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=wildlifenews.view_article&articles_id=56 It seems like the the run-off-the-cliff is better depicted by certain flightless bipeds.

E94-a1: your districts' personality clashes aren't going away with a merger. Your activity coordinator needles to lighten up and make amends and everyone whose been offended by her needs to get the burrs out of their butts. If they don't do that, no amount of merging is gonna help. You'll be living with these folks wanting to take jabs at each other long after most of them have moved on to other things.

A thread about a missing QM brought up the problem of a scout who (maybe for good reason) does not do social media. I've only known one boy who as PL made a call to the household of each one of his members. Often they are uncomfortable with that. Do any of you work with your boys in improving their power of personal contact?

The big tent is ripping over this, regardless ... and will continue to do so as long as someone on one part of the country is bothered about the attitude of someone on the other part of the country. At some point we'll have to get out our thread and start stitching. Hopefully before the rain comes ...

Wonder if they can now open every meeting with a moment of prayer?

Meetings with POTUS do not happen every year. Last time the did was three years ago.

Again you are talking about an existing train wreck .... that elephant is in another room. I suspect most youth are indignant about the whole proposition. I figure most of my 18+ year olds aren't gonna bother with the application and be out the door regardless of orientation. They simply won't feel like bothering with one more piece of paperwork. If a couple of indignant homosexuals are out the door as well, I'll probably never know.

Okay folks, the real elephant in the room is this: Suppose Scoutson had enrolled at Pitt then joined my crew for some spring break trip, and was "a little chatty" with one of my HS girls. You betcha her dad would be calling me asking me what I "really" knew about "that guy" and all but guaranteeing that his daughter would not be going on any crew outing until I knew his back-story in full. When a flag goes, up on an adult ... every unit in which he/she is registered is notified. Thus, when the lawyer comes looking for who to blame for a repeat statutory violation, BSA can say it's done due diligence.

If they are generally compliant fellows, I don't worry about it. I just tell them that although they don't have a patch on their sleeve, they still need to figure out how they'll demonstrate scout spirit and leave a positive mark on their troop and in their community. In your case, I would ask these guys if they could take it on rotation to assist the QM. Every week at least one of them should ask "How can I help you?" They already know it's a thankless job, so being there for him will help him fill good about his work. Then ask the boys to give you a quick summary of how they think their young QM is doing and if there's something above his pay-grade that the four of them could pitch in and do. (E.g., fill those propane tanks. Chase down signatures for trailer registration.) In effect, you're treating these boys as JASMs without giving them the patch.