Col. Flagg

19 hours ago, NJCubScouter said:

I always thought that the Eagle candidate was supposed to be in charge of his (or her) own project.  I guess not.  I agree with the idea that projects should follow YP guidelines, but beyond that it kinds of takes away from the idea that the Scout is in charge of the project.

This issue (with the Eagle project) is no different than any other Boy Scout event or activity. They are planned and executed by the Scouts, but the adult leaders are responsible for health and safety. PLs and SPLs are still "in charge" of the events, but the adults are responsible for safety.

If anything, this just aligns completely with what has been our mission as Scouters all along. You are confusing being in charge with who is responsible. Eagle projects are no different than any other Scouting event where the boys plan, are in charge, but the adult leaders responsible.

I hear the guy who set up Hillary's email server is applying.

19 hours ago, Rock Doc said:

Regardless, the question remains - how does this "new" YPT format serve Venturing? For that matter, how does it serve the newly-forming dens of female cub scouts?

I don't suspect we will get an answer to these questions until BSA makes up its mind about females in Scouting overall. How will Venturing work after Boy Scouts for Girls comes around? If past experience holds true, BSA will make changes to their program and then, months later, figure out what training is required.

This would hardly be a job description from a successful corporation. More like a wanna-be organization drafting up something they THINK sounds important and businesslike, but is really a bunch of silly double-speak.

This smacks EXACTLY of the type of hazy, vague, ill-thought out stuff BSA spews on a regular basis. Go read any of their training curricula...it is just a cryptic.

7 hours ago, ParkMan said:

The current online courses are:

SCO_3001 - Overview and policies

SCO_3003 - Sexual Abuse

SCO_3004 - Bullying

SCO_3007 - Certification Test

It strikes me that there are some gaps here in the numbers -  as if they intend to add more content.

Also - they have both a mandatory and helpful category.  Again, seems like they have infrastructure for more.

 

This happened a while ago when they broke the former Venturing YPT training into these multi-module set of courses. This was a while ago. I doubt that BSA thought that far in advance to about adding new modules. Never seen them do that before. Planning ahead? 

1 hour ago, FireStone said:

The video games and movies thing drives me nuts every time the gun debate comes up. Do our politicians really not realize that these same video games and movies get shipped around the world, including to countries with little gun violence? There are countries that are far bigger consumers of video games than the US. So where are all of the school shootings in those countries? 

It's not just video games and movies either. Look at violence overall in some of these countries, not just school shootings. Honduras and Guatemala don't have a large number of school shootings per se, but their street and gang violence is off the charts. Go visit a Mexican border town, take a walk down the street in your shorts and Yankee's t-shirt and see how long until you get robbed.

17 minutes ago, ianwilkins said:

I'm not sure the classification matters. There was a list of 17 kids who were the same age as my Explorer Scouts when they were shot and killed. Same age as my own children. They are gone and the lives of those around them are in tatters..

It does matter because they are different problems. Much of the student on student violence has to do with local politics, economics, rivalries and other things. It has nothing to do with the issues in the mental health system, over-prescription of certain drugs, the rampant abuse of legal drugs for recreation, etc.

You see it as "a gun problem", but it's not as simple as that. It is much more than that.

2 hours ago, WisconsinMomma said:

How does your Troop mange its stuff?? 

Beyond the obvious that you've no doubt investigated:

• Fundraise to cover the cost of a pod or storage facility space. 
• Contact a storage contractor and see if they'd we willing to donate the space annual or reduce price.
• Work with the CO to build a unit/area/room on property which they and you can use.
• Find an alumnus with property willing to allow you to store stuff.
• Contact other units in your district and see if they will 1) allow you to store stuff, or 2) go in on a storage facility with you.
• If council camp is near by see if they will allow you to store on-site (highly doubt they will, but worth talking).
• Contact council to see what other options they have.

Of course, access, security, money, etc., are all issues to varying degrees with which you will have to deal.

5 minutes ago, ianwilkins said:

22 January: NET Charter High School, Gentilly, Louisiana – An unknown person fired shots at students from a vehicle in the school parking lot. One person was injured (though not by gunfire).

26 January: Dearborn High School, Dearborn, Michigan – Shots were fired during a fight in the school parking lot. No injuries were reported.

31 January: Lincoln High School, Philadelphia – A fight during a basketball game resulted in the shooting death of a 32-year-old man outside the school.

I wouldn't classify these three as "school shootings". As least, not in the same way that last week's tragedy was. The incidents above took place after school hours or *might* have involved a shooter that was or wasn't a student. That's a bit different than a student bringing a firearm on campus and discharging it.

If you want to broaden the discussion to student-aged kids and violence, then I suspect the number is much higher than 18 incidents. Expand that to the number of kids who simply bring firearms on campus and that number grows further. Expand that to the number of kids detained for bringing anything deemed a "weapon" on to campus and that number would explode.

On 2/17/2018 at 11:56 AM, Hawkwin said:

To clarify, that study doesn't state what you think it does. The study did not try to determine "crime related to drug use." That study simply determined that people arrested had drugs in their system at the time of their arrest. That doesn't mean that they smoked pot and while high, decided to car-jack someone.

Correlation is not causality. As your link stated, if they tested individuals arrested for crimes for having consumed water in the last 24 hours, such would not mean that 100% of crime is related to water consumption.

More likely the study suggests that individuals with the propensity to commit crimes are also likely to use illegal drugs. Not a rather shocking discovery.

On 2/17/2018 at 1:55 PM, Back Pack said:

But it doesn’t say there isn’t a relationship either. 

I think this sums it up. It at least shows that criminals had drugs in their system.

I find it ironic that Scouters are justifying the existence of illegal drugs.

1 hour ago, FireStone said:

I'm sure it happens. But I'd venture a guess that crime related to marijuana is probably lower than crime related to other drugs, and certainly to crime related to guns. 

Here's a 2013 study by the Obama administration that say otherwise.

38 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

Well that is not typical of national, or wasn’t. I haven’t been involved for the last 10 years. Is that District or Council wide a far as you know?

I would enjoy coming down to abserve the program in your area. Maybe you guys are doing something right that would benefit the rest of us. 

Barry

It was in our district. Not sure that we are doing anything special. It's not like we are going out and targeting men over women. We'd take anyone with a pulse to train them up. Maybe it is happenstance. Maybe it is because we are in Texas where guys (and gals) are big on the outdoors and just want to get outside.

In Y-Guides I noticed a large number of the dads there who came over to Scouting volunteered in various forms. Most committee positions were held by moms. Of the 8 dens we had while I was in Cubs 5 were men and 3 were women. The CMs were men but the Pack Committee was nearly all women.

The past two years during our Webelos recruitment camp out nearly all dens were run by mal DLs, but I did notice more female CMs than usual.

1 minute ago, Gwaihir said:

drunk driving kills something like 30,000+ people a year... we don't hear calls for the ban on alcohol.  And when we did ban alcohol, we quickly learned how the black market meets that demand, drives organized crime through the roof and results in more death and destruction.  

I mean sure, banning meth has done wonders for the horrific opioid crisis we are in where close to 50,000 die every year. 

 

and of course, none of this takes into account that of all these things, one is protected by a constitutionally enumerated right... 

Exactly the point. Banning and legalizing does little. When people want to do something bad enough they will find a way.

The answer lies beyond the old fall backs of ban this or legalize that.

1 minute ago, FireStone said:

I'm sure it happens. But I'd venture a guess that crime related to marijuana is probably lower than crime related to other drugs, and certainly to crime related to guns. 

I am sure the number of murderous sprees using an AR-15 are pretty low compared to other firearms.

You ask any cop about gateway drugs like pot and violent crime and give him your statement above and he'd laugh out loud.

1 minute ago, FireStone said:

Potheads? Very few I'd imagine. 

Really? So people do pot never kill anyone while on pot? Never drive stoned and kill someone?

Really? C'mon.

Just now, FireStone said:

How many people have killed other people with a joint? 

Not the point, is it.

But how many druggies have killed people to get their next fix? 

6 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

Could be right, but 80% of Bear leaders are moms in either the 2nd or 3rd year of Cub leading.

 

We can agree to disagree, I invested a lot of time to find this conclusion. 

Dont ever blame other programs, if a boy enjoys scouts enough, he will find a way. 

Barry I am not sure to what extend your research covers my area, but I can tell you based on my 12+ years locally:

• Most DLs are male. Most CMs are male. I would wager a good 60-70% of them. My district does an annual survey. I am looking at the last two years of data right now and easily 2/3 of all DLs are male.
   
• Our unit got together with three other units in our area back in 2010 and put together our own survey to pass around to all Webelos dens. It was online so we got about a 45% response rate which is great. The most popular thing taking kids away from Scouting were 1) select sports, 2) middle school activities (band, choir, orchestra, school sports), 3) school (e.g. need to study more, higher demand), 4) religious or other youth groups.

I can appreciate your research but it is not even close to what my area has experienced. 

Why is it that people want to take guns away from legal use under the auspices that access to them is bad and leads to crime, but they use the opposite argument when pot is mentioned? Access to guns=bad. Access to pot=good.

Either access to something is bad or good. You can't have it both ways...and be credible.

1 hour ago, blw2 said:

I'm not so sure I totally agree.  I think scouts is about a group of friends, usually 6-8 of them, getting together to do fun stuff together as a patrol.  In the process they practice leadership, learn skills, and all sorts of stuff.  Sure, the 'game' of scouts is outdoor oriented but isn't that only because the idea is that boys get so much good out of being outside?

Sure it wouldn't count towards nights camped, it probably shouldn't  be encouraged as a regular thing....but I'd liken it to a patrol getting together for a game of basketball at the scout hut. 

A special event, fun, leaders lead, .....

The cost of going to Disney for a few days could cover going to a high adventure base. Most kids I know would rather do that than see the mouse.

We stopped at DW on the way to Seabase one year, day trip. But to make a special trip? Doubt our PLC would even consider it. The cost for such a trip could be put to going to Alaska for HA, hiking the AT or doing white water on the Natahala.

1 hour ago, Eagledad said:

And one other big factor is the average Webelos leader is the burned out mom who has no outdoor camping experience. Is anybody surprised by the 49% crossover number?

Not sure if mom or dad who doesn't have the camping experience. I have had a near equal measure of both.

As to the 49% figure, one of the things in my area that impacts this rate are "select" or competitive sports. Right at 11 (or 6th grade), soccer and baseball select sports kick in. Practices are several times a week with a game at least once a week, usually on weekends. Since every parent thinks their kid is the next Messi or A-Rod, those on the fence about Scouting tend to lean toward sports...further pushed that direction by dad or mom (dad usually). The next decision point is high school (age 14) because they want to make JV or Varsity.

The non-sporting kids -- the ones Scouting used to be able to get with little effort -- are in to choir, band or orchestra or some other school team. These groups used to have one busy season, but now it is all the time, all year. So now even the geeky kids are stepping away from Scouting.

I don't think there's an easy culprit to pin the 49% number on.

It's not just the NRA. You can take handguns and assault rifles out of circulation but that won't stop people determined to do harm.

The NRA is the easy target (no pun intended). What about Hollywood and their role in desensitizing society with gratuitous violence? What about video game makers and their role? Schools? Degradation of the traditional family? Absentee parents? Lousy social programs? Drug proliferation? Crappy healthcare? Poor mental health screening?

There's a whole host of things that lead to violence. Blaming the gun lobby is the easy way out. It could easily be pipe bombs made with 100% legally obtained stuff from Walmart or Home Depot. You going to go after them next?

Change is needed. It may even start with gun control, but don't fool yourself that it's the answer. It isn't even the best answer.

27 minutes ago, Eagle94-A1 said:

We had a crossover the week before OA elections. They only knew one person on the ballot, their Den Chief. Out of the six or seven eligible, the former Den Chief was the only one elected because of all the new Cross Overs.

Yup, in such cases they know at least one candidate. We actually had that happen last year. The DC was on the ballot and one of the Lodge reps told three Webelos (just crossed over and their first meeting) that they couldn't vote. Our OA Rep overheard so the youth came and got me. I told the Lodge rep these were new Scout and entitled to a ballot (he disagreed but could not find it in the rules) so we had the boys vote. Yes, they were registered with the unit so they counted.

Happy to say the DC needed those three votes and got in with just enough votes.

Also happy to say that DC is now the OA Rep and leader of our ceremony team.

52 minutes ago, Jameson76 said:

Unless you're next to a screaming toddler on a Lufthansa flight. THEN it is all about the destination and not the journey! 

https://metro.co.uk/video/video-demonic-child-screams-eight-hour-flight-1628342/?ito=vjs-link

50 minutes ago, ianwilkins said:

I'm slightly hesitant to wade into this sad and dispiriting mire, and I won't presume to know what's right for your country, I really hope for all our sakes that change is made for the better.

Change will be hard. Even if we take up all the AR-15s and handguns lying around, kids could still make other things to cause harm. When people seek to do harm they will find a way whether it is a box cutter, pipe bomb or AR-15. We can take steps to eliminate some of the weapons but we will never get rid of all of them.

For me the answer lies with family, faith, friendship and fairness. 

17 hours ago, MattR said:

SOAR does one other thing that really helps. Put an announcement on the front, whenever you want, and one day a week it emails a synopsis of all the most recent announcements. So, no flood of emails.

Exactly! And it automatically updates and events or files that have been updated. All such updates are included in the eBlast announcement that goes out each week. The email lists are priceless too. We can target emails to OA or PLC (or whatever groups you create). It also allows the PLs to communicate with their patrol (and by default, also with parents too).

I can honestly say that it has saved me tons of time. Couple that with Google Drive and Skype, we can collaborate whenever we need to. In fact, I was on a PLC Skype call last year and it was pretty cool. 10 kids and 4 adults. Got a lot done and the adults could still keep their day jobs.