qwazse

Bringing it back on course, these various economic and political situations impact the availability of den chiefs. When I was a scout, my parents had more free time as Dad was nearing retirement. He or mom could get me across town to where a den needed a den chief. Or, we had two cars and I was old enough to drive there. (Honestly can't remember which.) I'm pretty sure the pack I was DCing for was not the one associated with our troop's CO. My SM would never put it this way, but he was not about to be bothered by the burrs up anyone's butt. So if a Cubmaster came to me asking for a den chief, I would get the word out to my best venturers to see if any of them could spare the time. I know one young lady who would be ideal for the job .... The thought of recruiting those lil' buggers for my crew would be the last thing on my mind. I've seen the best laid plans fall through too often. In your case Tim, I would start calling around to every troop and crew, starting with the nearest and working your way out to a twenty minute drive away. You might need to visit a meeting and personally make your need known to the scouts/venturers. You should definitely make your need known to your sister troop, but keep an open mind. Round here, if there is a "slippery slope" every one gets out sleds or puts on skis!

I feel your pain. I need a crew nag!

I'm sorry, I thought it was you who complained that BPSA should care about what the good founder wanted. He wanted women to step up to the position of SM. Did he realize that co-Ed units would eventually follow? Anyway BPSA is a protest to BSA's catholicism. Just like the religious movements the one claims to be pushing a greater reformation toward its origins, while he other is vying for universal acceptance (at least by what it perceives to be its base).

Troop: Committee Chair. Crew: Advisor with help of CC. We try to get a couple of folks to review the charter before handing of to IH. We also try to get rolling a couple of parent meeting cycles before deadline, so if an issue comes up we can bring it before the committee. (Already had a general discussion of how to handle some issues at this month's troop committee meeting.)

Posts need to recruit young vets. You may want to ask your DE if anybody keeps track of scouts/venturers returning from their tours. You get where I'm going with this. You can offer your your IH a list of warm contacts who he can call with the line "one of the things our post does is support a troop, maybe if you pay is a visit on a scout night, I'll introduce you to them." He would be doing you a favor by giving the boys some adults to talk to about military life, you would be doing him a favor by bringing some vets through the door.

Yep, your swimming upstream. But if you want to hear from COs and get some idea how scouting is working for them, that's as good a way as any. If you're thinking that you'd get good volunteers for committees, brace yourself for disappointment. For example, our COR is not a nuts-and-bolts guy. He just wants to make sure the church and the pack/troop/crew are working well together. When we did have an involved COR, he ran afoul of the SM at the time. His hanging around district folks only helped sew further mistrust. Dysfunction? Yep. One more disincentive for a COR to bother with district stuff? Yep.

I've received lots like the above, so it took me a while to remember one that makes especially proud ... Occasionally on a troop/crew swim, I'll here a couple of boys say "Let's dunk Mr. Q!" It's nice to know they think I'm still worth the effort.

Who's paying for the materials? If the CO is willing to accept the bump in cost, it might be worth doing. The IH may have seen a number of functions in the old pavilion when the crowd was at or over capacity. Sometimes the problem with Eagle advisors is that it puts a layer of bureaucracy between the boy and the beneficiary. We have been very fortunate in that our IH has been willing to work closely with the boys to support them when their project was at the CO. Get the scout at the table with the IH and see if they can set a reasonable goal for making this work.

I don't think it is "misogyny" to support male leaders for boys and female leaders for girls. True, Pere. But it isn't scouting. In his speech, BP was explicitly encouraging male and female scoutmasters (not committee members, not assistants) for "these young lads" (not lasses). It became obvious fairly early on, that the best leader available for a group of boys may be female. BP said nothing that would give anyone an excuse to stand her way. It's not clear that he would be bothered by young men and women sharing the same scouting unit in this day and age.

Yep, sinking tide grounds all boats ... The trick in scouting is figuring out what resources you do have, and leveraging them to the hilt.

T, I grew up a townie in farming/mining county. Advantages: Excellent campsites a walk out the back door. None our troop used were more than 40 minutes away. Webelos DL taught you how to shoot his 38 special. We all knew gun safety since most of the cubs had already been taught shotgun or rifle by our dads or brothers. Council HQ was a special road trip that SM would take as rarely as possible. (I guess folks who didn't like being a backwater saw that as a disadvantage.) Shooting sports? Practice in your back yard. Fire starting practice weekly on trash burn day. The main disadvantage was the scout shop in our town wasn't viable. We wound up having to drive a ways to get uniforms, sleeping bags, etc ....

those go out for coffee kind of conversations and I certainly dont take sides, but instead try to listen to both sides. But when you get to that level of conversation, those parents usually don't just jump up and agree. In this case, I prefer the get-yourself-invited-for-dinner kind of conversations. In my consulting business, I charge more if I'm more likely to be ignored.

But Beav, There'll be lots of new paddle boards and ATV's!

Hope it works out for everyone involved. It's not that parents' opinions don't matter, but we always have to keep in mind what empowers our kids. At one point in his soccer career Son #1 was not happy about the time he spent on the varsity bench. I kinda agreed, and I know the coach would have been happy to hear from me about it. But, I told the boy to have a conversation with the coach about what he would have to improve in order to be called off the bench sooner.

We had an end-of-summer campfire COH last month. I shared my beading with a young lady who earned our crew's first bronze award. I had her make a binder of her work so we would both have something for folks to look through. Not a big crowd, but just the right balance of youth and adults. (And my stash of chocolate and marshmallows got ate down!)

Our district is about 80% suburban. Our troop, although meeting in a "country church" is full of families who I nickname "North Side Refugees". They have some of the best growing up stories (including visiting their classmates in the State Penitentiary). Urban scouts have a wider variety of service projects. For example, my crew hosts a flag placement evening in a very large cemetery that includes otherwise neglected Grand Army of the Republic markers. It brings units from all over the district together in a part of town that they normally avoid. One SM from the suburbs was taken aback by the sheer history of the place. On the flip side, there seems to be a disparity in camping opportunities. Some urban boys are attracted to our suburban troop because we get out more. I'm drinking my coffee right now where an urban youth ministry is trying to start a troop. They are two blocks away from our SPL, but I'm pretty sure I won't have to worry about them recruiting him. Boy-led gangs aren't very well favored around here.

That's funny. Amish don't use zippers. Didn't you ever watch The Witness?

Frank, No offence, but being stuck in that cabin with y'all is a bit more than this scouter can handle most weekends. Slightly more than twenty years ago, my mom put two and two together one snowy night as I was packing for camp and said, "You're not going to sleep in that snow are you?" I replied, "Well, yeah. Just like I did last year and the year before." The freak factor hasn't changed.

Thanks 'Skip, 1. I think I will share this with my crew. 2. You post older and wiser than you look! 3. Love the falconry!

The Pacific Crest Trail? Sounds fun. But you'll likely need a longer range plan. It's a rare group of sixth graders who are fit for such an adventure. And usually, you need monthly hiking weekends about eight months in advance so your team gets conditioned to the concept, the terrain, their limitations, their gear. (Doesn't matter how light it is, you still gotta be real comfortable using it.) Usually 8th graders start to be able to get their heads around that kind of challenge -- thus the age range of BSA's venturing program. Of course if they haven't kicked each other legless on the soccer field, they'd be physically fit ... But that's only part of the equation.

Soccer will gut a weekend schedule. I'm not one for Sunday sports, but was so thankful when my kids grew into the Sunday leagues. (It left Friday and Saturday's free to camp.) The boys in Son #1's den were the same way. Skit after skit after skit! Even after they were in their tents. We could count on him coming home Sunday and wanting to do nothing but shower and sleep. Anyway, if your daughter is coming home whipped after every outing, that could be a reason why she's not keen on doing too many. Sleep hygiene is a serious challenge at this age. For some reason, folks frown on 10 year olds and matches. You'll probably hear some such advice in training. We cut son #2 some slack at that age one summer because he and his buddy had cleared a perfect fire ring, made a small teepee, with tinder in the middle, larger logs at the ready to the side. They asked if they could light it, and his buddy's dad and I gave them some slack and handed them the matches -- no doubt violating the letter of some camp rule in the process. But there has to be a greater law out there about honoring flawless execution. Anyway, fire starting is best practiced at meetings in a nearby campfire ring. With 8 kids, it takes a lot of teamwork to let only one of them light the match. And that applies to my venturers at times! My co-advisor (also a GS mom) always let her girls build fires. Never had a problem with young women being able to accomplish this on their own. I'll gather wood, but I personally only bother to light the fire anymore when everyone else gives up: e.g. rained all day, temps dropped, or discord has wrought failure and the risk of hypothermia is high. (BTW, in many 3rd world countries, fire starting is women's work.) I would jump at the chance to hike 5 days straight with my crew or troop. (Doing that on a hike across my county with my SM and two other boys at age 18 was one of those formative experiences.) But beyond summer camp my youth only seem to make time in their schedule if it's an expensive high adventure week. I know other guys manage to schedule weeks away with their units. [envy] Anyway, sounds like you have a decent plan that can flex with the girls' interest as they grow. Have fun!

Howe, let me rephrase. I have the dubious privilege of dealing with young women whose troops did not camp frequently between ages 11 and 13. They resent it vocally, and we need to encourage them to tone down the anti-GSUSA rhetoric. Only because they couldn't get "ALL" their fellow scouts on the camping train. If you want to produce more of those girls, let them settle for a campout a year.(This message has been edited by Qwazse)

RK, you are right in waiting until you can get nearly all the boys in the same room. And I can certainly relate to the autumn disruptions. This is a decision that can wait. Keep in mind that in waiting to long, boys might realize that they can do things differently anyway.

That's crazy y'all! Our pros make copies at hq for RTs. Not sure what budget it comes from. Don't know how much of RT comes out of pocket. Although, I did have a commish once reproduce a slide presentation he asked me to do in full color hard copies. I felt bad because it really was a lot of ink for little content. But the material was all new to him and he was excited about it.

Fine. I'll just talk to the hand Hand, what is a reasonable number of outdoor overnight activities that should be offered to the average group of 10 year olds? [Hand raises four fingers.] Does that include some kind of week long summer camp. [Hand puts thumb up.] Should I tell someone to lower their bar if one girl says one overnight/year is enough? OUch! [Hand slaps.] Get the training you all need. Take the girls camping once. Have fun. Go the next time they ask.