mashmaster

Thanks

My son is in the final steps of paperwork for Eagle rank. He has been a Cub scout, Troop scout, and is currently a Sea Scout and a Venturer. He has been lucky to go to Sea Base, Philmont in winter (and Summer this year), and World Jamboree among a ton of other scout activities. So I was thinking of donating $1000 in his name for the James E West endowment in our council as something to give back to scouting for others to be able to get similar experiences. Question is, does this go in his name for the award? I was thinking that I can complete it and present it to him at his Eagle Co

I don't think they can do a vaccine mandate. They could do a mandate that in order to be unmasked you have to be vaccinated but I don't think you are legally allowed to ask that question. I am not sure how HIPA rules work for this. So I think you can say this is the rule and people should be respectful to follow it, but you can't enforce it.

I wish they would let cubs have no national fee for the first year.

First off, Welcome to the forum. Agreed, although Swimming and First Aid could be be earned in a day. It would be a full day but could be completed in a day. I think most Eagle MBs have requirements that would keep them from being able to be completed in a day. I wouldn't recommend them to be rushed through though. I recently had scouts go through proper Red Cross training for First Aid, CPR/AED, and Wilderness First Aid. I wondered to myself how well they would sit through the 16 hour Wilderness course but our 5 scouts did great. We had a great instructor and the scouts were more m

We spread it for $2/bag. It is a very popular fundraiser here in Texas for our troops, school bands, baseball teams..... Spreading is the high margin part and the big work part.

Agreed make that first year free, do some free or really cheap cub events

I am not sure what group would be a good fit. Probably a combination of Coast Guard Auxiliary and US Sailing. What is missing is the character piece that scouting bring to the table.

I think it is a good option. The biggest problem is finding pants that fit our female scouts and leaders. We need 5.11 and Dickies to figure that part out

The current drop in Venturing and Sea Scouting is directly attributed to the fact that a lot of Crews and Ships stopped doing anything in person last year. The youth are mainly high school age and done with doing more online stuff. My son is in a Ship and a Crew. The Ship has been active sailing since last June and we have held steady on our membership, scouts aged out and we gained a few new scouts. If we didn't have to modify, I think we could have grown more. The Crew did online meetings and dropped membership by 50%. The youth are bored out of their minds for online meetings. Re

As a Skipper for a ship that is connected with the people at national that run this because we are basically already running on our own. There isn't inventory for Sea Scouts, the amount that BSA pays for Sea Scouts is extremely small and basically purely volunteer run. I don't know what you have against Sea Scouts, but you should do your homework on us before you try to throw our program under the bus. Our manuals are all PDF's, uniforms are purchased directly from Dickies or 5.11. You aren't paying OUR bills, I am many others raise money and pay money out of our pocket to Friends of Scou

That is because the programs are pretty radically different other than the age.

My daughter is getting her masters degree in Public Health. She has told me the percentage of vacinated people to reach herd immunity is >70%. So we are looking for a simple majority here. The India situation is horrible. Lots of different factors in play, very little access to vaccinations, health care access, new strain, higher density population...... Prayers go out for them, hopefully we can divert some of our vaccine to them since at least here in Texas the vaccines are plentiful.

Your troop and paperwork is much more than any unit I have ever been involved with or even visited. And that number is a pretty large number. Also, all those units would let the visiting scout join in the reindeer games. If I may ask, What type of organization is your charter?

Bring tents and teach them to set them up. Teach them how to make a campfire. Teach them something outdoorsy

Our CO is much more hands off than that. How do you handle a new prospective scout that just shows up that isn't part of your unit? Would you turn them away? My guess is that you report that they attended afterwards, but I could be wrong. It isn't a bad thing, but it isn't necessary as well. Potentially a scout wants to see and evaluate units separate from the rest of the den for some reason? I am not saying that is why this happened, but it could happen.

What policies? How is it a bad thing to have a scout visit a troop meeting?

No YPT issues here. The only issue would be if they were camping and he tented with a scout 2 years older than him. But at meetings nothing that I can think of. The only guide to safe scouting issue would be if they did an activity that isn't allowed for his age group, like shooting shotguns for example. It all good, welcome to the forum!

I don't see any rules or in fact any problems with this. The boy got to do stuff with the older scouts and hopefully had fun. Maybe that will excite him to join the troop when he is old enough. It would have been worse if he attended and didn't get to do anything. He might have decided Troops are boring and don't want him. I don't understand the point about why they should have informed you. Any of your scouts should feel comfortable visiting any troop at anytime, not just when there is an invitation. My advice would be to let it go, it is all good.

Welcome

I guess I am trying to understand what they hope to accomplish with this? Is it to get TV ads? From my personal interactions with the non-scouting public, everyone I talk to always seem to have positive feedback on scouting. I don't think that is what we need to solve. What we need to get something like this to figure out how to "get the butts in the seats". What is it that mom and dad need sign their 1st or 2nd grader up for cub scouts? If they can get TV ads and advertise to those parents, that would be great. I was hopeful that the TV show would be better. Sadly, it really wasn't a

Back to the OP, do what is best for the youth. That is what is important.

I don't understand why you are disagreeing? If the current CO no longer is willing or able to charter Scout units, what do you expect them to do? Finding a CO that is a good fit is important. We recently switched CO's because 95% of our scouts were no longer within 30 minutes of the location and we needed a place to meet. So when we begun our search, the district commissioner had a couple of Church's that were looking to charter a ship. The prior CO was a great organization, but they understood why we needed to move. Location was causing scouts not being able to attend, now they have

I have interacted with her and the previous two boatswains. They are all fine examples of our youth. The Sea Scout program does a great job nuturing the youth to continue to grow when they hit that stagnant stage of Troop scouting. That is why I am involved in it, even though it is a small program, it really is a great next step that I think many older scouts would benefit from.

I should mention it was scout led and planned. Not guide service needed, they owned the process from beginning to end. The only adult help planning was helping to contact local troops in the area who lent us the canoes.