Tampa Turtle

42 minutes ago, NJCubScouter said:

To be fair, this is one of a number of programs at Philmont.  The "core" program (treks) is still about the Scouts themselves. And hopefully always will be.

Yea, I think this is just better marketing of something that was always available and making lemonade out of the lemons of less crews signing up this year (for whatever reason).  Given the popularity of National Parks I think they may be exploiting an available market. 

IMHO it has gotten two expensive and too complicated to go. We have had plenty of scouts go but more and more they are planning and going on their own adventures (in and out of scouting) for the same or less money.

16 hours ago, my_three_sons said:

Criminal Background Check

I read Canadian Broadcast Corporation.

Sorry about that! You are lucky. We have a scout that has a shorter thumb now. Nothing says "fun campout" like looking for a missing piece of digit. And mom was a personal injury lawyer--we were sweating that one out*

I was doing microsurgery on a sticky yard gate with a dremel with the tiny wheel of sawing death the other week and my mind wandered and nearly took my thumb off. I no longer use chain saws around my property because I get tired now and that always leads to trouble. I hate getting old.

* All she cared about was what thumb was hurt. He played cello and since it was the string hand vs the bow hand she was cool with it.  

I keep hearing on the grapevine they have lots and lots of empty slots this year. The Philmont operation seems to depend on a bigger flow of participants than years pass to make the numbers work perhaps? 

Welcome! I love Iron Bru*...it's made from girders you know. 

*not really.

May I ask what bit of Scotland? I have been there three times.

Opps forgot the girl!

Could this be it:

2018 Itinerary Selection

Update! ALL Itinerary Selection Dates Postponed

We have given some thought to the recent events surrounding the release of itinerary information and have decided to move ALL itinerary selection dates to Tuesday, March 27 and Wednesday, March 28. This change is reflected in the Camping Gateway.Please see the Itinerary Selection Times Chartto determine your selection time.

There have been times (for various reasons) I have lost my cool in front of the Scouts or Students. Regardless of the justification I was withdrawing trust and respect at breakneck speed with the youth-hard to earn easy to lose. My point was one could argue all night FTF or on the Forum about the SM vs OA thing....by reporting I'd let Council sort it out...it would be up to what ever policy they would want to have on it. And I could see an argument from the SM side...we have pushed back at times on promoted by other presentations like FOS or WB beading taking over entire meetings. Fair is fair.

Sorry work is stressing you out. I have had a similar experience lately.

18 hours ago, David CO said:

Things should never get to that point. If it does, it is a clear indication that the OA advisor messed up. He should have packed up his OA team and left the meeting long before that happened.

We have the same problem in sports. Even though coaches and umpires have been trained to call off a game before letting things get too far out of hand, many people are overly reluctant to do it. They place too much importance on finishing the game. A game isn't worth fighting over.

So, when an argument occurs at a scout meeting, who should walk away? It is certainly not the scoutmaster. The scoutmaster is responsible to the CO to supervise the building and lock up afterwards. The scoutmaster can't just walk away. The CO requires him to stay until everyone else has left.

The OA advisor, on the other hand, has no need to remain in the meeting. He has no obligation to supervise or lock up. He is usually not even a member of the CO. He and his team are free to leave any time they want to.

The only reason an OA team and an OA advisor would stay at the meeting, in the situation you describe, if foolish pride. They just don't want to walk away. They want to stay and win the argument. They want to argue and fight rather than walk away.

It is more than condescending, it is prideful and arrogant. 

 

 

 

I would walk away and report the SM to Council.

9 minutes ago, The Latin Scot said:

If I may ask, where did you get this photo and information? Mind you, it's not entirely surprising, but what is the source of this picture? I confess the cover is ... well, boring to say the least. I hope they don't go with this monochromatic style in the end, but curious to know more. At least they are incorporating the addendums into it, but as the leader of an all-boy unit, I hope they don't go overboard with the gender-integration images inside. And what about our old friend Ethan? Will his twin sister Edna be joining us now?

sigh ........ I know it's been said a million times over, but this whole inclusion thing is really ruffling my feathers again, lol.

She-Wolf?

We have it on Trooptrack as a resource and trust our scouts to NOT look at it when they need a MBC. 

45 minutes ago, The Blancmange said:

If I'm parsing that sentence correctly, one of the reasons you believe BSA "left its values" is because it created the Disability Awareness merit badge?

...yeah... (slowly moving hand toward cudgel)

50 minutes ago, Jameson76 said:

In 1952, age limits were set so that adults over 18 years of age could no longer earn Eagle Scout

So Fluckey got under the wire.

When did the Eagle at 18 cut off begin?

I always say hands off the election team and election to my SM's. We had one who overly manipulated the list of who was eligible and the ASPL who was an arrowman stood up to him and called in the OA liaison who backed the boy up. I have overseen a few elections in other Troops. I have been in the room when the votes were counted and did not interfere when one son missed getting in by one vote on his last year of eligibility. But then maybe he should have been more friendly and cheerful?

In general popularity or not I think the boys, overall, make pretty good choices. To address the situation @'Lope mentioned pn more than a few occasions I have found out later (since I had two sons in the troop who hung with different groups I eventually got good intel) that a number of scouts we adults thought were " selflessness, unwavering commitment to serve, dependability, and Scout skills" were also martinets, two faced, selfish, or bullies who had us fooled. So I trust the boys and resign myself that a few good guys will get passed over.

Sadly as I was never a scout I never earned a merit badge.

I had some fun Emergency training on the job that had instant hurricanes, rioters, chemical spills, crashing airplanes, and terrorists all happening at once! Good times. I tried to bring some of that to the Merit Badge when I did E-Prep. Saw a 1st Aid MB that talked amputations and impalements (with actors) that kept their attention.

Best MB I ever sat in on (and I have sat in on plenty) was a couple at Woodruff SR, GA summer camp in 2010 and 2011. One was the Forestry MB in 2010 taught by a young man (former Eagle)  who was a monk in his day time job. He was a character and a real 'nature boy'.  The other was Bird Study taught by a Venture Scout in 2011. She obviously loved her subject and taught with great enthusiasm and could do all the bird calls. She was funky and simply  amazing. (I made it a point to tell them directly and the camp director what terrific jobs they were doing). While I think both instructors did 'tick' off the requirements they got the boys doing as much as possible and made them go out and do stuff in the real world even if it was a bit outside the requirements. Their enthusiasm about their subject  and youth really got a response from the boys.

28 minutes ago, DuctTape said:

Genealogy. While the majority of the requirements can be done by the scout "before" the session, I feel the scout gets zero benefit of the research techniques, software, interview questions, etc... I as the counselor have to offer.

Done over 3 or 3 sessions this can be a really good one.

17 minutes ago, cyphertext said:

What merit badge did they ask you to teach?  Just curious, as I can't think of any that could be completed in such a short time frame off the top of my head.

Fingerprinting. Can do it in 45 minutes.

51 minutes ago, cyphertext said:

I think this MB is great for a group.  My son's troop did it, and they participated in a 50 mile ride for Cancer at the end.  The group that participated met each week for rides and to train to build up for the Cancer ride.  It was an awesome experience for the boys.

Cycling does seem to work well as a group as a big part of it is riding the bicycle...no faking that during a class.

39 minutes ago, Eagle94-A1 said:

With all due respect, if you have a problem with 18 year old college students who are qualified to teach Eagle required MBs, then you may have a problem with operations in your unit. I was one of those "Over 18 and in college" MBCs who taught several Eagle required MBs, specifically Camping, First Aid, Swimming, and Lifesaving, in addition to several other MBs. As an 18 year old certified YMCA lifeguard instructor who had completed two 50 milers afloat , I felt more than qualified teaching the aquatic MBs.

 

I admit not every camp has good staff, but that is more on the CD and PD than age generalization.

It is not the MBC instructor, Academy, or Summer Camp that should be the issue it is the presence or lack thereof quality control. I think the core issue is mass instruction which seems to lead to more problems. Some of the best and the worst MBC instructors have been in the 18-21 age.

55 minutes ago, Eagle1993 said:

I’ve actually never seen a school in my area where junior high and high school are in the same building.  I guess it varies by region.  I personally am not a fan of Jr High kids hanging around high school students.

Yet we do that in Scouts.

BTW we tried exit interviews too. They were as murky as the work ones. I think a good BOR feedback seems more useful.

19 minutes ago, oldisnewagain1 said:

An exit interview in Scouting?!!!

Every day Scouting sounds more and more like a Dilbert strip.

22 minutes ago, walk in the woods said:

Your argument seems to have as a premise that a business has control over price, which it doesn't in a sufficiently competitive market.  Another way to state your argument about a business is this, the primary function of a business is to return value to owners.  This is accomplished by providing a service or good that meets a consumer demand at the market price.  Value is returned to the owner by meeting demand for the least cost possible.  Stated this was a business has exactly the same motive that you attribute to a government agency.  

The difference is when a business succeeds, value is returned to the owner, when Government succeeds, it rarely returns cash to the owners (taxpayers).  When a business fails to meet their cost constraints, it fails, when Uncle Sam fails to meet its cost constraints, it just raises more "revenue" through increased taxes on a captive market.  The government agency you reference is basically a monopoly with all the problems endemic to that model.

I have worked in government at various levels and what happens is if costs go up we have to do the same work with less people like most workers. At some point we do not have enough money to do something we have layoffs and it just doesn't get done. One thing I have seen again and again and again is governments services being stripped away by private companies who charge more for the same service and the public just pays more. It is not unusual for the private efforts to collapse and the government has to take it over again. 

At the local level we have had the state legislature both  demand we provide a service while simultaneously taking away the ability for us to raise any revenue to pay the costs.