smaster101

I voted for cooking, but if I had another choice it would be wilderness survival. This has always been a popular badge with our boys, and with a knowledgeable counselor they can they can learn a lot of important skills.

We have a person in our town that approached our committee chair about donating 20 acres of land to our troop. The value could easily be $20-30K. I'm telling our committee that it's not that easy, and that we'd have to set up the troop as some type of non-profit corporation in order to own this type of asset. Our CO won't be much help because they're just a small group of American Legion Vets. I really think we need to consult a lawyer about this. There may also be council restrictions about troops having these types of assets. Anyone have any experience or advice in this area that th

This may be a simplistic answer, but I've seen some kids like him that responded well to an adult friend or mentor. If it can't be you the SM, maybe there is a committee member or ASM or even a JASM that can befriend this scout and help him learn to behave. He might just be reaching out for someone who understands him. Anyway, I believe he should agree to follow the rules or be told he can't go on the trip. That's life, and people with bad attitudes should learn the reprocussions of their actions while their still young enough to turn themselves around.

Thanks to all for the many good responses. A couple of thoughts: The week following the camporee we had our monthly PLC meeting and the SPL brought up to the PL's and Jr leaders present the issue of scouts not attending services during scouting events. I was proud of this scout taking a position on this with his peers. Second, Bob White's comments reminded me that we used to always end each campout with a nightly prayer, but have gotten away from it after last year's summer camp incident. I think it's time we got back to this, and make it clear that that every scout is expected to

A few weeks ago I posted a message called "Are Church Services Optional The gist of it was that I wanted to know how to handle a situation that happened last year at camp where a parent told me his son didn't have to attend a non-denominational religious service. I got some good advice from this group on respecting parent's wishes. Weve announced a policy for this year at camp where a scout needs parental approval to not attend services. But now, a similar situation presented itself last weekend with a more disturbing twist. We were at a large camporee with 4000 other scouts & sc

Thanks to all for your suggestions. A couple of responses from me: "Control" was a badly chosen word on my part. As a father of a ADD 23 yr old son I know how control always backfired on me. SagerScout's suggestions are very helpful. This boy must want to be a good scout because his attendance is good at campouts and meetings. I can work on this with him. I agree that parents can be more of a problem. I have more patience for other kids than I did with my own son - I think we expect our own to be perfect. Sometimes when this dad is around I see him getting frustrated with

Our local district sponsored a Webelos Woods camporee last fall, and our troop had a great camping experience with our local 2nd year Webelos. Many have now joined the troop and are working on Tenderfoot. They've asked me why the camporee doesn't count for their Tenderfoot camping requirement, since they did it with the troop. I believe that it doesn't meet the TF requirement, but I want to know how others have explained this. The way the TF requirement reads it just says to spend one night on a troop or patrol campout, it doesn't say when. Unlike 2nd class, which says "since joining..."

Any advice on how to cope with a scout with severe ADHD? I have one in my troop right now. He's not a bad kid, very bright but also very disruptive to the other scouts. He disrupts MB classes and can't sit still or pay attention during any activity. His patrol mates don't like to share a tent with him because he never settles down. He acts very immature relative to his 12 year old classmates. Fortunately he's not aggressive, at least for now. His parents are aware of the problem and his mom gives me his medication to give him on each trip, problem is it wears off by evening, and then

Over the years I've had several boys like this. Actually I have one right now. They're mostly great kids, but are typically allowed to behave like this at home, so they don't know the difference once they get into the outside world. Sometimes it's just a sign of an 11 year old's immaturity. You can usually spot this type of boy when they first join the troop, which is a good time to start enforcing the right behavior. When I hear swearing coming from a new boy, I immediately tell him that it's not acceptable for a scout to talk like that. I usually have to remind him of this repeatedly, but b

I agree with some of the others, it looks like your son's scoutmaster and the other leaders need some training. Another resource might be their unit commissioner. This individual's job is to assist troops that might be off track, and it sounds like this troop qualifies for that.

I can never understand why adult scouters come up with rules to restrict advancement of scouts. This discussion of camping MB is a perfect example. As long as a boy completes the requirements why should it matter when the blue card was signed? As leaders we should be doing whatever we need to do to encourage scouts to participate in the program, and reward them when they do. How frustrating for a boy to feel he's done all the requirements only to be told he had to start after a card was signed. No wonder so many boys quit before they make Eagle. In our troop we keep track of the number o

I'm wondering about all the comments regardign camps that cost $150/week. Our local scout camp is $212 this year. Now, relative to other non-scout camps this is cheap, but are most scout camps less than this? Also, when I meet with our 5th grade Webelso to promote camp, I find that older scouts are the best salesman, and their comments about all the fun they have does more to convince parents than anything I can say. I try to focus on the organization and safety during the week, and let the experienced scouts tell them about the fun stuff. Last year we had 40 scouts from our troop at

You might consider appointing PL's rather than having an election, or at least appointing SPL's and ASPL. The reason is that it will give you an opportunity to select the "born leader" types rather than the most popular kids that tend to get elected. I know that elections are the prefered method, but in a new troop you would gain more by having your best scouts in leadership roles, setting the example that the next generation of leaders can follow.

Dear jmcquillan: Well put. I'm going to reflect on your comments and use them as I continue discussion with these parents. Thanks for your input.

To SCTMOM: thanks for your comments. I'm Catholic, but according to people I've talked to, the Protestant services at our camp are very nondenominational and exactly what you suggest they should be - an upbeat service targeted at young boys. Maybe thats why this particular scout told his father the service was not that bad.

Ive been a scoutmaster for about 12 years, and have never encountered a situation like this one before. Last year at summer camp it was Sunday morning and we were getting our scouts ready to attend church services. Earlier in the week I had told them that every scout was expected to attend the religious service of their choice; Jewish services had been held Saturday night and Catholic and Protestant services were held on Sunday morning. This is a camp tradition that has never been challenged before in our troop. A father of one of our first year scouts came up to me and told me that his