yaworski

You gotta love the public schools. I have a friend whose son is seriously ADD. His public school class still uses those silly clusters of desks instead of nice, neat rows. Well, this kid realized that sitting in a group wouldn't work for him so he moved his desk away from the group and set it facing the blackboard. The teacher went ballistic. From the beginning of the second grade, my son's school started doing the ADD dance because my son doesn't read well and would rather socialize (sitting in clusters) than pay attention. They said to take him to your family doctor for evaluation. Our family doctor has a Ph.D. in Child Psychology as well as an MD so he's pretty well qualified. Nope, the doctor said that he's not ADD. Oh no, said the school, you can't expect your family doctor to evaluate him because we see him all day and Doc only saw him for two hours. Next step, independent testing lab. $2500 for testing. Not ADD, ADHD or any other alphabet soup fixable by drugs but he does have some sort of processing problem for auditory input. School psychologist goes nuts at the next meeting because we went outside the school system. They pretty much refuse to do anything UNLESS we medicate him. This goes on for years. The school is a master of stalling. Finally, we throw up our hands and say, "Okay, we'll try the drugs." The school shrink says, "Great! You'll notice a change almost immediately and your son will notice how much better he's doing." Back to the family doctor who reluctantly agrees to the drugs but wants to monitor my son's weight and growth closely. Two weeks on drugs and my son feels sick, jittery, and says that he notices no difference in his ability to concentrate. Back to school for the next meeting. Guess what the shrink claims? That you can't expect to see results in two weeks and that you can't expcet a child to be able to notice a change. If I could afford it, he'd be in private school.

In the outdoor portion of our Boy Scout Leader Essentials (BSLE) course we covered tons of outdoor stuff. Fires: we had to do three fire lays and one fireplace. Light a fire with matches as well as flint and steel. Pioneering: As a troop we built a 20 foot bridge with ramps and a deck. The engineering committee planned the entire operation and the troop executed it. First aid: we covered tons of first aid which was put to use in the competitions. At the end of the whole thing, we had a competiton which included first aid, fire building, pioneering, knots, plant identification, and some other things that have faded from memory (there were seven stages in all). We had a fire building competiton earlier in the training and my patrol came in dead last but we won the competiton at the end (Ho-Rah!).

I think that we need to ask if this town in NC is an extension of Berkley where the flag was removed from fire trucks because it offended too many people. Why doesn't this agency already have the flag(s) as part of the uniform? Inquiring minds want to know!

The difference is that THEY created the fun and not someone else. I am astounded and very impressed that your son and his friends would actually make their own fun. Maybe once your son discovers that he has input into what the troop is doing, it will be more fun for him. In any case, what I do with my kids is to tell them that they have to stick it out until the next set of fees are due, then they can quit because I'm not wasting my money. Often their opinions change before quitting time. There are no pat answers. Maybe Scouts isn't for you son. Has your son earned his Tote'n Chip yet? Does he have his own knife? I recall that when my son got his own pocket knife, that made him feel as cool as cool can be because none of his non-scouting friends had knives (knives are dangerous, don't you know :-). To some extent my son lords his scouting experiences over his non-scouting friends. I have a knife and you don't I know how to use an ax and you don't I get to cook over a fire and you don't I'm going on a 50 mile bike ride and you aren't Since most of my son's friends are jocks and he isn't, this levels the macho playing field a bit. Still, there are no pat answers.

According to Mike Walton, a fairly well known Scouter who runs a very informative web site, the US Flag is optional on the Scout uniform but the WOSM patch is required. As for making a statement, I applaud that fellow. Not many of us have the guts or balls to put our job in jeopardy for something that we believe in.

"Female scouters also take woodbadge training, although I personally don't think of them as chicks" I would consider very few of the women Scouters that I know as chicks. Most don't even qualify as MILFs. For some reason most Scouters of both sexes seem to tend toward the rotund and wear uniforms that are slightly undersized. FWIW, I'm sure that no woman looks at me and says, "Wow, that's a FILF!" I weigh more than I should but my uniform does fit.

"BTW- The BSA did abandon camping in the 70's (or close enough to abandoning it for me). " I'm sure that at the time Bob thought it was an excellent decision.

Gee Scoutmom, I can't speak about everyone in my high school that participated in locker room hi-jinks because we have more than seven kids in the school. Most of the ones that I can recall went on to successful careers. Interestingly, the two felons that I know of one is an Eagle Scout who barely avoided jail time for insurance fraud and the other was a Life Scout who is now doing forty years. If you want to see cruel behaviour, you should look to your own sex. Girls at any age are much, much crueler than boys ever are.

"There are "scouters" on this board who are acting or allowing others to act in very dangerous and prohibited ways" Gotta agree with you here. Many deaths have been caused by Cub Scouts wearing an unapproved neckerchief.

eisely, you're doing almost as good of a job of missing the point as Bob White.

"In my opinion, any act that includes "humping" has a sexual meaning." So does giving someone the finger, telling them to "F off," and making kissy faces.

"Scouting needs to speak to todays youth not to the childhood of the leader." If that's the case, we should permit Gameboys and cell phones on campouts. Possibly, camping could become a virtual activity with no need to leave the house. The boys could have avitars pitch their tents in in cyberscpace and use their internet capable ovens to cook their food. International events would become a breeze.

Good Lord, listen to you people. This is a "boys are boys" situation and it is bullying. The older kid was doing what he did to get a rise out of the younger kid but it backfired on him. Should we condone it? No more than we should condone sewing someone into their sleeping bag. Back when boys took showers after gym class, this sort of crap went on constantly in the locker room. Why? Because boys want to see if the other boy has the cojones to stand up for himself. Because boys are stupid. Because. . .because . . .because. The victim should have not gone to the adults but should have told every other boy in the camp that the older kid was making homosexual passes at him. That would have turned the tables and made the bully the butt of the joke. (This message has been edited by yaworski)

If they do require an SSAN, they don't have a legal leg to stand on. Remember back in the day when all colleges used the SSAN as your ID number? A few lawsuits changed that so you could opt out and use another number. Why? The SSAN is a key to your financial information. My son's school wanted his SSAN. I asked the principal why? She said that they just wanted it. They didn't get it. I checked with the ACLU on this when my son's school was making the fuss. My faulty memory says that a government agency had better have statutory authority to request the SSAN and with few exceptions provide a privacy act statement. A non-governmental organization can only insist on your SSAN if the have a need to report income to the government.

I don't know about the skill awards but I was told by the manager of our Scout Shop that the First Aid merit badge uses a green cross because the American Red cross owns the "Red Cross" symbol and that there are trademark issues. I did a search in the Patent and Trademark Office's database and found that the Red Cross emblem does belong to the American Red Cross. How Johnson&Johnson get away with selling "Red Cross" cotton is one for the lawyers.

"I would hate to see this Scout not get his Eagle but the rules are the rules." I'm not a lawyer and I don't play one on TV and I'm sure that a real lawyer will correct me but I've there is a legal doctrine (the Latin name escapes me) that says that if a person is told by someone is supposed to know about the rules, he cannot be held responsible for violating the rules. Example, you are stopped at the on ramp for an interstate by a State Trooper who tells you that as part of an experiment all traffic is permitted to go 100 mph. Well, it turns out that the cop misunderstood what they told him at roll call and you get a zillion dollar ticket. If you could get the cop to testify, you'd get off. Fundamentally, the boy shouldn't suffer because of an adult leader's screw up.

"1. Why does Bob White catch by far the most criticism for his opinions and statements?" Bob appears to apply no personal thought to any Scouting issue. Nearly everything that Bob types is support of BSA doctrine. I'm sure that if BSA abandoned camping, Bob would not criticize that because "BSA is always right."

Ed, come on, poor people in Mt. Lebanon? That town must have changed since I lived in the area :-)

Lightening may strike but I agree with Bob here. Our troop has long had a rather wimpy uniform policy in that a uniform is consdidered complete with just shirt and cap. I find it ironic that those that complain most about the uniform are the ones in the $400,000 and %500,000 homes and don't bat an eye at paying $50 for a new game cartridge. Unfortunately, my son doesn't wear official trousers beause the uniform shop doesn't sell any with a small enough waist. Yep, that's right. I bought a pair of size 8 ($39.80, overpriced at half the cost) and they fell off of him. I don't know about you but I'm not willing to pay a tailor to alter my son's uniform. I wound up going to Kohl's and buying a pair of olive drab trousers that match the color for only $14.

"I don't care what the motivation was for the DE's taking woodbadge. They deserve credit for being there." So if he was there to pick up chicks, that's okay by you?

Bob, Bob, Bob, don't know what we're going to do with you. Maybe we'll ask your mother to restrict your computer access. You keeping mixing apples with oranges in an attempt to hide that fact that you have no legs to stand on. The discussion of loops and service stars is from a different group and has nothing to do with skills. As for the tracking section. Gee, I wonder how I could have missed that in the handbook? I didn't see a single picture of an animal track. You may mock semaphore but the Navy still considers it an important skill as they do Morse Code. I'm here and you're a half mile away, across a ravine. How do we communicate? Oh yeah, with our FRS radios only until the batteries die. You see, these archaic skills are wonderful for teaching character. Anyone can lite a propane stove or use an FRS radion. It takes time and energy to learn a skill like code, fire building, or ax usage. Learning that skill builds character because the doer is left with a sense of accomplishment. Kinda like building a house from brick instead of gluing vinyl siding in place.

Bob, You have some serious issues and should seek professional help. I'm sure that there is a BSA publication that addresses the mental health of Scouters.

OGE, you're getting Bob White's disease. You're reading too much into my comments. If your CE and DEs care, that's great, even better than great. However, I've seen too many people simply go to training of all sorts simply to "get their ticket punched."

Bob, you really need to get help. You aren't a very good Scout or Scouter because you don't follow the Scout law. I never gave you permission to call me "Y" but you have taken it upon yourself to do so. That isn't very courteous, is it? As for the rest of it, many people have come to realize that you avoid the issue and twist other's words to show how knowledgable you are of BSA doctrine. If BSA came out tomorrow and said, "The uniform shall be a lace shirt and skirt" you'd be the first and only member to proclaim what a positive change that is. In a thread about uniforms, you were defending the poorly made BSA uniform with the comment that you wear yours over 100 times a year. You might want to look at finding another hobby.

Just because they are there doesn't mean that they or their boss cares. It could be just for PR. As for knocking down a building, have you ever watched Controlled Demolitions Inc at work? Their work is engineering artistry.