WisconsinMomma

18 year olds are adults. So you don't need youth protection for an 18 year old, they are not youth. But the 18 year old cannot serve as a 21+ female supervision. That's my best interpretation of how things work. You should verify this with your council. An Assistant Scoutmaster is an adult leader age 18 or over who assist the Scoutmaster in delivering the troop program.

But I think most Troops try to follow the rules and get it right. Am I too optimistic about that?

I think the registration of adults for > 72 hours is good. Get the background check, get them covered by insurance, etc. Get them YPT training, that's good. It's not a huge fee. It's a cost of doing business and running a youth program in the 21st century.

Honestly, I would run the troop / pack as normal and stay out of the PTO's hair if you can.

Jim Lovell, captain of Apollo 13, is an Eagle scout (now age 90). The Apollo 13 mission was active 48 years ago as everyone worked to bring the astronauts home safely. Our family is watching the 1995 movie, the boys found it very interesting.

Sometimes people make big mistakes or get involved with the wrong crowd of people. I think the thing is, if a person has committed a crime, served their sentence and is trying to re-make a better life, that's good. That's what we want, people who want to do better if they've screwed up. @David CO To err is human, to forgive, divine. --Alexander Pope

Oh, you need PLC meetings!!! Who is dissatisfied? The adults or the Scouts? It should be the scouts evaluating the SPL of course. Now, maybe the SPL needs a little mentoring but that comes from the Scoutmaster, right? Perhaps the SPL needs a little help setting a schedule for the PLC meetings (our meetings are on traditional days, like the 2nd tuesday is PLC and the third is the scout meeting or something like that). Campaign promises -- that's funny. When my AOL den was trying to come up with their patrol name it was getting pretty fancy with speeches and stuff. Good job on keeping them focused on the scouts. You need just enough adult help for the scouts to be functional at a basic level but that's it! It is frustrating to me that adults jump in because they can do better. Well doh! But the point is for the scouts to get some valuable experience by trying and failing and trying again. Good luck -- are you adults perfectionist control freak types? Hang in there. Remind them that this is about the boys learning things and getting valuable life lessons. And the feedback should be from the peers! Sounds like they have a lot of ideas on how the SPL should do things but remind them that the SPL gets to have his own way of getting things done, to a point. And they should not turn Scouting into a chore!

Hi Scoutmom 86, I did not read the whole thread, but it sounds like your Cubmaster is being cautious about the situation, and that's understandable. If the Cubmaster does not yet know your boyfriend/fiancee very well, then give it some time. Attending events together at first sounds like a fair plan. You have put in time with the Pack, and that is great. I am so glad your son is having a great experience too! I think that things will get easier as people get to know your fiancee better, but a slow start sounds appropriate to me. It should get more comfortable for everyone over time assuming that he is a a great person and there are no red flags or other concerns that arise. Try not to stress out over it too much. In my Pack, there are certainly people with strong opinions but you can rest assured that we don't have everyone thinking the exact same thing, ever. It just doesn't happen. There should be some friendly people around, but it may take a while to find out who's easygoing and welcoming and who's not so much. Best wishes! Big picture if your son is enjoying Scouting that is great! Thank you for everything you do to support your Pack.

Oh yes, I got my left and right mixed up. Long day, doh! 11 y.o. on left, 13 y.o. on right. 11 y.o. is working on 2nd class, 13 y.o. is working on first class. They have done some merit badge classes together but definitely have their own interests too. Thanks!

I'm totally just wandering by to show off my boys' updated merit badge sashes, 11 year old's is on the right, 13 year old's is on the left. My 13 y.o.did his family project for Family life and has his chore log done. It's been months and months but he's getting there. 11 y.o. is/was having difficulty for swimming, getting down to the bottom to pick up an object. He'll get there eventually. Proud mama!

I like this. I have never been to Philmont and honestly don't know all that much about it, but I will tell you that my boys' troop is not necessarily into high adventure and the adults in my sons' troop seem unenthused about putting together a big trek. So, perhaps my family, mom, dad, 3 boys wants to go as our own family trip? That's fine. It's easier to manage than trying to get it through the troop. Of course if the troop goes, or if we have a multi-troop thing going, they could join up with that. But maybe for our family, it would work better to go on the family dates. At least we have options and it's more accessible to get down there.

Hey Everybody, I thought I'd share a tip that can help Scouts with the 90-day logs for Personal Fitness, Personal Management, and Family Life. We struggled with our son on how to do the logs at first and had some failure. My husband ended up buying a cheap monthly / weekly planner from Wal Mart that my son used to record his chores for Family Life. This worked better for him than an online log. The weekly calendar page spread gave him enough room to make his entries, and the book format made it easier to keep track of the actual log. We will use this type of planner again for all the 90-day log assignments for our boys. https://www.mead.com/mead/browse/product/TLD385?selectedSkuId=TLD3851018&couponId=SAVE20E&cvsfa=4442&cvsfe=2&cvsfhu=544c4433383531303138&gclid=Cj0KCQjwqM3VBRCwARIsAKcekb2Lb9h_DNl1NSDx9gw6ItP6QlgnU6MjqLHMl4P0CEBUJmKSKo7hvrsaAnKhEALw_wcB

Yeah, I was never a Scout either.

Thanks for sharing that link. I like this, as it gives the boys more action and probably makes the neckerchief exchange go faster than individual cross overs.

Hey Scouts and Scouters -- if you have been to an excellent, inspiring merit badge class, tell us all about it!!! I have heard good things about UW-Madison's Nuclear Science badge program, but we haven't experienced it yet. I am sure there are some very good classes out there, let's review them! The Greenfield, WI Fire department puts on a very good Fire Safety merit badge with a short classroom bit but lots of hands on, supervised fire extinguishing. (I know that many Scouters aren't fans of organized classes but this is NOT the place for that discussion.)

Hey Scouts and Scouters -- what was your favorite merit badge and why? Tell your story here!!

I've had to do this and it was tough. In my den, we had a boy who missed just so many meetings, his family had other things going on and he didn't earn rank. I reached out to his mom and let him know the situation and had given some updates along the way with the missing stuff. I had to let her know that her son wasn't going to get the rank when all the other boys in the den had finished theirs. I offered extra time if they wanted to try to make it happen but they declined. We just call them up and hand out badges but still it was obvious to this guy that he was not called. But that is life too. All our kids cross over a bridge and we put on their new neckers.

Are there other cycling MBCs in your area that you could meet with? If so, it might be nice to meet one to expand your personal network. I think tracking on GPS is a cool idea for your record keeping even if you don't need it for the badge. Good luck and have fun!

Thanks so much for everything you are doing to help the families in your Pack. I'll share a few things that might help. Are you having committee meetings where the den leaders report on how they've been doing? This is how our Pack generally keeps track of where the boys are at in advancement. If the den leader says -- they're done with their requirements, great, they're done. If they say, we've got a few things outstanding, then that''s where they're at. Our Advancement Chair orders bling based on progress reports from the den leaders. And recognition is important, so I think a major job for you will be to get reports from the Den Leaders and all the stuff you will need for crossover - rank badges, neckerchiefs, pins, any of that stuff -- based on what the den leaders are telling you. You should also generally keep track of who has their Bobcat, who is working on it, etc. I agree that the formal tracking is not critical in cub scouting. Just make sure that kids are progressing and they are getting their stuff -- belt loops, whatever they need. Great that you are helping your den. Keep at it. Supporting your den is job #1. At our monthly committee meeting, we plan the activities for the pack meetings. We make an annual calendar of pack meetings in summer. Our pack uses a google mail account and a google drive for our stuff -- mailing list, rosters, forms, whatnot -- and so anyone on committe or the den leaders can go into that Google drive and email people. So I recently sent out an email to the whole Pack about Pinewood derby car specifications and a few notes about Pinewood Derby night. Then our CO sent out a sign up for snacks and volunteers for Pinewood Derby night using Sign Up Genius. Hope that stuff helps. Do your best, don't sweat the small stuff. Have fun!

Building up endurance on the swim team sounds like a great move. Maybe he can try to gain some weight before camp too? My two older boys (ages 13 and 11) have worked on their swim merit badges in local pools, not the lake at camp. Both worked in individual lessons with a swim coach who is also a BSA merit badge counselor, then they took a MB class offered at another local pool. They spent probably 3 months working on swimming to build stroke technique, efficiency and endurance. My oldest is very thin and we got him a wetsuit and prescription goggles (very inexpensive on Amazon) to help him, he was freezing even in an indoor pool that has colder temps for competitive swimming. Oldest passed the MB, middle son is incomplete and needs to finish up work on diving. While their swimming has improved greatly, their coach said they should do Emergency Preparedness in lieu of Lifesaving (or probably wait until they are bigger and stronger for Lifesaving -- 400 yards is no joke). At camp last year, my crossed over Arrow of Light class all took swimming merit badge except for my kid, who didn't want to do it at camp. From what I heard, it was a very long week with a lot of work on swimming but they all got the badge. The summer camp was overall lenient with badge giving, so I don't know exactly how well they did or how much they covered. Hope your son has a great time at camp and success with his efforts.

I think that perhaps this is a situation where you can effectively use praise whenever you catch this boy doing something right. Perhaps the boy would be encouraged by a kind word here or there and a show of appreciation for his participation and later, contributions to the Troop. Sometimes I feel like praise and thanks are under-employed tools that could be very effective if used more often.

We had an initial discussion about girls in Cubs at our committee meeting last night. The initial reaction was positive. Our CO chair said that they likely have no objections to a girls' program. Then two of the moms complained about some of the things they dislike about the existing girl scout program, and one of the moms immediately said she prefers the Cubs program for her daughters if it's available to them. It sounds like we will have an open door for girls and their parents to get involved in Cub Scouting starting in the next school year. It will be interesting to see how many come into Cub Scouts. We will probably need some recruiting plans for boys and girls and I wonder if we should have separate recruiting tables for each gender? Not sure. If we can get a few adults and girls committed early they can help lead the way.