WisconsinMomma

Thanks for the replies everyone, the guys have a plan to talk with both families. Just keep them in your prayers, hopefully it will all resolve well.

Hi Eagledad, it's fresh news, like in the last 24 hours, so yes, they need to get on it.

Yes, but we can't let an 11 or 12 year old fend for himself against a 16 o 17 year old, either. The kid's dad is the retiring Scoutmaster and the kid will be going for Eagle scout probably within the year, very smart, athletic kid, ambitious. It is a bit delicate. But there is a complaint from the parent of a young scout so that's a legitimate starting point for investigating the issue. I imagine that if bullying is happening, it's a bit of alpha male pecking order type posturing, who's strong, who's on top and who's not strong and not on top.

Great feedback, keep it coming. Dad is Scoutmaster who is finishing up his term and he's a good Scoutmaster. Incoming Scoutmaster is good, too we have a lot of really good adults in the troop. I am not sure if kid is SPL now, he was SPL earlier, and they just had elections (I would have a hard time imagining bad behavior getting voted in, but, it's very possible). I will share all your great feedback with my husband later today. Hopefully they'll have an easy time working through it all.

Hi Scouters, My family returned from summer camp and last night I was chatting with my husband. He asked me how I would handle a bullying situation. I said, the Scoutmaster needs to deal with it and you need to let the Scoutmaster and the CC know. He said, I'm an ASM, I'm responsible too. I said, yes, make sure the SM and CC are on it. Anyway, we talked about it a little more and here is the situation as I understand it. An older scout in leadership may be bulling younger scouts. But there is very little to no evidence. My husband said he had another kid in a headlock in a summer camp in years past. The situation seems to be one where, the older Scout is smart and only bullies when there are no adults present, and no one is seeing anything. Also the scout's father is in Troop leadership. My husband thinks we may have lost a few younger scouts if they were bullied in years past, but again there is no real evidence. I encouraged my husband to work with the CC. Our SM position is in transition. I also told my husband that I feel that this older Scout cannot be left alone in the future. As much as we say we don't want helicopter parents, if there is suspected bullying then I think that the adults must ensure that there is no opportunity for a kid to get away with harassing another kid. If there is bullying, it is certain that other Scouts witnessed it, but nothing has been said about this scout (in leadership, and his Dad is in leadership too, so who are they going to talk to?) So this situation needs to be monitored for a while. The kid is innocent unless there is evidence but it is a challenging situation. Apparently one of the parents of a new scout has sent an email with a concern re: bullying. I also let my husband know that the Scout Executive was a resource. I am sure you have better advice because it is hard when you are close to a situation and the people. What do you recommend? Thank you!!

OK, personally, I don't think this is your problem. I know it is frustrating. You are not the Scoutmaster, right? This is not your problem. This scout will have to start tenting if he cares about advancement. I hope your sons had fun at camp. Try not to stress over stuff that is not your problem. I am sorry but it's not worth your time. If you are advancement chair, make sure you push back on advancement if stuff is getting overlooked.

It's easier to work the scout program than to fix the schools.

I also think with boys, you don't know what they are absorbing. Exposure is good. If they don't look like they are paying attention, they might still be paying attention, you know? And it can take a lot of repetition for boys to get the hang of things.

I'm jumping in without reading the whole thing. I like some of the bookish Eagle merit badges. Communication is an important skill, so is personal finance. I think Family life is very good. If Scouting teaches Citizenship, I think a Citizenship merit badge is good, but maybe it could be condensed? I don't know though, Cit in the Nation was extremely thorough and would be great at helping a kid in school, and probably covers *more* than school does. And that is good. We don't want to lose education in citizenship. I think these life skills, like Cooking, are a big part of "adulting" that seems to be getting lost. I like those merit badges. Just have to mix that with some real fun and goofy stuff and keep it balanced. I do think troops should be separate gender and that summer camps should offer a girls week or a boys week, so that there are opportunities to be single gender. Some of the merit badges are more for younger scouts. Sculpture is easy,, Leatherwork, there's something for everybody. I wouldn't give more restriction. I think that middle school scouts have more time on their hands than the high school kids who have jobs and college applications and honors classes and more intense sports, etc.

I don't have daughters, and am committed to helping our all-boy Troop, but if a girls' Troop needs a female to go along on a campout, I would volunteer to do that or other small tasks if I had the time available to help and all they need is a female to tag along.

@TheFlyingMum The head of your Troop is the Charter Organization will be someone called the COR, or Chartered Organization Representative. The head of your troop's Chartered Organization will be someone like the PTO president, or head of the Rotary, or head of the church, depending on what your chartered organization is. You also must contact your Council's Scout Executive asap, and if needed, the national hotline as RememberSchiff detailed above. The info. he linked to is great and I hope it is helpful. Best wishes and thank you for helping Scouting.

I'm a female cubmaster. I wear my tan shirt, blue loops, Cubmaster patch, trained patch, fleur de lis with centennial ring, a 4 year service star, a wood badge patch in the temporary patch position above the pocket. I have a Wood badge custom jacket and sweatshirt that I sometimes wear. I also have a red patagonia zip up better sweater that I sometimes wear with the uniform. I have green uniform pants, a belt, and nice hiking shoes. I would like to get a name tag. Oh, I have scout socks too! I should add that I walk around with terrific posture when in uniform (although sometimes I have seen myself hunching when talking to small boys, must fix that), and I hope that my great posture is a signal to other Scouters that I'm totally awesome and a confident female leader.

@FaithfulScouter are you interested in the job or do you know anyone who will be good at it? All you need on a basic level is, IMO, the ability to run a meeting and stay on task, attention to detail for rechartering, ability to recruit and discern other committee members and willingness to get trained.

We have an umbrella policy anyway, but I am not worried about Scouting lawsuits.

1. The program is the same for all participants. 2. Go to Wood Badge this year. Get your online trainings done and I don't think anyone will harass you about the position specific stuff. Have a great time - woo!!!

I wonder if I can or should wear my Wood badge necker (plaid) with my Cub Scout uniform.

Hi @bearess I am totally late to this thread. How is it going for your son now? Have you talked with the Scoutmaster? It sounds to me like the adult CM was almost bullying your 10 year old son, which is unacceptable. I hope it is going better. Hang in there!! Best wishes to you and your son.

Yes, I do not understand this either. What I briefly read here is something like -- patrols will not be allowed to camp completely on their own without adults, and patrols cannot go on hikes, etc without adults present. But I am not clear on the exact details and it will be important to understand exactly what is going on.

I have to say, it sounds as if you want to go volunteer and help a Pack with their Webelos program. If you're not interested / able to go volunteer or partner with the Pack, then I suggest -- stop looking over your shoulder. Instead, focus your energy on making your Troop program the best it can possibly be. I have a hard time hearing a troop complain about new scouts, when -- new scouts are new scouts. The troop has them for as many as 7 years -- ages 11 to 18 to help the boys learn and grow from young tweens to adult men. The best thing I did as a Webelos/Arrow of Light den leader, was to encourage and excite the boys about Boy Scouting. I viewed my job as a sales job, and I told those boys how awesome Boy Scouting is. (Note that, I had no Boy Scouting experience, and I was going totally on faith that the Troops will deliver.) I was extremely pleased when all six boys in my den chose to cross over into local Troops. Were they great outdoorsmen -- no! But they had an interest in continuing their Scouting journey and I think that was job #1. And they all earned Arrow of Light, which is a big accomplishment for them and their families. Cub Scout packs are not perfect, just as troops are not perfect --- they're not! We're all run by humans who are just trying to do the best they can, sometimes they have more success than others. I appreciate the feedback about preparing boys for Boy Scouting and will take it back to our Pack for the coming year. My youngest is a new Webelos and I can share with his den leader and help the Webelos and AOL think about Boy Scouting and the patrol method sooner. We have many troops in our area, and the boys can choose to go to any of them. I expect that all troops in our area will be cordial with our Pack. Honestly if some troop came to us with complaints about our program, it would be strange. All the troops we've worked with are delighted to welcome any new boys that are coming out of our Pack, and it's not because of their training, it's because they are delighted to help young men continue their Scouting journey. Also note that not all Cub Scouts and their families choose to move into Boy Scouting. For a few, Cub Scouts is it. It is a sales job to encourage boys to continue. It is possible that the Pack you are working with has a light program, but, what are you going to do about it? I think it's easier to work on that in your Troop and especially work on your new scout retention --- our Troop loses a lot of scouts in the first year or two. I don't know if it's preventable, but it is important to engage the young guys and bring them in and form a strong connection in their first year. Good luck with it!

I just want to say, Amen! I think that it is important for young Scouts to realize there is more to the world than themselves and that there is a responsibility to a higher power and to the community. I also find the practice of communal prayer and reflection important, especially in a society that says, no it's all about you all the time.

Welcome and thank you for talking about your journey, and best wishes for a great summer!!! I have seen a few YouTube videos about Northern Tier. Also, I think you should feel free to call or email their director and ask some questions directly about getting ready for the job. Best wishes and thank you for staffing!!!

Rowe is an excellent communicator and would be a fabulous spokesperson. He believes in the BSA. For an executive director, those folks are professional fundraisers and capital allocators. That is not the same job as a spokesperson.

Hi, First of all, thank you for working with the Scouts. It is not easy! Second, I am thinking about something called executive functioning -- which is basically, organizational skills. This kid may have difficulty with some of these things and keeping track of directions and times and dates, etc. Since there is evidence that following directions and keeping tack of times and dates is causing some difficulty, see what you can do to make the communication about these things easier for you and for the scout and his family. Here is what I will suggest. I once had a terrible experience with a CC who was belligerent towards our family, including my ASM husband and our oldest son with ADHD, a new scout at the time, and I think his motive was a power play to push us out of Scouting. Except, we had no plans to leave, he left. My worst experience in Scouting and the prime example of how not to do things. But, perhaps you, or your Scoutmaster and you, or perhaps the Committee Chair and SM and you can have a meeting with the dad with the tone of --- how can we make this work better for everybody? But if you do this, you have to be very positive and forward looking. It's about figuring out what you can do, and what the boy can do and how the family can support the troop and the boy so that things run smoother. Maybe email reminders before outings with the date and time would be good! Our troop does that. Maybe giving the kid a note with a few bullet points (from the PL) would be good also. Our Troop also does paper permission slips. The bottom is a tear off and the top has the date and time and location, etc. Our family puts the top part on our fridge and it is helpful. Maybe the kid could work with the Troop Guide. Maybe there are some areas where this kid is talented where he can shine and be a leader. Maybe you can find the times to praise him when he's doing things well. Maybe the parents have examples of things that work well in their home or at school that you can apply to Scouting. You can express to the parents that you need help, but be very, very careful to do it in a way that does not attack their son or their family. The goal is to make it work for everybody. It's not a disciplinary meeting, it's about a teamwork with the family and the troop. You probably need to come up with a communication style with the kid so that you are not repeating everything. You probably need a plan for how you communicate, so you give directions once, you repeat once, and after that the kid is on his own. Also, if he argues, you have a way to stop talking and not engage Discuss this with the parents and ask them how they handle this at home or how things are going at school. You can very gently discuss the behaviors (not the kid) the behaviors that you are hoping to improve and need help with. You must be kind and gentle. You are building a partnership. But hopefully an hour with the parents over a coffee can help you be much more effective in the troop. This is almost like an IEP meeting for Scouting, but be careful and not paint this boy as a problem. Maybe the parents don't have a lot of ideas for how to work with their kid and are struggling as much as you are. Be compassionate and of course, kind, courteous, friendly, etc. I hope that helps a little. Best wishes. P.S. If you have any perfectionist tendencies, you gotta let it go in order to survive!