Twocubdad

So despite my not believing in or supporting FY/FC; that I don't think FY/FC is beneficial to either the troop or the individual Scouts, and that I actively counsel my Scouts to slow down and take longer than a year to earn First Class, you're saying because we have the programs in place which could allow a Scout to earn First Class in a year despite all these objections that we have met our responsibilities under the Advancement Guidelines and can check that box? Cool. At least you're consistent!

Are you kidding? I see just the opposite. I see more times when folks make HORRIBLE messes of programs or volunteer assignment, then instead of any sort of accountability, everyone else smiles politely, folds their hands and says, "We all must be Scoutlike, mustn't we?" I'm not saying you need to kick their dog and call their mother names, but how about a little accountability?

That's great news, B! I was going by this: 3.0.0.3 Unit Advancement Responsibilities Unit advancement coordinators (or chairs) and those who assist them have the basic responsibility to support the unit leaders advancement program, to maximize rank achievement, and otherwise facilitate a smooth implementation of the process. Specific responsibilities are outlined in the leader literature for each program. The following responsibilities are not all-inclusive, but typical. 1.... 7. Establish practices that will bring each new Boy Scout to First Class rank within a year of joining, and then to Star rank the following year. (Ya beat me to it, Beav!)

@moose -- "TwoCub- it maybe fine if you got the opportunity to do it.. I guess I just remember when son was a new scout in his first troop. They had small older boy patrols, but when the new patrol of crossovers came in they lumped them into one huge new boy patrol, of about 25 to 30 scouts.. Hard to call that a misapplication of the advancement program, eh Moose? Fred -- finally! Common ground. I can get behind your description of the two camps, creative compliance and creative avoidance. Creative compliance is excatly what we're trying accomplish -- we're taking the BSA program wholistically -- advancement, mission, ideals, individual requirements, -- analyzing the strengths of our particular units and coming up with a program which is faithful to the overall goals of the organization AND meets the needs of our Scouts. The creative avoidance guys are the folks who parse the requirements, hide behind pedantic policies an avoid the big picture, right? Here's what I see as the difference between the two camps: I am more than willing to accept that you can make FY/FC work in your troop. If it works out as the best approach for your Scouts and unit, then you just knock yourself out over it. I'm not so arrogant as to think I know what is best for your Scouts and unit, having never laid an eye on any of them. I'm willing to stipulate that you know what you're doing, are well trained, understand the nuiances for the different tweaks to the program and have the best interests of your Scouts in mind. But you're not willing to extend that courtesy to me, huh. Why do you feel the need to impose the FY/FC program on our troop when our fully-trained leaders, with decades of experience in the program, have made the determination that it is not in the best interest of our Scouts? Beavah's analogy about lay CCC-CPR vs. ACLS is good. My understanding (and I don't want to start a debate on the merits of various CPR protocols) is the old-school, chest compressions and mouth-to-mouth is more effective on any given patient. But CCC CPR has been judged better from a public policy standpoint because more people can be trained and are more likely to use it. Consequently, ON AVERAGE more total lives can be saved using CCC. But IN PARTICULAR an individual may be better off with the old standards. Same with Scouts. If I'm in Irving looking at 3 million members, maybe FY/FC is a better program ON AVERAGE. (I tend to think not, but then I don't get paid to make those decisions.) But they are idiots if they fail to recoginize that with 3 million members there will be those with the knowledge, skills and abilities far above and below the averages. Sure, a national program needs to target the center, but it needs to accommodate the margins. Instead of hauling out the Advancement Guide and thumping it under our noses, they need to be thanking their stars there are folks out there who have dedicated substantial parts of their lives to the program and have the understanding to apply it ar beyond what the AVERAGE program policies and guidelines contemplate. So tell me, when you drop over in the tall grass along side the trail and Eagle92 is coming up behind you, do you want him to use his all his knowledge and ability as an ACLS provider or do you want him to just do CCC because that's policy?

Too much money involved. We're getting a new, for-profit baseball/softball tournament park opening here next year. They're touting the $millions it's supposed to bring in travel, tourism, hotel and restaurants. Near here the local parks & rec departments are building their own tournament parks to capture some of those same dollars. They're even using money from the tourism tax to pay for baseball fields. Not to change the subject, but one of my pet peeves is the amount of tax dollars which subsidizes youth baseball. Of course the NAPWMMOP (National Association of People Who Make Money Off Parks) hauls out statistics which show towns "need" to have X baseball fields for Y population. And of course every town in the country has less than a third of what is needed. Almost ever city park here is covered in baseball diamonds (and a few soccer pitches). And there is a constant parade of coaches complaining they can never schedule games and practice times they need. When did it become a taxpayer mandate to provide space for baseball leagues? Why don't towns provide bowling alleys? Or Scout camps? (Yeah, I know why, it was a rhetorical question.)

What happens when a scout comes into your troop knowing how to cook? Do you still require he take 2 or more practice runs?.. Maybe, maybe not. But what's the harm if he does? Serves as patrol cook a couple weekends, shows off to his patrol mates, builds some camp cred with the older guys, maybe teaches a few things to the boys in his patrol. Or maybe right off the bat he goes to the ASM and says he wants to do his First Class cooking the next campout. The ASM will talk to him about his cooking experience to date. Scout: "Well, sir, for my Tenderfoot requirement I made myself a marinated ribeye, steamed broccoli and rosemary pototoes. For Second Class, I showed my Troop Guide how to do a dutch oven breakfast casserole and we made kabobs for dinner." ASM: "Really! What menu do you have in mind for this weekend? Scout: "The patrol really liked the breakfast casserole, so I'd like to do that again. I think it can become a Blue Moose tradition. For lunch I want to keep it simple, so we're just doing grilled chesse and tomato soup. For dinner I have a really good chili I've made with my dad a couple times that use andouille sausage -- it's great. One thing I really want to try -- but I've never done before -- is baking sourdough bread. I've been reading about it and already have a starter going." ASM: "That's great! Be sure to plan enough for a few extra guests! (wink, wink)" We don't have a hard and fast rule that says "you may not complete the First Class cooking requirements until you have served as patrol cook for X campouts." The ASMs job is to work with the Scout to see that he is ready to tackle the requirement and to help him get ready if he's not. Maybe that means the ASM and Scout meet before the next troop meeting and work together on a dish. Maybe that means the Scout spends another weekend or two working with this patrol to hone his cooking skills or that he helps the ASM cook a meal for the adults one weekend. No formulas, no inflexible rules, no added "requirements", just kids being given the opportunity to really learn a skill and to work along an adult of character while doing so. E92 -- Why do you have an ASM worrying about cooking instead of an older Scouts? Because when we started this we didn't really have any older Scouts with the skills to pull it off. And we sorta backed into the First Class requirement thing. Our initial goal was to raise the bar on the cooking skills in the troop. Placing added emphasis on the First Class requirement was one of a number of things we tried. Now, we probably do have the older Scouts to do this, but his is really working well for us and I don't especially see a need to change. Philosophically, I don't think "youth led" has to mean "devoid of adults". Youth Leadership and Adult Association maybe aren't co-equal methods, but certainly aren't opposing concepts. If the choice is to learn a skill from an older Scout who is only a step or two ahead of the younger boy (or maybe not), versus spending time with a really neat older fellow with a tremendous amount of knowledge and experience in the area, I'm going to make use of that resource. In "cooking" a program for our Scouts, we have a well-stocked pantry -- lots of program options, a number of different philosophical approaches to the program, lots of guidance from BSA in terms of training and policy (which is sometimes self-contradicting), the interests and abilities of the leaders in the troop, the interests of the boys and their parents and the direction of my Chartered Organization. My job is to pick and choose the ingredients for my Scout Troop stew and make a meal which is both tasty and nutritious. Personally, I like a little okra in my stew; it adds flavor and texture. But by itself, I hate okra. Same witht the troop program. I'm not here to cut my wrists on any particular method, philosophy or even advancement policy. I'm here to provide the best Scouting experience I can to our Scouts. A little a dis, a little a dat!

In the 18 months or so we've been doing things this way, we have yet to have a Scout fail to meet the pass the cooking requirement. If you guys will get your heads out of your "no added requirements", you'd realize that the way we handle the cooking requirement almost guarantees success by allowing the Scout to learn the skill before being tested. Do you really think a youth is well-served by being sign off on a breakfast of undercooked bacon and burned pancakes with runny batter oozing out of the center? Those boys sure didn't gain any self-confidence or earn the respect of their patrol. If they learned anything, it was being patrol cook is a lousey job. But darn-tootin' he SERVED as patrol cook. On the other hand, the Scouts in our troop take pride in their meal preparation because they do it well. We used to have issues with patrols planning PopTarts for breakfast. I'm much more likely to have a Scout walk into my camp with a piece of cheesecake he made for his patrol, or a new dish he found in an old cookbook. We've had about 8 boys earn Cooking MB in the past two years, where I can only remember one doing so in the previous six. One of my older boys was bragging to me Wednesday night that he's making planning to make gaspacho for his family over Independence Day -- something he learned to make for his patrol. Kids smell BS a mile away. If you game the requirements, they will too. If you sign of on cold hot dogs and scorched Dinty-Moore, that's the standard you've set. Do you really think it's a bad thing to ask Scouts to wait to complete a requirement until they're able to do the requirement reasonably well? Do your really think the intent of the First Class cooking requirement is to "serve as your patrol's cook" means to fill the position regardless of your ability to do so and without concern for the quality of the food you serve?

"This is a deffinate add to current requirements. For many requirements you have just added considerable duration to achieving rank. For example that they, say, have to cook for their patrol multiple times, not just once, on multiple campouts. Same for building a camp gadget, using a map and compass on a hike (now your saying multiple hikes), etc., etc. This will delay advancement for all Scouts, especially those in larger patrols. Do you really think this will go over well in the field?" ABSOLUTELY! And this First Class cooking requirement is precisely the issue which has caused our troop to rethink our approach to advancement and to dump First-Year/First-Class. Yes, you absolutely need to cook for your patrol multiple time before passing the requirement. Our catch phrase is to don't pass the requirement the first try, you pass on your best try. We now have a one ASM who handles all the cooking requirements. BEFORE attempting the FC cooking requirements, a Scout meets with him to talk about his menu, shopping list, budget, nutrition, etc.. Part of that conversation is talking about what the Scout has previously cooked well. Maybe he wants to repeat some of those dishes, maybe he wants to build on that and try something new. Maybe he ruined something before and wants to try it again. It's all good, but none of that conversation is possible IF THE SCOUT HASN'T TRIED COOKING BEFORE! This is just the opposite of one-and-done, which we have tried and abandonded. Before, especially with the race to Fy/FC, new Scouts started tackling FC cooking requirements on their second or third campout. When did they have the opportunity to learn anything? They technically met the requirement -- burned pancakes, raw hamburger, soggy Ramin noddles and all -- and if they were luck, wouldn't have to cook again for years. (If you play your cards right, there is always some sucker working on First Class who can cook for you.) This is yet another example of how unit Scouters take an element of the advancement program and use it to help out Scouts really learn a life skill, earn the sense of accomplishment of really completing something, and taking another step or two toward being mature, self-reliant adults. That doesn't happen if you pass them on the requirement after one weekend and three ruined meals. Are we adding to the First Class requirement? I DON'T CARE. For those of you who are upset my Scout may be somehow damaged by the added burden of actually learning how to cook, PM me. I'll send you my COR's email and you can let him know you want to volunteer to be Scoutmaster of out troop. But once again, my overall point in this thread is this sort of approach to advancement should be allowed by the Advancement Guide. Individual units should be given this flexibility. Frankly, we don't do this with every requirement. We're tough on cooking and first aid. We don't get too wound up over lashings. And that should be our call. If your troop figures there's a McDonald's on every corner, or that the key to long-term success in Scouting is moving boys through the early ranks quickly and keeping same-aged boys on par, I'M OKAY WITH THAT. That's your call. But why does Advancement policy favor one approach and not the other?(This message has been edited by Twocubdad)

Saw an interesting video on Continuous Chest Compression CPR. http://ahsc.arizona.edu/node/730 Sent this to my troop first aid instructor (a RN). She said she has been trained on this protocol for months now. Is there such thing as an "official BSA" version of CPR? If this is the latest/greatest but BSA takes time to update the literature, is there a problem teaching this method to Scouts? There is no certification for this protocol (which is one of its advantages) so it wouldn't be appropriate for thing like BSA lifeguard where certification is required. But is it okay for First Class or First Aid MB requirements?

My reading of Beavah posts, beginning Monday, 6/19 about 11am, was he was providing an overall policy-level perspective that the intent of the advancement program is for scouts to gain a working knowlege of the underlying skill behind a requirement, not to just technically meet the requirement in a legalistic, hair-splitting way. In Beav's example, while rattling off, "wash your hands, keep cooked food separate from raw meat and keep hot things hot/cold things cold" may technically meet the requirement, Beavah's POLICY would be for boys to have a working understanding of food safety and, if fact, the ability to keep himself and his patrol from getting sick. (And of course, Da Beav is perfectly capable of clairfying his own posts.) Was is a final draft policy statement? No. But a dang fine starting point. You started this thread looking for suggested changes to advancement policy. You've been given 10 pages (minus your responses) of very clear suggestions. However you only want to defend your intrepretation of the current policy. And now a suggestion isn't a suggestion until it's in final draft form? I'm curious of your connection to the national advancement folks. Is there more to this than you are letting on?

Does anyone else hear an ax being shapened? When folks start scurrying around for copies of bylaws which are never otherwise used, it ain't a good thing. Sounds like the CC is trying to avoid a fight. Drop it.

" acceptance of breastfeeding really does seem to be a matter of exposure. " ba-da-CHING!

You want us to rewrite the guide for you? Actually, I'm cool with that. SERIOUSLY! Beav has actually done a pretty good job. Take his post from Monday morning in which he suggest incorporating language similar to the bylaws (and gets started in the food safety example) and adopt it wholesale into the Advancement Guide. I'm actually thinking about putting it into our troop handbook. Here's another start -- Get folks on the committee who aren't advancement wonks, but line-serving unit scouters who believe advancement should work TOWARD the overall mission and aims of Scouting rather than against them. Replace the everyone-gets-a-trophy types and the professional who believe the goal of advancement policy should to give everyone a badge so they continue to pay their membership fees. I nominate Beavah.

At the request of our CO, all adults attending overnighters need to be registered which means they have passed background checks and completed youth protection training. I know folks will be all over the board regarding the gay issue, but sharing a tent with the boyfriend (or girlfriend for that matter) is over the line. I would tell the SM this stops or you go to the COR and or Institutional Head with the matter. That this would essentially "out" the grandson to the grandfather, isn't my problem -- that's not blackmail, it't just the chain of command. If the father doesn't want that to happen, he needs to be dang sure the boyfrind doesn't attend another event.

ZERO. Council provides presentation kit. Senior Patrol Leader, Color Guard, Escorts, Scoutmaster, Committee Chairman and Chartered Organization Rep. all volunteer their time at no cost. Whatever the families want to do after the ceremony is on their tab.

it's just another form of paperwork.

Thanks, ED, that's a great compliment coming from you. In fact, we've got two Scouts going for their SEVENTH year! Last year we had six of eight guys on our Philmont crew get home from the airport at 2am and were at the Scout House nine hours later to go to camp. Of course they slept most of the week! But they had fun when they finally got out of their hammocks.

Here's some of the what, the when makes absolutely no difference to me: -- When "participate actively" was defined as being registered, the policy which was effective until January 1 of this year when, -- "participate actively" was defined to include participation in non-Scouting, but Scout-like activities. -- When the policy was put in place which allows a Scout to receive credit for time served in a position of responsibility even though his performance was so miserable that he was removed from that position before completing his term. -- when Scoutmasters were told their role as the "gatekeeper" of advancement means they should stand at the gate and heard kids through. -- when Scoutmasters were told that authorizing Scout to start a merit by signing the blue card doesn't mean the Scoutmaster has any descretion in determining if the Scout is ready to tackle the badge. It is simply an opportunity for the Scoutmaster to have a friendly chat with the Scout. (And thank heavens for that. I would never chat with one of my Scouts if the Advancement Team didn't provide the opportunity.) -- When time-in-rank requirements were taken out of T-2-1. -- When Scouts were allowed to work ahead on requirements instead of working on ranks sequentially. -- When all this stuff was taken out of the hands of the people who know their Scouts best and are charged with actually delivering the program to the boys and taken over by some anonymous Advancement Team. And by the way, there is a big difference between an 11 year old finishing Eagle in three years and a 15-year old doing the same. The 15-y.o. should be able to easily make up the stuff which should have been challenging to an 11-y.o. If a fifth-grader can blow through the material in the same time, where was the challenge for the 15 y.o?

I don't give a rat's rear about the history. If advancement has always been a 3-4 year program, then it's always been broken. I've got Scouts in the program TODAY I'm trying to work with. Why would you have a program for 11-18-year-olds but design a key element of it that is useful for 3-4 years? I've read the Advancement Newsletter. It's garbage. It is nothing more than a propaganda tool for the one-and-one, everyone-gets-a-badge crowd. Those are the people who have gutted the advancement program. They have absolutely lost touch with how advancement should fit into the overall program of Scouting. You want to improve the advancement program? Put every one of them on a bus. If you want me to read the newsletter, give Beavah a guest column! Seriously! Why does this particular point of view get official status? When does this get voted on? By whom? Aren't theses decisions supposed to be made by volunteers? Who are they? How are they selected? Do other points of view get representation or is his another self appointed committee chosen to maintain the status quo?

Excellent post, dkurt -- and Beav too. My entire point in this thread has been that we've allowed advancement to become the weak link in the program. I find it ironic that the current advancement policies seem to be designed to keep even marginally-interested boys in the program and advancing, but I believe it has the opposite effect. We all understand how high adventure and leadership opportunities are tied to retention of older Scouts. Hopefully we can set one or both of those hooks. But then we've create advancement policies which turn Eagle into a three or four program. For the boy who are focused on advancement, they earn make Eagle and then what? I don't understand the membership math. Is a boy who makes Eagle and drops at 14 better than one who ages out at 18 as a Life Scout? Are we really satisfied with a Scout who is active until 14, then limps along with marginal attendance until finishing his Eagle just before he's 18? As long as he paid his $15 every year, I suppose so. But what did he gain from the program? As a Scoutmaster I'm trying to help my Scouts get the most out of the program for as long as they can -- experiential learning, I believe they called it. The primary tools I have to do that are the outdoors program and leadership. Advancement should be the third leg of that stool but the current advancement policy has take that tool away. You want to fix advancement, fix that.

We take everything and the kitchen sink to summer camp -- and I just bought a new portable water heater to go along with the sink! I want our campsite at summer camp to be the house in the neighborhood where all the kids want to hang out. So we take all the toys. We haul tons of leatherwork and carving tools, last year we built our own tamahawk throwing range, this year we're adding a slackline. Our guys hang around camp playing cards and other games every night, so we take every Coleman lantern we can find. We've got a half-dozen solar landscape lights we poke around the campsite, a couple near the latrine, one outside my tent and the SPL's). And tiki torches we ring the campfire with tiki torches -- how can you vote anyone off the island without tiki torches. We get squares of discontinued capet samples so every tent has one (I like to brush off my tootsies before getting into the rack). I've got a 12v battery system for my tent that runs a string of lights and a couple fans. Last year the boys gave me a set of fuzzy dice that light up, so now I use them like porch lights. Every night one of our ASMs drafts whoever is working on Cooking MB and they make a batch of cookies, brownies or cobbler for the troop, so we have our a full camp kitchen. And a separate setup for coffee in the morning -- we're not waiting for the chow line. We also run our own first-year program in-house, which means we bring all sorts of program stuff for ropework, ax yard, cooking, first aid instruction, etc. That's a pretty good pile itself. It's all about having fun, being over-the-top and a little silly. Enjoy!

You know, Beav, we've got 12 or 13 councils in our state. Twelve or 13 different corporations and I'm guessing all have corporate counsel. I know stuff varies by state, but getting waivers appropriate to each doesn't seem insurmountable. My guess is there are other organizations or businesses which operate in more than one jurisdictions and have figured this out. You probably remember I teach at camp school. There are several sections where local regulations are an issue. This is one, how different states treat medical stuff is an other, state licensing and regulation of camps is another big one. The camp school syllabus basically dumps this on the camp directors, who are already looking like a doe caught in headlights. Never could figure why the regional office (you remember when we had regional offices?) of the area directors couldn't have a handle on this and provide the proper informations.

So E92, your SM should do what the SM in my sons' troop does -- grow a pair, make his signature on the blue card meaningful and JUST SAY NO. He even whites-out those merit badges on the camp schedule before distributing it to the troop!

Bnelon@ "Advancement is simply a means to an end...." Excellent post, Bnelon. The quote is right on the money describing what the advancement method should be. Unfortunately, the road national is headed down with advancement policy -- defining and redefining simple requirements, creating loopholes where none need exist, lowering the bar to the lowest common level and all but begging Scouts and parents to appeal decisions by leaders who only want boys to give Scouting their best efforts -- is absolutely counter to the ideals expressed in this that section. The phrases "experiential learn" and "growth acheived through participation in a unit program" jump out at me and are similar to the line I use with new parents, "Scouting is to be experienced, not completed. Experience takes time." I don't care how mature or intelligent a Scout is, he is not going to gather the same experiential learning in six months he would have over four years. This is the heart of "active participation" (English definition, not BSA). When BSA allows boys to move on with only six months experience or allows them to stitch together six months over years of minimal participation, AND they hamstring the efforts of unit leaders who want their Scouts to experience more of the program, BSA policy is working 180 degrees to the goals stated in your quote. My goal is to give my Scouts as much experential learning as possible by keeping them engaged in the program from 11 to 18. Advancement policies which undermine that need to change. I am also in agreement with LisaBob regarding the direction of the thread. And your looking for real changes to the program, or are you just honing you argument against change?

Can National apply "Train 'em, trust 'em, let 'em lead" to adults, too? I don't really give a rats rear about all this historical stuff. Fun reading and a great program resource. Doesn't really matter to our day-to-day troop program. But still, I have a difficult time imagining GBB sitting down with a calendar and calculator to figure out if a Scout can cobble together 6 months of leadership over three years of spotty service. Question for you -- when was the first advancement guide published? When did national start publishing semi-monthly updates "clarifying" advancement rules? I honestly don't know and really don't care. But I'm guessing that for most of the history of BSA we made do with the material in the BS and SM handbooks then trusted local units to implement the program. The problem with advancement is the snowballing bureaucracy which has developed to micro-manage advancement within units. The underlying policies, guidelines and redefinitions have made the black-letter requrirements in the handbook meaningless. (Sorta the same thing that happened to the Constitution, eh?). Why does anyone care if the program is absolutely level across every unit in the country? How does that advance the mission of the organization? So what if one troop looks like a Marine recruiting poster and the one across town the Bad News Bears? Seems like I was trained that diversity is a good thing. If the Marine troop is proud that their Scouts are "real" Eagles and the Bad News Bears happy to have earned Eagle quickly and moved on to other activities, whose leg is broken? Whose pocket is picked? And of course "mastery" is subjective as are any number of the requirements. Teaching young people to make ethical decisions is a pretty subjective endevor. The only way to wring the subjectivity out of the process is to reduce everything to the lowest possible level so everyone can comply (a bunch of Bad News Bear programs) or to create a huge bureaucracy to micromanage the process. BSA seems to be attacking the issue on both fronts.