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Point: I have a scout with ADHD who is struggling to master knots. He’s doing it, but it’s a challenge. How is it fair to him if your scouts can advance without knowing how to tie all of the knots that they should?

Counter-point: is the SM testing on land navigation? Safe swim defense? Fire building? Cooking? Bill of rights? Pull-ups? If not, why is the conference only covering a fraction of he skills a scout should have?

8 hours ago, T2Eagle said:

From the referenced news article the BSA's attorney  "Ashida retorted that in its nearly 120-year history the Boy Scouts have never had a firearm fatality. "That's never happened, " he said."

If that's true …

It’s not true. All of the standard operating procedures didn’t come out of thin air. Someone somewhere got hurt.

There’s a thread somewhere in this forum about a suicide at camp.

It may be that the quote is out of context. On a range following protocols to the letter, it’s hard to imagine how a fatality could occur.

I hope to high heaven that 4-H has never experienced anything like this.

9 hours ago, T2Eagle said:

… I'm astounded by the poor judgment on the part of every adult present.  How is it that none of them recognized how wrong an idea it was to bring their own completely inappropriate arsenal to a scout camp.  

How this happens? The modern interpretation of second amendment rights lends itself to gun enthusiasts who are not (possibly never were) part of a well-trained local militia.

It's nice that some years back, leaders of the pack and troop thought that some money should flow in the direction the troop treasurer observed flowing. They had their reasons. But ...

If your units did not have by-laws approved by the units and the CORs (and therefore the CO), then that is not an ensconced policy. So the reply to the troop treasurer should be, "Great, show me the by-laws specifying what should be transferred so the treasurer can note it the memo."

11 minutes ago, TWP said:

Yeah I don't want to put myself in a role where the initial reaction everyone has is that it's sketchy. I have done nothing to deserve that and I am not ok with being seen that way. If that's how people feel and I have to work to convince every single person I meet that I'm normal then I'm out

Don’t blame the organization or its members. Blame the people who took advantage of it and the subculture that encouraged them to act that way.

Personally, I don’t care if a scouter from other parts would show up with or without children of his/her own. I’m letting him/her in slowly.

My advice: show up at round table in your district. Look for training opportunities. Have fun.

Meanwhile, participate in local clubs that do activities related to the merit badges that you counsel. Those adults might have other connections that you might enjoy making.

The council or the one it merged with could still have a record of that award.

The local library should have community newspapers for that period.

21 hours ago, RememberSchiff said:

Well said. Then are these raw membership numbers sufficient to determine if a demographic is under-served, disinterested, priced-out, ...?

No. National and regional polls of youth who are not in scouting and their families would begin to answer that. But, knowing the numbers might help BSA ask better questions.
Moreover, similar reports from BSA and other Title 36 organizations would give policy makers a sense of how their constituents could be served.

On 5/5/2023 at 11:04 PM, RememberSchiff said:

Should demographic data (gender, race, religion,...) be included in the National Annual Report? Or is a scout is a scout, albeit in different age groups?

If your biggest brag over the last decade has been about opening more program to girls, yes enumerating by sex would be your national duty. This is a global concern and intrinsic to WOSM’s census( https://members.scout.org/membership-report-methodology)

If your elected representatives are claiming to address the needs of minorities and seeking programs that do that, you should report the information that you’ve collected on the matter.

There are reasonable constitutional concerns about reporting religion to elected officials. On the other hand, the changing landscape of support from faith-based nonprofits due to recent lifting of statues of limitations would be of immediate concern to legislators.

Financials should matter to elected officials, but congress does not seem to be all that bothered about dept.

10 hours ago, RememberSchiff said:

…."There are now more than 119,610 young women in Scouting, and 4,613 have attained the rank of Eagle Scout. …

So, roughly 10% of youth members are female. Now, why couldn’t Mosby up and say that in the annual report?

14 minutes ago, InquisitiveScouter said:

Because sexual mores are very different here in the US.  I remember my time in Sweden, when I had discussions with many Swedes about views on sex.  Very different.  Still....

I didn’t want to imply that liability for youth heterosexual assault (or even unwanted consensual relations) was the sole mover.

There is also a sincere belief among Americans that youth do better in a unisex environment. Exactly how they do better is an open question. The developmental psychology of it all really doesn’t matter. Parents do vote with their feet. The fastest growing scouting organizations in the world are generally unisex. The fastest shrinking division in BSA, Venturing, was predominantly co-ed. Our execs see England and Sweden as either 1) an anomaly or 2) a long term strategy that  won’t recoup the boys lost for decades.

Lacking a popular elected leader to insist that things change, in the eyes of BSA sees turning fully coed as catering to the few at the expense of the many.

This is very simple: what policy is most likely to forestall death?

Do that.

4 hours ago, AwakeEnergyScouter said:

…. You just need a little common-sense coordination like all gender A out of the tent so gender B can change and then switch.

@AwakeEnergyScouter, you and your dad were in an organization that did not face staggering litigation for damages when someone from gender A assaulted someone from gender B.

I discussed the BSA’s legal situation with several Scandinavian scouters, and they couldn’t imagine that the staggering scenario that we face would happen to any organization in their country.

10 minutes ago, fred8033 said:

We need to transition to a troop is a troop.  Troops can choose to be boys only, girls only OR boys & girls.  IMHO, we're in 2023.  If YPT is address, this should not be an issue.

@fred8033, the historic and persistent 4x rate of sexual assault upon young women vs. young men in the US, (2021 YBRS summary here) and no proof that coed groups can avert this all but guarantees that segregated units will be preferred for the near future.

That’s pretty much the way we do it.

There are different ways to handle if someone is not present. Usually it’s something like:

PL: Five present, two accounted for.

SPL: Who is missing and  how are they accounted?

PL: Bob and Joe are escorting Mr. Q to the medic to remove a fishing lure from his head.

SPL (saluting): Thank you.

[Patrol yells.]

Boy’s Life used to demonstrate this stuff via their comics. I don’t keep back issues, and the online archive isn’t indexed terribly well.

‘schiff’s $.01 is pure copper, so worth more than most of ours …

I’m not too bothered by brevity. I didn’t previous recent reports that killed ink with large fonts and half-page images.

The other obfuscation is not splitting by sex. We don’t know if nationally we lost boys, girls or both.

The H/A stat is cherry picked.

On 4/29/2023 at 3:56 AM, Cambridgeskip said:

…That kids who are not scouts just do not get it in terms of youth leadership?

We get that a lot. The crossovers are pretty clear on the concept. (I think the most recent curriculum is especially helpful.) Others that age need to warm up to it. It can be source of some behavior issues for the boy whose gotten used to ignoring his parents, and now there’s this older youth to whom he must answer.
Last week, our SPL touched base with us about one such 1st year. The good news was that the scout’s parents are very supportive and respect all of the new “older brothers” assigned to their son! 

8 hours ago, Calion said:

Could you quote anywhere, in any of those books, where it is covered in sufficient detail? Such that someone could actually do it?
...

Yes.

• https://troopresources.scouting.org/team-building-activities/ in reading to the troop the instructions for "Hi-Lo", the SPL specifies when patrols should give their yell.
• https://troopresources.scouting.org/knot-tying-skill-activities/  in reading to the troop the instructions for "Taut-Line Hitch Race"

This is sufficient detail without making the SPL feel obliged to fit it into every possible game or activity.

Beyond that, the SPL can and should confer with the PLC as to when and how they should be directed to do their yells. You note the page on "silent commands". That is not intended to be an exhaustive list. The PLC could decide on a signal for each patrol to give their yell.

17 hours ago, Calion said:

…

“Scoutmaster, how do you tie a bowline knot?”

“By tying it."

The correct response is “have you asked your PL?”

Sometimes I say, “Can you use an index?” If not, I show them how to navigate their handbook.

With our crossovers, I do ask, “Can you read?” And make clear that I understand that some kids can’t and may need a buddy to help them.

It’s a big country. There’s no set way for an SPL to call for patrol yell. He may decides with the PLC how this should be done. Troops are allowed to have their own flow … their own way to communicate.

if you haven’t looked yet, give inquiry.net a browse. It has some pointers from older handbooks.

On 4/21/2023 at 3:34 PM, Calion said:

… Shall we have Scouts figure out how to tie knots without instruction as well?

For the record, I learned how to tie most of my knots from the handbook. (Or, later, the pioneering merit badge pamphlet.) Instruction serves the scouts who are having trouble on their own, and a troop may have many or few of those for any particular topic.

What does that mean? I won’t invest a lot of time on knot instructions if the scouts seem to get it. I might instead find times when a local pool is available for swimming instruction. I usually ask the PLC what they think is their members’ weakest scout skill, then I try to provide a program option that they could develop.

If I’ve gone over with the SPL all of my suggested for patrol years, and he is only having patrols give their yells at the start of some competition, I’m okay with that — as long as the patrols know their identity, look out for their members, and are each amassing time on other essential scout skills.

4 hours ago, Calion said:

How can the answer to “when and how does the SPL call for patrol yells?” be “YES!”?

I think @InquisitiveScouter is jokingly saying that it’s up to the SPL (with the guidance of the SM) to determine the “when” and “how.”
One size need not fit all.

@AwakeEnergyScouter, also try contacting WOSM Asia Pacific Region, https://www.scout.org/where-we-work/regions/asia-pacific/region If I find the card of one of the representatives who I met at the World Scout Jamboree, I’ll PM you with his info.

If come August, you get absolutely no where, while I’m at the next WSJ, I’ll stroll over to the Nepali troop’s campsite and let the leaders know that a stranger on the internet would like to talk to them.

They should be a part of every roll call — be it meeting or activity.

Our troop is finding it really hard to inculcate in our scouts. That’s partly because we present colors very first, and so many scouts are still drifting in. I would rather scouts have a 10-15 minute activity before gathering for colors. But, institutional inertia is harder to correct than the course of the Queen Mary.

5 hours ago, RangerEagle said:

... Never worked with district or council before. How beneficial do you find roundtables and district executives? ...

Roundtables are like a box of chocolates. You never know quite what you're going to get. But, I think cub leaders benefit the most from them as they learn about programs that may interest their pack.

On 4/8/2023 at 1:33 PM, InquisitiveScouter said:

And yet, you named them "friends"... the horror 😛 LOL

Among us Mediterranean types living just north of the Mason-Dixon line west of the Appalachian hills, there were two kinds of people: friends (largely ignorant of spices like garlic and anise) and cousins (people whose plain cooking was high-end restaurant fare in them big cities).

On 4/8/2023 at 2:02 PM, AwakeEnergyScouter said:

Are these Westerners who have never made Bolognese sauce? 😯 Who are these people who don't cook with garlic?? You have to tell us more about this.

@AwakeEnergyScouter, you don't even want to know what folks in my town would associate with that fine city in northern Italy! In pockets of this country, there still remains a dearth of experience with European cooking. (For fun, check out the PastaGrammar series on YouTube.) I love my high school classmates dearly, but I may very well be the only one among them whose first introduction to Swedish meatballs was courtesy of a roommate from that country and not from a furniture store!

PA and WV are well known for ramps and other edibles that are about to spring up along the stream banks and ridge lines; however, there are still scouts who stare at me blankly as I pick the fare for my next salad while hiking.

We have a lot to learn from each other. And, if we do, our palates will be very happy.

Back to the OP. We aim to have some sort of basic ingredients that scouts can safely cook, then we try to teach them how to add the things that boost flavor and nutrition. I often will challenge our boys to think of their favorite meal that their parents make at home, learn how they make it (possibly inviting their buddies over so Mom and Dad can teach a half-dozen of them at a time), and try to replicate it at camp.

On 4/4/2023 at 7:39 PM, AwakeEnergyScouter said:

This must depend on the families in the troop, because that is absolutely not what happens at our house 😱

Shouldn't we model and teach good, healthy food?

Half the fun of scouting is learning what passes for food at other people’s houses. (For me, I realized that my friends had no idea what garlic was for.)