Eagle94-A1

Regarding Scouting removing a volunteer, unless A) it a youth protection issue B) health and safety issue, or C) legal issue, they will not remove someone. If the CO would have sought legal recourse, the the council would have jumped in.

Unfortunately the answer is yes. And I say unfortunately because the OA is a great tool to retain older Scouts, and invigorate the troop. Me personally, I would like to know why and have a chat. The SM may not know a lot about the OA. Real situation occurred to me when I was an OA chapter advisor. I found out that one Scout's mother would not let her son join the OA. Spent over an hour and a half on the phone talking to her about her concerns, what the OA really does, etc. She got a lot of malarky off the internet, and wanted to know if the OA is so special why no one in the troop was in the OA, nor the old long time SM or the new SM (whom I didn't know as they just took over), if the OA was so special. I told her don't know why the members of the troop were not active (sash and dash), nor who the new SM was. But the old SM was not only a member, but a Vigil Honor member who served as a lodge chief, and section chief when he was a youth in the OA.

In my humble opinion, Older Scouts in a troop is a sign of a good troop. I know growing up, most of us didn't earn Eagle 17 or 18 ( using the "wimp clause" ) The one Eagle at 15 did leave the troop shortly after getting Eagle, but for a darn good reason: his family was moving to Hawawii. And if I'm remember correctly, he got involved in Sea Scouts once he moved.

My youngest was the same way. I called Mom and had him picked up. That helped. but did not solve 100% the problem.

We got a lot of Scouters who are concerned about this policy change. I know my district lost a lot of district level leaders when the policy change occurred regarding gays. In fact my district had 3 active committee members as a result of the last policy change until today. Now have 2.

I do not know if it was in jest or serious as it was an email. But one father said he would say his daughter identify as male so she could join Scouting. BSA has opened a can of worms.

I have reservations, serious concerns about this. I know for a fact that BSA will remove long time volunteers at the hint of misconduct, even if investigated by law enforcement and shown to be false charges. There have been lawsuits about Scouting babies. In my neck of the woods, we had one female Venturer whose parents tried to sue because she "ran away" to work at summer camp with her boyfriend. Only reason it didn't go anywhere was because she was 18. Thankfully it all worked out in the end; the two Venturers are now married and the parents and daughter are reconciled. But it got interesting. As for me personally, I have no idea what I am going to do. I'm still shocked by the announcement coming out as it did. here I was concerned about "Helicopter Mom" going to summer camp with her just crossed over son, and this announcement happens. I have lots of reservations, and I see this as a precursor to Scouting going completely co-ed (I am thinking by 2020 it will happen, especially with the language the current CSE has been, and continues to use) But I am really concerned about my sons, and all of the boys. It seems as if there are getting to be fewer and fewer 'boys only" organizations as they are constantly getting attacked, yet having girls only organizations are not only OK, but encouraged.

I'll ask my son's SM about this and take notes. He is partially deaf, and does lipread.

The word saying tour planners would be going away was premature. It's not official yet. EDITED: This information was posted on Bryan on Scouting, and the retraction was on Facebook.

Here are some online sources that may help. http://thecouncilguide.com/ http://www.patchcamp.com/ http://scoutpatchcollectors.com/category/council-shoulder-patches http://www.scouttrader.org/ And an FYI site http://www.scouttrader.org/collecting/csp.pdf

WOW!

One of the patch collecting organizations used to put out a book. But I think it's now on DVD.

Actually more on the lines of, " Don't make the mistake I made....." VERY TRUE!

Me personally I say run for election as often as you want. And run for reelection as often as you want. I admit, I do not like how my troop does elections: only 1 six month term of office for a position is allowed. So you need to wait 6 months before running for the position again. They do the same thing for appointed PORs: SPL can only appoint new people. Once the successor's term is over, then you can run for election.

I'd tweak it a bit, but it is similar to the National Honor Patrol Award, what some of old fogeys know as the Baden-Powell Patrol Award. Looking at the current requirements, it can be done in 3 months. I though it used to be 6 months. http://www.scouting.org/filestore/boyscouts/pdf/512-021_WB.pdf

Agree, low key and simple.

Back when I turned 18, nothing special was done. But I also had an ECOH to plan, and they gave me a position patch. 5 years later, when I graduated from a local college and was moving out of town for my first professional job, they had a special roast for me going away. Since his ECOH was a while ago, mabye doing a simple Scoutmaster/ASM Investiture ceremony at the April COH? ideas here: http://scoutdocs.ca/Documents/SM_Investiture.php and http://www.settummanque.com/coffeeweb/LO/newsm.htm or have your PLC come up with their own.

My biggest challenge as a new adult way back when was transitioning from a Scout to a Scouter. Boy Scouts trains ya to DO and then when you hit 18, WHAM! You got to sit back. I still have trouble sitting back. I see a lot of Cub Scout leaders having the problem too. Heck the next crop of new Scouts we get in March will have many parents in that situation. Regarding NSPs, well you probably read my opinion of them. We are a mixed aged patrol troop.

IMHO, I'm the prime example of last minute Eagles. I was a Life Scout for 5 years, and earned my last MB 5 days before turning 18, and all the paperwork and SM conference completed about 3 hours before turning 18. EBOR was over a month later due to scheduling. I always tell my Scouts not to do what I did.

1) @@LeCastor 2) The only TL unit I knew about in my neck of the woods closed shop. Do not know what happened. I found out when one of their church members joined the pack that my troop is affiliated with.

Back in the day, SM Fundamentals was the course to be trained and when I did it, it was completed over 4 weeks. In my council growing up, one Saturday was a mix a class and outdoor, hand on stuff, AS A PATROL. ( all caps are for emphasis here on out). Then we had a model troop meeting, AS A PATROL. We were expected to have a PATROL MEETING ("party line" calls were OK too) to discuss our duty roster and menus for the last part of the training: the camp out. The camp out was done by PATROLS. Now did I learn anything new? Only the paperwork side of Scouting. I was a 19 year old ASM who had done the weeklong Brownsea 22 course, so how to run meetings, camping, and other skills were already ingrained in me. But it really helped those new Boy Scout leaders who were Cub Scout leaders with no Boy Scout experience, and reminded a few experienced former Cub Scout leaders that they need to switch gears. While I think the training was better, it did require a commitment. I had to wait a year to do the training since it was only offered twice a year, and I couldn't fit it into my schedule. Even then, I had to miss a troop camp out to complete it.

Thank You!

My troop acquired a bunch of gear. Some too old and torn up to be of any use, some old but still quite usable. And some that are like new. Two of the old but usable items are vintage BSA backpack frame, specifically the "Large Cruiser" and the the smaller L-shaped "Frontier Frame" What the troop is looking to do is get a hip belt, and possibly updated straps, so that we can loan it out for those getting started in backpacking. Any ideas on which hipbelts and pads top go after? Only thing I can thing of is going after old Camp Trail hipbelts and straps since they made the BSA frames.

My thoughts. 1) While the Advancement Report is needed for council records, THE BOY SCOUT HANDBOOK WITH THE SIGNATURE IS THE OFFICIAL RECORD THAT ALL OTHER RECORDS (ADVANCEMENT REPORTS, SCOUTNET, ETC) MUST BE BASED UPON! (Caps, bold, and underlining are emphasis, not shouting. OK maybe a little because the original troop is messed up) 2) I can understand the new troop not wanting to sign off. None of their committee members conducted the BOR. I know I would feel signing. 3) My suggestion would be to submit the Advancement Report with a copy of the signed book with "See Attached" on the signature spot. In the two cases I had to deal with regarding council having incorrect or incomplete records, in both cases the Boy Scout Hand Book with the signatures were used to correct the records or reconstruct them.

Seen this happen too many times. Even when a council offers a pre and post course session that includes One thing I have done recruiting staff is to find those who need IOLS but have the knowledge, skills, and abilities to to teach sections of the course they know, and sit in on parts they need work on. For example, the combat medic I know did the First aid section, helped in several others, and sat in on the rest. Etc. SMs so that they know what is goignon and how to support the Scouts, it still happens.