JosephMD

When we do elections, the youth arrowmen on the elections team count the votes.  If there is only 1 youth, the adult adviser does a second count.  It gets a little crazy.  We usually have pre-printed ballots with a place to mark y/n.  It is like Florida in the 2000 election some times.  Our standard is, if there is any mark that is not clearly an N or the word No in the box, that is not clearly an unintentional extension of the vote above or below, it counts as a yes.  The unit doesn't know the vote counts.  If I'm the adult adviser for an election, if a scout gets a really low number of votes compared to his peers, I might mention it to the unit leader because it could be a sign of other issues.  But I don't tell them, Johnny got 10 votes and Billy got 11, just the names of the scouts who were elected. 

Just happened to have a unit commissioner at our meeting before the camp out to remind us of the rules.  I guess it was mentioned in YPT2, but working in both the Venturing and Scout program, I didn't make the connection.  We were able to save it because it was a camporee which made it easier to join with another troop to make for enough adults.  

We send a letter too, and some of them will bounce, and I won't find out for a week, then it'll cost us an extra stamp and envelope.  These days, you have to use every communications method available.  Letters, e-mails, e-mails to scoutmasters, direct communications to TOARs, fliers in unit roundtable mailboxes, even telephone calls.  I still have people tell me that they didn't know. 

I'll be there on the IST.

My son is going with Crew 141, they've designed some great patches, a neckerchief, and a t-shirt.  Neckerchief is really awesome, but at $21 ea, he won't have many to trade.  

There were many in our lodge that wanted to do this, a February 1st election / ordeal, and our council VOA was on board as well, but not quite enough support within the lodge leadership to actually make it happen.  

Last week I learned that a troop can no longer camp with one adult over 21 and one over 18, but not yet 21.  When did that change?  I now that is how its been for venturing as long as I could remember, but for troops.  

This is just another nail in the coffin for small troops like mine, with parents that work for a living.  It was kind of weird telling a 19 year old Eagle Scout and Vigil Honor arrowman that the BSA didn't think he was good enough to be an adult on a troop camp out (but uncle Sam would send him off to die halfway around the world).  

I probably wouldn't be here today but for my tap out in 1990.  I don't remember the words, other than that they were powerful and moving, I remember being called, I had no idea, and two Indian runners racing up the isle to get me, I ran / was dragged with them to the chief, and got my firm taps.  I had no idea what this OA thing was all about, but that experience told me what I needed to know, that this was something special, a big deal, extraordinary, and I wanted to do it, whatever it was.  Young kids aren't listening to the words, like me, they won't know much about what all of this means.  Then you'll ask them to come out to an ordeal, why should they, they won the popularity contest, right?  Is it me, or are they trying to accelerate the program's decline?  

Wrapping up elections season and preparing for the ordeal.  I shouldn't be shocked anymore, but every year I am.  Elections paperwork that lacks the information we need, has misspelling, or is just plain illegible.  The level of effort that the advisor has to put in to make all of this right is considerably more than it would be for the unit leader just to do it right in the first place.  I'm several hours into correcting BSA IDs, scouts' names, and had a 20% e-mail address failure rate.  I dream of a day when they can click a button in scoutbook.com that says "unit leader approved for OA election" and it gets us the information electronically, but until then, I guess I'm stuck pushing paper.  

Finally remembered my password for this site.

I never really found out how the process worked, but he was selected to attend!

It was never really a troop thing, but my older son used to keep track of it, but he soon ran out of room in the camping log.  When he got his new book, he didn't really update it.  The troop now keeps track of it in Scoutbook.com - attached is part of my son's log.

• Actively participate in a communications-related club or organization for at least three months. Participate in at least three activities of the organization where you practice or improve your communications skills. Examples include Toastmasters, debate clubs, or drama clubs.

Being in the National Capital Area Council - there is no shortage of historic sites & government offices!  I think our scouts have an unfair advantage on that one.

I have a couple of uniforms.

1. My standard troop uniform.  Has the standard CSP & Lodge Flap

2. My OA Adviser Uniform.  Has the OA Centennial CSP & Lodge Flap set

3. My new Jamboree uniform - that one has the 2017 Jamboree CSP & Lodge Flap

4. My Venturing uniform - also has the 2017 Jamboree CSP & Lodge Flap

Obviously, I had the last two put together for the Jamboree (I was staff), but now, they are just in the rotation.

#1 is getting a little worn and will probably be replaced next year.  I will probably maintain the standard look.

Maybe, if I go to NOAC in 2020, I'll replace #2

Why is it so strange that the COR be involved in the rechartering process.  After all, isn't he/she the one ultimately responsible for the membership make-up of the CO's unit?

You would be surprised how many people will think along the lines of "This is Scouts, what does the church have to do with it?"

The merit badge counselor signs off on the requirements, not the scoutmaster. 

That being said, does the MBC think that he has completed all of requirement 8 as written, because there is a lot more to it than serving as the master of ceremonies for a coh. 

 

8. Plan a troop or crew court of honor, campfire program, or an interfaith worship service. Have the patrol leaders' council approve it, then write the script and prepare the program. Serve as master of ceremonies.

Did he plan the COH?  did the PLC approve it?  Did he write the script and prepare the program?   And then serve as the MC?

Still, the MBC signs off, not the SM, but in this case could the SM be signaling that the requirement isn't actually completed and it wouldn't be trustworthy to accept it as so?  or, the SM just might not know what he is talking about.

I hope they get advised that it might be an idea to get one for the jamboree, or rather, two or three or four. Swapping neckers is a thing. Though there's a sliding scale of desirability, I'd guess that a US necker or a UK necker, or one of the other big contingents, would be low desireability, while one from, say, Senegal, would be extremely sought after.

My best trade at the 2017 NSJ was my silky blue Jamboree neckerchief and big shiny slide for a Madagascar Scout's neckerchief and woggle.  I traded a lot of patches, gave most of them to my son but this was one for my collection. 

I would imagine, from the USA something like an Eagle Scout neckerchief would trade a little better than many of the other things.

I've also been told that entire uniforms get traded.  There are still many NSOs with uniforms.  My son really wants to make this kind of trade. 

I got the e-mail this morning.  My son applied for the BSA contingent for the 24th World Scout Jamboree in 2019.  I of course approved. 

What I don't know is how applicants are selected.  It doesn't seem to be a first come first serve thing like the NSJ.

When I was a cub scout my den had a cheer.   It varied over the years. My favorite was Den 3 Den 3 we drank too much and have to pee! 

No, non webelos cubs can't wear the patrol patch on their sleeve as the guide to awards and insignia specifically limits the use of the patrol patch to "Webelos Scout only"

http://www.scouting.org/filestore/pdf/CubScout_Insignia.pdf

From my view of the camp,

 

It seems to me the Order will be somewhat easy to gender integrate. 

 

The biggest issue will be the attire of youth on Ceremonies Teams and supporting ceremonies as runners and such.  With young women, with gender equality, if they have to close their chests in with clothing, so will the young men. 

 

Your alls' thoughts?

 

ICS.

I don't think we required boys to wear shirts at the waterfront do we?  I don't think it will be a problem.  They will wear what they like. 

All of our ceremonialists wear shirts. I don't see a problem.

 

Also, per national, they all must wear pants under breech cloths. I heard something about an blanket incident at NOAC in the 80's that prompted that change.

That was a rule in the 80's?  Wow.  I feel like 90% of the things I did in my late 80's / 90's era scouting were against the rules.

I'm assuming that these adults are not paying their own registration fees.  This isn't a practice I agree with and what I would work to change.  A scout pays his own way, the scouters should be setting that example.

I wouldn't take on this role as the scoutmaster though, this is more of a committee chair job.  Refer the parent's to the committee so you can focus on your SPL's program.

@@sst3rd I think that would literally break our lodge.  We are very large and the only way it works is for chapters to handle ceremonies in their districts.  We do our own chapter ordeals, call outs, brotherhoods, Arrow of Lights, Eagle ceremonies, and so on.  Our lodge is so large we also have areas (groups of adjacent districts) complete with their own chiefs and advisers.  The areas usutally run their own fall Ordeals and a leadership development conference.  

Your lodge's ceremony committee won't get very far if they are trying to force members to do anything.  They will need a compelling reason to join the committee and participate.  There is nothing wrong with a lodge running the show, the lodge is the basic entity of the OA, many don't even have separate chapters.  That being said, I think they will have to wait a while for some new youth who haven't experienced the turmoil of this change for them to begin to recruit from chapters that had active teams disbanded.

Maybe the next election for lodge chief will go to the arrowman who promises to return the chapter's ceremonies teams!  

I haven't heard anything about it.  Our chapter just got our budget amendment approved to spend $750 on ceremonies gear and patches.  It would be a shame if that was money wasted.

I just finished running my first merit badge class.

It started last Saturday at our district camporee.  I had 45 minutes to work with groups of about 25 on a couple of requirements for the radio merit badge and ended yesterday with Jamboree on the Air activities which included covering more requirements and those who addended both and did requirement 8 as homework (research a career) the would leave with a signed blue card.

1. Blue cards: Why does the concept of the blue card seem so difficult for scouts?  I ran into this at the National Jamboree too, so many scouts really did not know how to fill them out.  Also, one troop had their own blue card form, that was weird.  I learned why many counselors at merit badge classes clearly state that the cards should be filled out completely and numbered, because when you have a large stack of cards, it starts to chew up real time filling out cards for scouts. 

2. Big event classes.  At the National Jamboree, scouts knew they were giving up 1/2 of their program day to take the merit badge, so they were generally interested in at least earning the badge, if not the subject matter too.  At our camporee, over 200 scouts rotated through the station.  Most of them were not interested and didn't want to be there, and that was not helpful to anybody.  

3. I'm getting a reputation, good or bad, as someone who won't let you attend the class and not participate and still get a sign off.  If the requirement says discuss or explain, each scout will discuss or explain.  Many of the scouts seemed perplexed by actually being expected to discuss or explain, as if it is the first time they have had to do this for a merit badge before, even some of the older ones that I know to be star and life scouts!  

4. I really enjoyed helping 13 scouts earn the radio merit badge though, and getting them on the air communicating.