RangerT

From personal experience with my own boys I still believe that the BSA made a huge mistake back in 1989 when they made Webelos a two year program. With a year of Tigers, then Wolf, then Bear its no wonder to me that after a year in Webelos they are ready to move on to something new like boy scouts. With the dismal turnover in numbers of Webelos to boy scouts these days some Webelos leaders feel they failed when in truth the fact remains that four years in Cubs is enough for most boys. 2nd year Webelos get tired of doing crafts and activity badges, they are ready for new challenges and the prog

There has been a rumor going around in my council that the OA is considering opening membership to all Venturers as well. What emb21 posted is the current policy for the OA. The story I hear is that National is concerned about the growing decline in membership in many OA lodges and that making the OA a "scouting camping and service group" instead of a "boy scout" group might revitalize it, again this is just an unsubstantiated rumor but it would have some interesting conotations. Imagine inducting female Venturers as well as Venturing adult leaders into the fold, it might bring some new life i

With all due respect to Bob and Baden there is something to be said with both arguments, however Bob was the first to cast insults at Baden who then defended his position against those insults, in either case a lose lose situation. On topic, what happened here is a perfect example of poor adult leadership in the troop and shows a desperate need of further training. The sad part is that this boy will always know what happened and that Eagle may not mean quite as much, time will tell.

Eamonn I understand where you are coming from. In my council it is even tighter financially and the SE's first step was to cut the staff of DE's by 50%, then taking a large loan out on the council properties. The remaining staff have been instructed to spend ALL their time in the the next six months finding new financial resources in their districts, now twice their original size, ignoring their districts letting the volunteers deal with all the problems as well as doing all recruitment, school nights, events. So you can imagine there are some very upset volunteers and staff. What re

Eamonn I heard the same thing from our SE today. Apparently Sea Scouting will become a stand alone program apart from Venturing, which he said most sea scouters had been wanting for a long time. The result will be Nationally that the Venturing manual will be revised deleting the bronze award in sea scouting and the Quartermaster award references. As far as on the council level all that will change will be sea scouting will have their own leader meetings and no longer be a part of Venturing forums or roundtables. Which makes me wonder what happens in a council where there is only one

Terry A well thought out and insightful perspective, reminds me of Colin Powell's assessment of the situation. People in this country are in such a rush to vote party line without analysizing what each candidate truly stands for, and many are letting fear and misinformation guide their decision. It is true we need to chart a new course in Washington otherwise our economy will continue to lose industries to overseas and we could find ourselves as a country that produces nothing to trade with in the global economy. Remember that the president alone can't accomplish much without the sup

I tend to agree with Beavah here, if a boy is not advancing I have found a one on one talk with the boy much more effective in finding out why and helping him get going. Most advancement stalls, in my own experience have been on the road to first class, after that most keep going pretty well on their own. One disturbing trend I found at the end of my time as SM were many boys who simply did not care about advancement, the first class in one year program worked well, but after that they felt it was too much work and they really didn't care about Eagle. The reasons were always the same, school,

The youth protection video is also on line through the BSA website, you can also be certified in Venturing YP at the same time. Remember take the YP for Venturing which is very different from the regular YP. emb 21 gave some sound advice about your female associate advisor talking to the girls, it will have more effect than coming direct from you. You can also create a similiar scenario when you do ethical controversies with your crew, you may be surprised the answers they will come up with.

My council now has a mandatory training program in place and if the leaders are not all trained we have been warned that our charter at the end of the year will not be renewed. Why I agree with the idea in principal the methodology of using threats and intimidation to make it happen I feel is very unprofessional. I still want to know if this is a requirement from National to all councils or is it some SE's trying to impose their will on the volunteers. How many charters will they lose this year because of this new requirement?

Kudu is correct with his remarks about watered down methodology put in place in approx. 1972 and unfortunately have kept this diluted program since then. Now I am not advocating going all the way back to 1910 but without the challenges of a more vigorous outdoors emphasis boy scout numbers will continue to drop. No matter what the books say without the boy really being challenged the program bores the boy. Look at the 13 year old Eagle scouts most of them haven't got a real clue about leadership or the outdoors. When getting the highest award in scouting becomes so simplified that almost any b

You know Eamonn I think I must take issue with your last post, in the time I have been part of this forum I have witnessed Bob White harrass, insult and attack other members whenever he disagreed with what they had posted, he did not try to discuss politely he attacked. In at least 99% of the cases Bob has initiated the attack and continued it, and the moderators have let him get away with it. I too think that this behavior is unscoutlike. White claims to have all this knowledge of scouting and yet all I ever see him do is quote a page out of a scout resource and then commence his attack on th

I think what you call these meetings is of little consequence if they are getting leaders together, planning district and council Venturing activities and showing council they are indeed a strong group within the council so they are given council support. One advantage of having these meetings in conjunction with the other roundtable is that there a sense of belonging to the district, and helping Cub and Boy Scout leaders see who and what Venturing is all about. My district, and council have a strong Venturing presense so we never encounter the problem OGE did. Unlike many other councils our V

From reading this thread the question was answered correctly a while back, the CO/CR/IH are the ones with the authority in most instances. However it seems to me that Bob was particularly hard nosed and very rude to a few of the posters here, claiming to be innocent while putting them down in the same instance. IMHO this forum is supposed to be an exchange of ideas not a pissing contest that this thread has turned into. People should be free to express an opinion or statement without being subject to a barrage of negative comments. To me Bob was the initial instigator and a couple of othe

shortridge Venturing is not like boy scouts in the instances you describe. Someone going for Ranger usually has already completed the Bronze Award in Conservation where they have learned their basics through their advisors, and if they do not have the knowledge they use consultants who are suppose to be experts in their fields. Much of the Ranger Award is left up to the teens own initiative to obtain the necessary knowledge needed for the various requirements for that award instead of being totally dependent on the advisors. Many Venturers going for Ranger attend classes put on by wildern

I think some of you are blowing this way out of proportion, on a coed crew overnighter the rule is that you must have minimally one adult male and one adult female and at least one of them must be a registered leader for that crew(from Venturing course at PTC last summer). Ideally you want to have the appropriate number to cover the number of youth participants, in my crew we always have at least two male and two female adult leaders/parents present at any overnighter and usually more. However the rule is one adult male and female leader is required, and no in Venturing the adults do not have

Well I met with the council SE today about the letter asking him if he had a directive from National to implement this change, his answer was "NO". He went on to relate that this was decided at the last executive board meeting unanimously. I then asked him why this action was necessary, I quote, "The numbers of scouts in the council has been dwindling at an alarming rate, the quality of some of the programs I and my staff observed were horrible and I decided it was time for action." I then asked him how many COR's were invited to participate in this meeting and he answered none. You see in my

In my council the mandate has come down in letter form from the SE to all scouters stating that with rechartering for next year that ALL registered scouters in every unit must be fully trained, including committee members, in fast start,youth protection, new leader essentials, and the appropriate basic for their unit. In addition the leaders working with the youth directly must also complete advanced training on a schedule to be decided by the council. "Failure to adhere to these policies will result in the unit not being allowed to recharter for the new year." One other point mentioned was th

John WE are not here to convert our scouts, as I said in my first post an interfaith service even among Christians is near impossible to achieve without ruffling feathers. I think you are blowing this way out of proportion and calling these services to bring scouts together to focus on the divine an anathema is an innaccurate use of the word, as well as bordering on the ridiculous. I appreciate your devotion to your denomination but remember Jesus opened his ministry to all Jew, pagan etc., and to be too exclusive in sharing your faith with others from different faiths puts you in line wi

Having been a scoutmaster and Venturing advisor for many years I have noticed a few things on this topic, first the youth don't seem to have the hangups we adults do concerning their faith. I have let PLC's and crew officers design worship services that were all inclusive not so much by denomination but by the overall belief in a supreme Creator of the universe who created the beauty of the wilderness we were all enjoying at the time. We adults are so concerned with being politically correct we can't see the forest from the trees. The term Interfaith I think is the real problem is even groups

Trev, I like your scenario. Ed you are way off base on this one and that question has about as much revelence as asking the scout if he is a virgin, both of these questions are none of your or anyone elses business and are totally inappropriate at any BOR. ED it would be like asking you if you ever cheated on your wife. I really hope you don't sit on any BOR's Ed because your sense of appropriateness and common sense is sorely lacking.

I have to agree with Gern here, "Who are you going to vote for?" versus "Do you understand the importance of voting in being a good citizen?" are very different, one invades personal guaranteed rights while the other addresses being a good citizen. Sorry ED but you are way off base here. Which of these questions is the most appropriate and which has no place in an Eagle COH, I think any rational person can see that for themselves, it is fairly obvious.

Trev I went to Monroe my first year then to Van Nuys High GO Vikings and WOLVES, lol.

I agree with most of Eamonn's post, the technology that controls most young peoples interests today in large part is a polar opposite to the scouting program as a whole. Now I know there are technology MB's and activities but those do not make up what the heart of scouting truly is or should be, namely an understanding, care, and appreciation of our outdoor resources, as well as leadership and citizenship skills. My feeling is that National has altered the original program so much over the years that we have lost our focus. Scouting was never supposed to be about computer games and technology,

As a ranger in the National Park Service I can tell you directly that old fashioned camping is way down. What people ask is if we are going to build more lodges or hotels in the parks which I respond with a strong NO! I have said for years now that the outdoor emphasis of boy scouts scare many of todays youth away, which is a sad commentary. Those who consider themselves campers want a place to park their trailers or their massive RV's and still want the site to have all the hookups and elite restroom facilities with private showers available,and possibly a nice coffee shop nearby. Almo

First of all Bob I think it is incorrect to call Venturing a scouting program in the true sense, there are no required uniforms, no advancement as all awards are based on the interest of the individual versus the entire crew, since the program is fluid and flexible in nature the methodology of venturing is obscure at best. Your sea scout program by contrast is a very structured, uniformed, quasi militaristic in nature program with drills , saluting et. al. Since Venturing has this nebulous structure it takes well trained adult advisors and youth officers to make a crew successful. The ot