T2Eagle

Swatara Lodge 39, Lebanon County Council had a deer as its totem.

This seems like a fine project to me. I would ask about the amount of work necessary, is it enough to have shown leadership? I wouldn't assume it isn't sufficient. It's just that I, and probably most folks, am not familiar enough with it to make my own comparison to other projects. If his estimate makes the scope seem small, it would seem easy to expand it to more than just one pile. I do think an educational display to go along with it would be a very good enhancement and would strongly encourage that even if there wasn't a concern about it "passing." I did a quick search for habitat piles and eagle scout projects, his wouldn't be the first. https://mucc.org/upcoming-wildlife-habitat-opportunity-gourdneck-sga/ The more I read about habitat piles in general, the more I liked the idea. I also found this site, which I had never seen before and am going to share with my troop. https://eagleprojects.boyslife.org/tag/wildlife-projects/ This proposed project seems consistent with some of the projects showcased and with a project one of our scouts just finished that was working with the local metroparks on building and placing a number of kestrel boxes. If you think there's going to be skepticism, maybe include examples like these as extra exhibits attached to the proposal. Good luck to him.

Those are not mutually exclusive events. Our troop is a regular participant in ways large and small in our parish. Scout Sunday is an opportunity for the scouts and the parish to specifically recognize and celebrate scouting in the parish. Keep your scout sunday participation, expand on the others.

Here' a quick tutorial about how advancement should get recorded for a scout. The scout completes a rank and the troop submits a report, electronic or paper, to the council, and that rank is attached to the scout's member ID in the council/national database. BSA computer systems are not particularly modern or well built and so it's hard to be more precise than this in a description. Similarly, a scout completes a merit badge and (hopefully) turns in a blue card to his troop and the troop again records that through the council. In direct answer to your question, the original merit badge counselor could certainly retroactively sign a blue card even though he is not currently registered. The blue card itself has a line to indicate the date completed. The merit badge counselor should sign the card and your son should then turn it in to his current troop for proper recording. To the question of whether merit badge counselor status expires. There are two registration requirements to be a merit badge counselor, you need to be a registered scouter and you need to be registered as a merit badge counselor with your District or Council. Some people are primarily registered as part of a troop and are then additionally, or in the parlance "multiple" registered as merit badge counselors. Some folks are primarily registered as merit badge counselors and not directly affiliated with any specific troop. Either way that registration or membership needs to be renewed each year either through the troop rechartering process or through the District/Council rechartering process. Good luck with helping your sons get their record keeping straightened out, and glad to see you stayed aboard. Out of curiosity, what motivated your son to stick with the program, and why do you think most of his fellow LDS scouts did not?

Our troop wants to head towards Pictured Rocks in the UP of Michigan this summer, and we're looking for camping, and other activity suggestions while there. We're driving up from Ohio, and we'd especially like to find someplace in the upper part of the lower peninsula where we could lay our heads just for a quick night, even something like a church basement would work just so we could leave home in late afternoon and not try to drive it all in one shot . Thanks in advance.

As near as I can tell, although it's always initially challenged, the idea that each diocese in the US is a separate entity and not a part of a greater whole has held up through 20 or so diocesan bankruptcies, so to the extent that's a parallel most local councils should be able to stay out of this. The councils that are going to be in trouble are not so much those with bad facts as much as it is the councils in those states where they have made the recent statute of limitations changes. I doubt it is in anyone's interest to litigate this all the way through a trial and appeals process, so likely a settlement will come after a couple years of preliminary litigation and negotiation.

I'm curious what you see as the bigger goal of your patrol competitions. Interpatrol competition can be a fine thing as a means to an end --- maybe to foster a sense of camaraderie within the patrol, maybe as an incentive to up the skills of some individuals, maybe just as a way to showcase skills that have been mastered. But there are other ways to accomplish all those things. If the result of holding competitions turns out to be something negative rather than something positive then maybe rethinking ways to accomplish your goals is in order. Coincidentally, we have the mother of a former scout who helps run a fundraiser for us every year. Tonight she was there to talk about the fundraiser at a parent meeting that also included the parents of AOL scouts about to crossover. SM was telling the parents of the differences between Cubs and Scouts, emphasizing that each scout's journey and advancement now is his own to do and at his own pace. The mother, then stood up to talk about the fundraiser, but started by telling, unprompted, something her son said to her just as he was completing his Eagle, She said "My son is currently a doctor at Mayo clinic, and i couldn't be prouder of him. But he told me when he made Eagle 'Mom, I tried every sport there was, and I wasn't good at any of them, but I was good at scouts because I didn't have to be better than anyone else, I just had to be as good as I could be." Competition can be a great thing, but it's not one of our aims or methods, and it's not a necessary part of scouts. If it is accomplishing what you want it to accomplish, great, but if it's not ,think about other ways to get where you want to be. What happens on campouts? Does patrol B pitch their tents, get out their equipment, and feed and clean up after itself (truly special needs scout excepted)? If so, why worry about if they do it faster, slower, more efficient or less efficient than their troopmates?

Just FYI, Cub Packs have all had "3" in the thousands place for decades. Nobody uses it, nobody thinks they should use it. I don't think any Cub pack has found it to be annoying. Every single digit, double digit, and triple digit unit number you see is actually a short version of a four digit number. Troops of boys have "0" as their first digit; I forget what the number is for Crews.

Had this happen with two of my scouts, one while he was in the troop, one a couple years after the family moved, but he was still a scout in his new town. Most of what I have to say would only start an argument I have little interest in having. I will say that my own son struggles with this; he was hospitalized for it once. Lots of kids in there with him recovering after having their stomachs pumped or their wrists stitched back up. No one in the ward was recovering from a gunshot wound.

I've had several scouts from other troops join ours. I 'll ask why they're looking for a new troop. Most are variations on a theme of personality clash. I'm more interested in finding out what they're looking for in a troop and being sure they understand ours before they join. I leave it up to the scout and family to let the other troop know they're leaving. There's never been anything that I heard that I thought I needed to convey to the other troop. What am I going to tell them: that the scout and parents didn't like how they run advancement, or campouts, or planning, or whatever ? I've also had scouts come visit and not join. I really wouldn't contact another troop to tell them their scout is looking, that could make a precarious situation much much worse.

I'm willing to triple your pay , now hop to it.

We use troopmaster not scoutbook. In TM you can just use the BOR date and it back fills all the other dates. At the times when we've been in between advancement coordinators and I've picked up the ball that's all I did. Our current AC makes a copy of the handbook page as part of the BOR process and enters each separate date. I don't see the need to do it, but I leave it up to her.

Vote for Bernie? I kid, I kid. AS DavidCO said, ER if you need to, otherwise take your cue from the parents. Many councils provide Health and Sickness coverage for injuries and illnesses arising from scouting activities. Check with your council to see if this applies. https://www.scouting.org/health-and-safety/alerts/insurance/

Prayer is not banned in schools, prayers led by the government, i.e. the school and its employees, are banned. To add a little historical perspective, OUR PRAYERS, that is Catholic prayers, were always banned. No child was allowed to say the Pater Noster or Ave Maria. Catholic children attending public schools were made to pray in a way that was inconsistent with the teachings of their own faith. The rise of Catholic parochial schools in the US was largely driven by a fear that attendance at public schools with their compulsory Protestant religious indoctrination would lead to a weakening of the Catholic faith in our children..

As it is, according to the article they've already made $6,000 and are on track to get to $10,000. I'm not sure trying to make more money would really be a good idea.

Does that actually answer the question? Gliders are not the same thing as a "hang gliders, ultralights, experimental aircraft, or nontethered hot-air balloons" It appears that "flying ... following completion of the Flying Plan Checklist" would not be prohibited, and after looking at the Flying Plan Checklist I don't see anything that prohibits flying in a glider so long as it conforms to the requirements for pilot and aircraft worthiness. Any aviation experts out there want to chime in?

NOTHING is better than Thin Mints. But I did order a box from my niece. Purchased on line through NYPenn Pathways council. I'll post my opinion when they arrive.

Consider the yurt a cabin not a tent. Whole troops with a full range of ages share cabins all the time. For the adults, do whatever separation makes everybody most comfortable, be it hanging tarps or the lone male sleeping in his truck.

Does a scout have any say? Only so far as the troop follows his suggestion. But there's no reason in this story to think the scout on his own took some of the proceeds of his sales and gave or ordered the giving of those funds to anyone else. This is a news story that has two facts: 1) a scout sold $15k popcorn, 2) some portion of the money raised from those sales was used to help a local nursing home. There is a causative relation between the two facts: in order for there to be money to give to the nursing home there had to be a sale of popcorn. There's nothing inaccurate about the story as told, but in a local feel good news item of less than two minutes duration there's no time and no reason to walk through the obvious chain of events: 1) Scout sold $15k popcorn, 2) after paying council troop retainss $5k from those sales, 3) troop decides by whatever process they used (presumably including some input from scout and his family) to pass some of that largess on to nursing home. As a practical matter there's no other way for this to work. Unless the scout only accepted cash, or cash plus checks made out to him personally, the money from the sales all has to pass through the troop's accounts, and ultimately it's the troop writing whatever check or other form the donation took. It's just a pleasant little story to fill up one third of the time between two commercials on the local news broadcast and nothing more. Don't over think it.

I enjoy singing, people near me may not enjoy that as much, but my WB experience was definitely on the misused end of the spectrum.

Do I have to sing, or worry about silly totems, or pretend my shirt doesn't have a collar and have a uniform inspection? Because all the good leadership development programs I've attended contained none of those elements, and the in one that included them it seriously detracted from the program.

What you can do with the grant money is most dependent on what the terms of accepting the grant are. It's important that you understand that your unit is not an entity, it's a subset of your Chartering organization. When you are making the application for the grant it will be the CO making the application for the grant to be given to the CO. My interpretation of "solicit contributions for unit program" is you're not supposed to go out and just ask for cash donations. As mentioned above, most grants have some sort of quid pro quo or otherwise limiting condition that makes them something other than just a straight cash donation. Work through your CO, if they're OK you're OK.

DavidCO is right, there is no accusation to be made, but it's unusual and you can inquire about it. I would email the dadASM and scout and say I just received nine MB cards from Scout and they're all the same merit badge counselor and all signed the same day, this is really unusual, could you tell me more about this. Then see what they have to say. Maybe an uncle or cousin is actually a MBC for the badges in the other council, and maybe there's a half decent explanation for it all. The best way to approach it is to refrain from making any kind of accusation or insinuation that anybody did anything wrong, but rely on the BSA's rules that MBs can only be approved by a registered MBC. The MBC can be from another council, but you need to be able to verify that in order to represent them as completed in reporting them to your council for recording.

You weren't in violation of any rules. From the GTSS "In most cases, each youth member will be under the supervision of a parent or guardian. In all cases, each youth participant is responsible to a specific adult." Your son was responsible to a specific adult, your friend. There are plenty of times when neither of Jimmy's parents can go camping so Johnny's parent says "I'll be responsible for Jimmy." And of course you can have one adult responsible for more than one Cub or else siblings would almost always be out of luck.

it doesn't depend on where the event is being held. It does depend on whether it is a scouting event. Every Chartering Organization agrees to "Conduct the Scouting program consistent with BSA rules, regulations, and policies." BSA has specific YPT rules, they're not onerous, they're not unreasonable, and they're not hard to follow or enforce. If you are participating in a scouting event, or any event outside your own home, you are implicitly agreeing to follow the rules of the event or to forfeit whatever right you might have to be there. You can't walk across the basketball court or join the team huddle when you're at a kids' basketball game, and no one needs a prewritten agreement in order to enforce those rules. A CO's responsibility is to ensure that BSA's rules are followed at any scouting event they're conducting. If there's anyone who is not willing to follow those rules it is the CO's responsibility to enforce the rules and/or remove the offender from the event. That's not a violation of anyone's rights, including the CO's. If a CO can't or won't do that then they should end their BSA relationship.