TigerLisa

During the 2010 Centennial year, there were four "historical" merit badges introduced that could only be earned in that year...Carpentry, Pathfinding, Signaling and Tracking. Scouts in our troop earned and reported completion of 34 individual historical merit badges in 2010. These MBs do count toward advancement, and they appeared on all advancement and summary reports from ScoutNet...up until recently. BSA has apparently made the decision to completely remove any record of these MBs from their reporting system due to "abuses" by various Councils and troops. I guess what that means is people were earning and reporting them beyond the allowed period of time. Rather than leave the record of existing, properly-earned badges in the system for reporting purposes, BSA removed them entirely sometime in 2012. Scouts in our troop who previously had these MBs listed on their individual summary reports no longer have them. Does anyone else see this as a problem? BSA is telling us it's no big deal because "other records" can be used to prove the MBs were earned. I think it's ridiculous that they couldn't make a simple change that prevented anyone from reporting NEW instances of the MB without removing any record of the badges from the system completely. It just makes more unecessary work for parents and troops.

OwntheNight, that was a superb idea for how to end it! I say this as the poor Cubmaster who stuck myself with the job of re-pairing socks that had lost their mates or been re-mated with an unmatched partner. Out of 200 pair, there were surprisingly quite a few in that state!

We also did this recently -- at our November pack meeting. Our version was far less structured. We split the boys up into two sides, dumped the pile of balled-up socks (almost 200 pr. for about 30 boys) in a line down the center area between the teams, blew the whistle, and let them go to town. After about 10 minutes, we blew the whistle again, had the boys collect up the ammo and place it back in the center, and did the whole thing over again. They had a blast! The socks were donated to the local rescue mission to be handed out at their Christmas dinner. Win-Win.

I stumbled across the BeAScout page a couple of months ago and updated our "pin" information with our pack website and correct contact information. Since then I have received several leads from the site, a couple of which have resulted in Scout registrations. I've had mixed results with the follow-up tool for contacting the interested parents...twice the information actually went through, and once it appears to have been lost. Using the e-mail address the parent provides and contacting them directly (outside of BeAScout) seems a safer alternative. Still, it requires little effort on our part to keep the pin updated, so it is a no-brainer to do it and take advantage of the tool.

We started out with a custom web site hosted on Geocities (a former committee member designed it), which left us in the lurch when he flaked and dropped out. All of that content was lost to the pack. We then moved to Google Sites, which was easy to set up and update, but did not solve some of the privacy concerns that we had. Not everyone wanted to set up a Google account with all of the extra baggage that entailed. WE finally settled on Scoutlander, and that is where we stayed and intend to stay. We did a long-term domain name registration with GoDaddy.com so we were able to continue using our custom domain name, but it is redirected to the Scoutlander site. Everyone loves it, the content is secure to only registered members, and it is exceeding easy to use. The e-mail broadcast is one of my favorite features. I highly recommend Scoutlander!

Hello all! The campout went great. We had some wind yesterday which made setting up the camp kitchen a bit challenging, but no rain or thunderstorms at all. The temperature last night got to the upper 30s, but nobody froze and I didn't hear a single Scout complain...I heard some complaining parents, but I tune them out. The weather was perfect for breakfast, our Scouts' Own service this morning, and a rousing game of capture the flag. SO glad we did not cancel!

Thanks again for all of the advice and encouragement.

Beavah, that's a good point! This person has also been a dedicated volunteer leader for many years, so I trust her opinion.

The final decision was to go ahead with the campout, so away we go! The forecast for rain and thunderstorms has eased off a bit, but it's going to be C-C-C-C-C-O-O-O-O-O-O-L-D!!!

Beavah, thanks for your input. I did ask the person I felt was the most experienced local Scout leader/camper in our Council office, and her opinion was, "If I saw 50% chance of thunderstorms, I wouldn't even be considering taking Tiger Cubs up there camping." That's part of the reason I'm so conflicted about this.

The good news is that the forecast improves slightly every few hours...hopefully by tomorrow, I'll be thinking how silly it was that I had concerns. Thanks everyone for your feedback.

Found your old thread, Anamaria...thanks for the tip.

AnaMaria, I tried searching as far back as Jan. 2009 but couldn't find a similar question...I guess I didn't use the right search terms! Yes, it's hard to think about the disappointed kids, but imagining the possible worst-case scenarios makes it easier.

Our meeting space is at the elementary school where we are chartered, and they require 30 days notice, so that is not an alternative. We are trying to figure out if we have an alternate space in town to try and salvage some of the activities. Food shopping is tomorrow, so we should be able to make a decision before then. This is peak camping season, so a plan B campsite for 80 people at lower elevation (and less storm likelihood) is out of the question. There is no under roof shelter that I know of at this campground.

Yes, I was also thinking of new campers getting turned off about the whole thing if it's not a good experience. Thank you for the comments, suggestions and questions...it's helping me to understand if we have considered everything before we make a decision.

Our pack is scheduled for an overnight family campout this Saturday at a state campground at around 6000' elevation in tall pines and surrounded by mountains. Unfortunately, the NWS is forecasting chance of thunderstorms and 50% chance of precipitation beginning Saturday night. As Cubmaster trained in BALOO and Hazardous Weather, I feel like the ultimate responsibility for deciding whether to go ahead with the event lies with me and the Committee Chair, although obviously our event organizers will be in on the discussion. My feeling is that if the chance of precipitation or thunderstorms is 50% or more, the event should be canceled on Friday afternoon (tomorrow) and families notified. I would plan to send an e-mail to everyone tonight indicating what our thought process is so that people can be prepared. If the NWS is saying 25% chance or less, then I would consider going ahead with the event and having an emergency weather plan in place for once we get up there.

We'll have close to 80 people with kids ranging from Tigers up to Webelos. If they were all older kids, maybe on a Webelos-only camp out, I would think differently, but my gut tells me that with little kids along, we need to err more on the side of caution.

I'm wondering if this sounds reasonable...I get the feeling that some on the committee would like to go ahead and just deal with whatever weather comes up, but I know that is the wrong approach with Cub Scouts. Not that it is an overriding factor, but if we cancel by 5pm on Friday, we get back all but $7 of our reservation fees.

I have called our Council office and spoken to someone with a lot of Scout camping experience. She advised to be more cautious because of the age of the kids involved, but wouldn't really give a specific guideline. I guess I'm looking for a sanity check and advice on what guidelines others use. Also, what is the "gold standard" for weather sources to use? The NWS (weather.gov) paints a much more grim picture of the situation than accuweather.com does.

Okay, so it's not just us. We also keep a running list, but it's getting a little out of hand with 35 Scouts and several months of backordered items. We check weekly as well, and will continue to do that. Thank you for the responses!

We have had terrible luck both with our Council store and online at scoutstuff.org with finding some of the new belt loops and pins. I am curious if we are all in the same boat? Specifically, we cannot get the Video Games BL or pin, Nutrition BL, Hiking BL, Good Manners BL, Kickball BL....the list could go on. From what our Council store tells us, they have yet to receive the first BL of some of these so-called new items. I say "so-called" because they have been out for months already! I would be willing to phone order and pay for shipping from another Scout store if I thought someone had them. Our Advancement Chair is having to become an inventory control person in order to keep track of backordered items going back three months!

Our pack does not give an opt-out option. It is totally voluntary to sell, but we do strongly encourage it and try to make it as painless as possible. Like someone else above said, we focus most of our energies on show-and-sell sales. We have had great success with these, and try to hit at least 2-3 different store locations over 4-5 weekends to make sure each Scout has at least one opportunity to sell (we have roughly 50 Scouts). Once everyone who wishes to has signed up for a slot, we offer additional slots to anyone who wants them. Our popcorn sales were almost $20,000 last year by this method. Yes, a handful of boys still went gung-ho with door-to-door sales, but not many.

We also do the Scout Accounts. Any Scout selling $400 worth got his recharter and Boys' Life paid. A percentage of any sales above that went into his Scout bank. Any Scout selling $1000 got a free ride to camp. We do not charge ANY pack dues, so this is our only way to raise funds (aside from the "No Girls Allowed" bake-off at the Blue & Gold). Now I am hearing that Trail's End is eliminating tins for ALL popcorn products and I worry about our fundraising for this coming year, but that is another issue for another post.

ManyHats raises a good point. I have heard of Packs who require the completed worksheets be turned in in order to claim a belt loop or pin. I think this would need to be stated as a policy that applied to ALL Scouts in order to be fair, but it is a viable option to eliminate this kind of thing in the future.

I agree with Greaves. Yes, we are supposed to take the Akela's word for it. But I think in an extreme situation like this (19 PINS for a Tiger???), I would nicely inquire as to whether they are clear on the requirements for those items. We had a situation last summer where a den put in for numerous pins for new Scouts, including ice skating. Well, our area does not have an indoor ice skating rink, and these boys were brand new, so we KNEW that one was bogus. It turned out to be just sloppy record-keeping by the den leader and not actually READING the requirements clearly.

If you want to get really technical, the BB gun belt loop was probably not a good example because it is a restricted item in the sense that it can only be earned at a BSA-sanctioned day camp or overnight camp. But yes, the gold and silver arrow points as well as Webelos activity badges are all on the advancement report.

Thank you to everyone who has replied...I am glad to at least know I'm not crazy in thinking this should not be this way.

I have actually spoken to the store manager about this -- she was adamant that their policy (the council office) is that ALL sports and academic belt loops and pins MUST be filled out on an advancement report showing the Scout earning the item and the date. When I said that I was under the impression that the BSA did not keep track of this stuff, she said, "But WE do." This is not a person I want to irritate, so I let it go at that. I then went to my DE and asked if he could find out more about this policy and explained our frustration. No word from the DE yet.

It's a double-edged sword...while I'd like to go up the chain of command and get a silly policy abolished, it would come with the risk of ticking off a person that we rely on for a lot of other things (the store mgr). It sounds like our council store is definitely in the minority with this policy, so I have the choice to accept it and quit complaining, buy our products elsewhere and spend pack $ on shipping costs, or make waves that could possibly cause heartburn down the road. Either way, I am definitely going to investigate some pack mgmt. software tools.

I will have to look at the various pack management software options. If the software did not allow you to fill out the advancement report (Form 33403) with belt loop and pin information, we would still have to manually fill out forms for those items. I agree about ordering from scoutstuff.org...too bad they don't offer free shipping, but it may very well be worth it to avoid these hassles.

Ah, I did not know there were Council- and National-owned shops. I bet you are right, ScoutNut, and that is why they are able to set their own rules for this stuff. It actually was the store manager who confirmed this requirement to me.

We are slowly dragging our pack, kicking and screaming, into modern times. I would love to implement pack management software while I am here, but we are not quite there yet. Thank you!

I hope this works...tried twice yesterday and both posts were corrupted.

I am wondering how other packs handle the process of buying/recording awards with their council office? For the record, we do not use any pack mgmt. software. We use the Trax spreadsheets within our dens to track requirements and awards, but when it comes to buying stuff for the pack meeting, we have (until now) done everything on paper. Our Advancement Chair filled out advancement reports by hand for every single thing, from rank badges down to belt loops. This is what our council store required. Not only was it a tremendous amount of work (we average 50 very active Scouts), but things tended to fall through the cracks...a recent check of Scoutnet showed numerous missing awards that never made it from paper to the computer.

We are now trying to get away from the handwriting and do things in a more efficient way -- using internet advancement for rank awards and filling out an electronic order form on the Scoutnet site for all of the other stuff. I thought we were being really clever. I did the awards myself for the first time last month, so I submitted the internet advancement report, printed 2 copies, filled out the order form online and printed that...took it all to the Scout office and got my stuff. No problem! Except the person who helped me wasn't following their procedures because he is new. Now I am told I will need an advancement report for every Scout earning a belt loop or pin -- filled out manually. The online unit order form is not adequate because it doesn't list Scout names. I found a version of form 33403 (advancement report) that someone created as a fillable PDF file, but it still has to be filled out for each Scout and then printed. Crazy!

From everything I have read, BSA doesn't care who earns what belt loop or pin...they are not required for rank (except in the case of some activity badges, and in that case, the activity badge is the award). They are just "things you earn for doing something" as I heard someone here say it. Even from an inventory control standpoint, I can see needing documentation of *how many* of a belt loop you bought, but why do they care who it is for? It's just more paper to shove in a box somewhere so nobody can look at it for 7 years.

I told my DE that I could just buy belt loops online from Scoutstuff.org and they won't ask me who earned it. Why should we have this ridiculous paperwork burden for something that doesn't matter?

I wish venting made me feel better...does every council have this requirement? Maybe I'm being too demanding?

Thank you, Scoutnut, for the update and the link!

Does anyone know WHEN the official CS 2010 materials and training will be available? I have been using Fast Tracks (which I found and downloaded on my own) for the past year, and I love this approach. It doesn't preclude me from adding fun stuff from old Program Helps or Baloo's Bugle, but it gives me a solid way to ensure the boys advancement with minimal planning on my part. As the new CM in our Pack, I am especially interested in getting hold of these materials quickly for two new DLs who were pressed into service and have anxiety over knowing what to do in den meetings. Of course, we will get them trained and equipped with manuals, but being able to tell them that CS 2010 is around the corner would relieve a great deal of stress.