Pack18Alex

DuctTape, remember, Cub Scout is family oriented. If we have 20 Cubs attending an event (as opposed to a meeting), that means 80 people there. Feeding 80 people is no trivial task, and not entirely reasonable to ask 8 year olds to do. Also, a quick caveat for my pack, we're a Jewish Unit chartered to a Synagogue. That means that all food must be Kosher, the Jewish Sabbath must be observed, etc. Since most Council/District events take place on Saturday, if we want to participate, we're camping for the weekend. Pinewood Derby: of my 25 cub scouts, maybe 3 have dads who have ANY tools

"My point was if you need MBA's and accountants on your committee, then perhaps the program itself is not focusing on the boys and scouting" Maybe. Alternatively, having MBAs and Accountants on my committee means that our organization is able to plan and execute more "big events" that the boys love. We ended up with 5 Campouts this year (planned 7, two were council level one that got canceled). Last year, without a professional quality committee, we were lucky to get 3 off. Our Troop doesn't have the business heavy committee, the Pack camps more than the troop. Before we were a

Sorry if I appeared to be a snob, it wasn't meant that way. From my work at the district level, more of our units fail because of financial collapse and leadership collapse than from parents unable to teach the boys Scout Skills. Building and training leadership amongst adults, and managing finances, are things taught in business school. Having someone with that background is extremely helpful for managing that side of the Unit. Can you get by without it, absolutely. But it helps to run a program if you know what's going on financially.

Sorry, it wasn't intended to be snobbery. It was meant to reflect the skill set volunteers bring. A pack near me has a leader who is a carpenter. He's taught the boys AMAZING woodworking skills, built amazing gateways, etc., because he has the skills to do it and the desire to train them. Another few leaders I know are teachers, they are great at inspiring the youth and managing the process, they are also trained to do it. Nothing about aptitude, all about skills. We have two MBAs, a CPA, and Financial Analyst on our Pack Committee. Our finances run smoothly, and the direct co

A well run business oriented Committee is extremely helpful. That's NOT what you want for a Scout Master, that IS what you want for a committee chair. One of my Den Leaders was SUPER AWESOME with the boys, but horrible at record keeping and tracking. One of the moms was an accountant, she stepped up as Assistant Den Leader, set up tracking spreadsheets, and organizing outings. She'd have been a HORRIBLE Den Leader, but turned the Den Around tracking achievements. I'd kill for a few teacher/blue collar types for my direct line scout leaders. All of our den leaders are nervous around

You need to be careful with Tigers... involvement scares parents. If you have a younger sibling coming into Tigers, try the parent as the Tiger Den Leader. Otherwise, Tiger Den Leader is a crap shoot. As the school year goes on and the parents realize that your leaders don't have magical powers, just a cheap army-knock off shirt, they are easier to get to step up. At recruiting, it scares them.

I know Journey to Excellence is often maligned here, but I think it's really great. Our pack collapsed last year, my son had just joined as a Tiger and the old leadership threw in the towel. I was signed on as Tiger leader. The Bear leader stepped up a DL/CM, I stepped up as TL/ACM (later CC), and we went through and cleaned up our paper officers. I grabbed JTE in March or April and started working down the checklist. We went to the formal Den Meeting/Pack Meeting split (prior to that, it was weekly Pack Meetings, with activities haphazard. I took tons of training, pushed the parents

We have families with hardships. It sucks. However, someone, NOT you, needs to talk to him about the pack appreciates his help, happy to write-off certain fees, and cover them to be a part of the pack. However, fundraising money is different, that's taking money that is owed to the pack, he can't get paid to be a scouter, even if he and his son get to go free. Since he clearly took a "loan" on the amount, get him on a payment plan. He needs to come up with $20/week until it's paid off. You're too close to the situation, but the difference between the pack covering his costs (writ

The replacement of private civic life with public functions has been going on in America since the New Deal era. In the civil rights era, this provided huge benefits because civic life, as private institutions, discriminated and public life didn't, so this created a more open country. However, one of the downsides is that American volunteerism and local self government is now endangered. Corporate "responsibility" helped keep things going for a while, but we're seeing public companies being defacto government in their treatment, and losing local responsibility. Yes there are winners an

The BSA top salaries don't seem that high to me. They seem reasonable for people running organizations of that size. I mean, our local Council Budget is 3.6M, I don't see how you could have an executive overseeing that competently without paying $200-$400K/year. Now, the level of competence is another question. National puts out antiquated tools, so council is administratively heavy to administer them, that isn't helpful. But you're delivering a semi-consistent program to millions of youth with hundreds of thousands of active direct line volunteers, that requires some serious manageme

This is silly. By making him get close to his 18th Birthday, it's denying him the opportunity for Eagle Palms that he's earned with his service and merit badges. The SM is making up his own requirements. The parent needs to request a meeting with the Committee Chair. The SM might want more of him, but that's for the Palms, he's earned his Eagle. He's already lost out on one Eagle Palm with this nonsense. We had two 13 year old Eagles presented at Roundtable last night. The opportunity to earn Eagle Palms (and all their excess merit badges), was proudly pointed out by the EBO

Any science/engineering prof that doesn't use a curve should be reported. Hard tests and a curve are the norm, that's what makes the test realistic. Separate from what your son has done, that prof is an idiot.

Yeah, I'm Pack CC, and a Troop MC. I don't have a boy in the Troop, but I've sat for a BOR and when picking stuff up for the Pack, I can sign for stuff for the Troop. Keep training up to date for all positions. When you re-charter, there is an option at the end for indicating that someone is paid in another unit, it's counter intuitive but it's after the Boy's Life screen IIRC. Do NOT have the Troop "transfer" you (which costs $1), just dual register and keep both. Next year, decide which Unit is paying for you. It is wonderful, and critical that you are involved in the Pack

When I convinced my wife to go along with cub camping we bought two Coleman Air mattresses that came with a battery operated pump. She fills them up with my daughters while my son and I are setting up the camp site. Alternatively, a few of my families are wandering off to plug in their air mattresses to fill theirs up... So at least mine is filled at the campsite and not at the bathroom or in the car...

I find it a bummer that they don't do arrow points for Tiger Electives. The beads are lame since you often don't get the rank patch until late enough in the year that you don't wear them long. My son earned 4, the other boys 1, and a few were 1-2 electives from the second. For what it's worth, my recommendation to future Tiger Den Leaders was to give out the elective beads as earned to encourage the families to do electives with their Tiger Cub, since the point of the Tiger Electives is to prepare them for Cub Scout Electives. Apparently, "back in the day" there were arrow points f

We budgeted $200 for the event, spent about $250-$300 and collected $150 in donations... having some slight cash flow issues because Council STILL owes us from online popcorn, I've been harassing them, supposedly check being cut March 4th, not holding my breath, I'm withholding Camp Card money until they pay us.

I don't see any reason why you couldn't direct 20% to the Troop General Operating Budget, and 80% to the Patrol Account (you could even have literal bank accounts for the Patrols, there aren't that many). Let the Patrol be responsible for collecting dues/event fees, and let the patrol decide if they want to fundraise to cover, or if they want to pay. Has the side effect that patrols may organize around socio-economic factors, but such is life.

Uniforms probably are safer, as Boy Scout Uniforms are specifically listed by the IRS as a deductible uniform clothing since it has no purpose outside of Scouting (this is for volunteers). A backpack that is used by the Scout can be used outside of Scouting and would seem like a personal benefit. Now, if you wanted to outfit all Scouts with matching Backpacks with BSA logos, etc., and fundraised for it, you're likely in the clean, since the Backpacks belong to the Troop and are loaned out to the Scout. The main issue is the ISA, not even the private benefit. Money raised under the 50

We're doing gifts/prizes for camp cards on an individual scout basis. If the family hits a certain volume, they go to Cuboree for free. Next fall, we're going to do something similar with Camp Cards and registration fees for major camp outs. Our Pack Campouts are cheap, our District/Council events have registration fee and cost more, so we're going to try to use Popcorn to cover it. I think that allocating the money towards patrols should create zero issue with the IRS, it's NOT a private benefit, and the fundraiser is okay for the Troop, I don't see why they can't allocate budget towa

When I was Tiger Leader, I was pretty meticulous about the beads, the boys LOVED them. When we did a Go See It in Activity Shirts (once or twice), I awarded the bead at the beginning of the next meeting, then another bead at the end. One time I did two at the end (as I was getting a handle on things), it worked marvelously. I found it ridiculous, the boys LOVED IT. The new Tiger leader didn't bother with the beads, the boys are haphazard on attendance and our Tiger retention from month to month is lower than I'd expect. Young boys will sit through the most boring of meetings t

Well, I think Webelos Patrols might avoid the "split from friends." They can all wear the same Den Number on their sleeve, and be assigned to 2-3 patrols that they can pick the names for. In the 1 Den, 3 Patrols (if you are up to 15 now, I'm guessing they'll grow in the fall to 18+). I would assign patrols in the fall, AFTER Day/Resident Camp. One option, put the boys that went to Camp in a separate patrol, since they'll have 2-4 pins done at camp. That way if the other patrols are doing the pins that they did, they can work on a different pin. Webelos Den Leader is responsible f

For the skits, do two skits for the mega den, and put half in each skit... That'll help them organize into the groups you'll use for Webelos.

The school year is almost over. You have maybe 7 meetings left. Get three parents to agree to be ADL for the rest of the 7 den meetings and split up for the activity. Next year, as Webelos, run them as two patrols. I wouldn't shuffle the existing scouts for the last few months. Buy the DL a good bottle of bourbon for after the meetings...

I have no dog in this hunt, I'm Jewish, my Pack meets in a Synagogue, so explicitly Christian groups aren't of interest to us. LDS uses BSA as their youth programming. Many churches house BSA programs, thinking it's a good program and happy to offer up meeting space, but how involved with the Church is the Unit? We have some Packs/Troops here attached to private parochial schools and only open to students there, they run it as an after school activity. We have a few chartered to a Church but that meet in a public school and only recruit from that school, the involvement with the Churc

My title is Committee Chair... I came on as Tiger Den Leader when our Pack Leadership collapsed. The Bear Den Leader became Bear Den Leader/Cubmaster, I became Tiger Den Leader/Assistant Cubmaster. I then added the Committee Chair role because we needed it to recharter, I also had one wolf (and two joined), so I did Wolf Achievements/Tiger Electives in the Spring, major PITA. It took a year to turn the program around. A functional Pack Committee remains the biggest challenge, that's my goal for 2014, get the Pack Committee meeting monthly. My suggestion, stop letting everyone run amu