carebear3895

7 minutes ago, Sentinel947 said:

For my entire Scouting life, my troop never had a DE. We finally got one in early 2020. He attended one meeting, and sent the current (6th) Scoutmaster a long email of suggestions and improvements. He has many good suggestions, some things I've attempted to implement over the last 9 years, and some that were fresh ideas. Our current Scoutmaster was a little taken aback by it. To me it's the exact wrong approach to helping a unit improve

I'm guessing two things: 

1. He's a previous volunteer

2. He's not going to last long

But all in all, that's not his job. 

On 10/5/2020 at 11:02 AM, Eagle94-A1 said:

Do not know how effective that will be. We have areas of  the council with no internet service, or dial up service, as we a rural area. Some of my friends are only online at work because of connectivity. Others are using their phones as hot spots, which uses data. One of my friends is paying through the nose to get unlimted data so his 3 kids can do their online school work with their phones as hotspots.

As a DE in a rural area, my biggest fear was internet access for my volunteers. I have seen storylines. 

My district committee  has loved using zoom because they don't have to drive to "another meeting". The Chair has proposed we make this a regular thing even in a post pandemic world. 

Unit level volunteers despise it and would rather risk meeting in person than do anymore #ScoutingAtHome. And to their credit, a lot of them don't get any internet access at all anyways. 

The Comms still meet up at a bar for their meetings I'm pretty sure lol. 

8 minutes ago, ParkMan said:

  What do you do when there are not enough units to be able to have enough district volunteers for in-person meetings within a reasonable drive? 

I find crying to be effective. 

1 hour ago, ParkMan said:

I would think this would be a great position for the right person to make very visible.  It could really go a long way towards building confidence in the hearts and minds of volunteers if the BSA was out proactively talking about these things.  However, the challenge isn't to come out and talk about all the changes the BSA wants to make - but instead to be out listening to the obstacles volunteers are facing and then working internally to resolve them.

Actually, thinking about it some more, I wonder if the leader the BSA needs out talking to people is the National Commissioner.  Instead of the CEO (Mosby), should the most visible Scouter be the National Commissioner?  Should the BSA make the National Commissioner the Chief Scout?

Very good thoughts, but I think if you wanted to make nice with folks out in the field, it has to be a paid National Scouter making time for these types of Town Hall Events. 

1 hour ago, elitts said:

 

• If a rule immediately requires exceptions and extensive explainations, it's a bad rule. (Two Deep Leadership being required for every activity)
• Don't make rules that you know are going to be ignored. (attempting to mandate Two Deep Leadership in people's home lives)
• Don't make rules that are inherently nonsensical or conflict with your own program. (Age Appropriate tool Use)

 

 

I think we can find some middle ground here. The two deep thing should've followed a K.I.S.S. philosophy, but National did National things. 

I think the big difference i was trying to make (and I did a poor job, tbh), was that the poster was not arguing the rhyme or reason of a rule, but disagreeing with it just based on who made it (in this case Big BSA).

14 hours ago, ParkMan said:

 

It would not be hard for the BSA to begin to remedy this.  For example - what if the BSA gave an ACSE the title of "Chief Scout" and put him/her in charge of programming.  As part of that person's job, he/she person held monthly town hall meetings around the country.  The Chief Scout fielded tough questions from unit volunteers and gave honest answers.  The Chief Scout painted the vision of the organization.  Sessions are recorded and put online for all to see.  What if that person made a statement early on that "we will not sacrifice program quality for membership."  Don't sugar coat things, be honest, genuine, and direct - in other words, be an authentic leader.  I have a hunch that volunteers would love a person like that.  

 

These positions actually do exist. 

There is an ACSE of Outdoors adventures (but his primary role is oversseing the HA bases).

There is a National Director of Program. She is actually an oddity in that she was never a Professional. She was directly hired to the position. Under her are:

National Director of Cub Scouts

National Director of Scouts BSA 

National Director of Exploring. 

I believe they eliminated the Venturing/Sea Scout Director position. 

I have said this before on this forum, but am very open and candid with the volunteers I work with. My philosophy has always been  "if someone is going to help me solve a problem, then they need to know the problem first". Not to brag, but I believe honesty and integrity have led me to have a great working relationship with all my volunteers and my district has directly benefited from it. It DOES however have a tendency to annoy my SE. But hey, hard to argue with results. 

2 hours ago, ParkMan said:

What I believe this leadership article is implicitly saying is that authentic leaders should work to cultivate a culture of communication and openness.  That there are 5 layers in the BSA is fine.  There are many organizations with a lot more layers than that which have managed to resolve this kind of problem.  Really, just having the senior leaders of the BSA get out there and start visibly talking to unit leaders would be a good first step.  A monthly update from the CEO would be a good step.

I work for the CEO and no one has heard from him directly since he took the job. Surbaugh would at least make the effort to communicate with field staff. 

To your point though, upper and middle management have always been the weakest link of the Boy Scouts. There are a lot of artificial layers to National. 

3 hours ago, David CO said:

I don't blame them for this.  Our unit doesn't want them.  We would prefer that they stay away.  On the rare occasion someone does show up, we aren't very cordial.  We don't even offer them a cup of coffee.

lol.

But on a much more serious note, it actually worries me that you're teaching youth to be hateful,  judgmental,  and un-scoutlike. 

1 hour ago, David CO said:

I do.  It is.

Imagine being so cynical towards the BSA, you hate rules that are put in place that are meant to protect children.

Wild. 

13 minutes ago, David CO said:

 The YP rules are being applied to scouters 24/7. 

 

you say this like it's a bad thing?

4 hours ago, David CO said:

This topic is about the CO's rules and procedures.  It's not about BSA rules or the charter agreement.  

lol

1 hour ago, CynicalScouter said:

BSA doesn't own the unit. But the unit is required under the terms of the charter agreement to abide by BSA's rules.

 

Correct. Per the Annual Charter Agreement. 

Well.....That sucks. 

What a time to make more restrictions. 

My Troop used to pay for lifetime NESA membership for all eagles. So I wear mine out of respect and gratitude for the Leadership. 

9 hours ago, qwazse said:

With a motivated philanthropist, Trail Life USA could buy BSA. They seem to be expanding, but not rapidly enough to justify such a move for the assets they may gain. And they’d still gain the liability of the legal actions.

 

Trail Life has the illusion of stability. They don't even have 10% of the youth protection standards BSA does. God forbid something happens to a youth, they are done for. 

I have to give it to them though. They figured out the secret on how to recruit 11-17 year olds. 

16 hours ago, ParkMan said:

When I saw the post about the new GSUSA uniforms I was struck by how much they looked like BSA colors.  It got me to thinking - what if in the bankruptcy process the GSUSA makes an attempt to buy the assets of the BSA and effectivly merges the two organizations.

Possible, not possible?  What would you think?

Mergers talks have gone on for decades. Rumor was it we got really close in the late 2000s/early 2010's, but then came crashing down. Some field offices even housed both organizations in preparation. 

If GS/USA does ever buy the BSA, it would just be to liquidate it, not save it. Of course, they do have a new CEO now so anything is possible. The last one was VERY anti-BSA. 

18 hours ago, RememberSchiff said:

What I found from wiki. Membership numbers are fuzzy but @David CO seems correct.

 

It's not like I made anything up. I literally provided official BSA sources. 

And David suggested Lone Scouting started in an urban environment. You and I, based on your wiki source, actually agree that it didn't 

14 minutes ago, David CO said:

I agree that BSA would just see this as a competing organization.  They would never go along with a split.  

BSA has a lot of "paper" Chartered Organizations.  These are fictional entities that only exist on paper.   Their sole purpose is to allow the leaders of new units to complete the chartering paperwork without actually having a Chartered Organization.   A Lone Scout program would benefit BSA by allowing BSA to get rid of all of these fictional charters without depriving the scouts of an opportunity to participate in scouting.  

I thought you wanted an organization where the Chartered Organizations ran everything? Why the sudden shift in heart? 

3 hours ago, David CO said:

That is simply not true.  Lone Scouting was originally created in Chicago to serve newspaper boys and other urban working boys.  My dad was one of them.  He peddled vegetables off of a street cart on the south side of Chicago.  As such, he knew a lot of the newspaper boys who sold newspapers on the street corners.  They recruited him into Lone Scouting. 

Many small farmers would bring their crops into the city and sell them to street vendors, like my father.  They got to know each other, and Lone Scouting spread to small farmers and agricultural worker in rural communities.  By the time BSA bought out LSA, there were more rural Lone Scouts than urban Lone Scouts.  There were once 250,000 Lone Scouts.

Can you imagine what a difference it would make today if BSA had 250,000 Lone Scouts registered?  BSA has distorted the original vision of Lone Scouts.  I know that you would like to restore the original vision of Boy Scouting.  I wish you would want to restore the original vision of Lone Scouting as well.

This is incorrect. I have attached the official BSA Lone Scouting  guidebook for reference. https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/boyscouts/pdf/511-420.pdf

Here is also an article from Bryan on Scouting that helps explains the origins and reasoning behind Lone Scouting: https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2015/09/28/what-are-lone-scouts/

I don't believe the BSA has a distorted vision of Lone Scouting. It actually may be you have a distorted vision. Hope that helps. Thanks. 

Just now, David CO said:

Most execs feel that way.  They're wrong.

Sometimes I feel you hope Scouting dies just so we can all be unemployed 

7 minutes ago, CynicalScouter said:

Now, one thing I have heard Councils doing is to have lone scout "troops" and "patrols" but I am not sure if that is widespread.

This is actually starting to regain traction in our virtual setting. 

16 minutes ago, David CO said:

I disagree.  I think the structure and design of Lone Scouts was better.  If BSA had adopted more of the Lone Scout program, it would have greater appeal to this generation of scouts.  Today's families are less likely than previous generations to join programs that have a fixed schedule of activities.  They want more flexibility.  Lone Scouting offers that flexibility.

Some councils won't even register boys who want to participate as Lone Scouts.  They would rather have declining membership than a strong Lone Scout program.  If BSA goes under, a new scouting program along the lines of Lone Scouting could be very successful.  It would need some modernization, though.  

A hybrid program consisting of both traditional units and lone scouting would be best.  But if unit scouters and council execs won't allow a hybrid program, I think lone scouting could make it on its own.  

Scouting, by design, is most effective when in a group setting. (i.e dens, patrols). Lone Scouting is an absolute last resort option if traditional unit can't happen. I HIGHLY DOUBT there are councils out there that will refuse to register a Lone Scout, ESPECIALLY when there is declining membership. 

I'm not sure what you mean when you say the "structure" of Lone Scouts is better. There is no structure....that's the point. Unless that is your argument. 

Just got done talking to a buddy of mine who is (was) at ScoutingU. it was over 100 people...permanently. 

Most of the training team, member care, a good chunk of supply, membership growth coaches...

This is heartbreaking. Whatever your feeling towards paid BSA members, it's gut wrenching to see people lose their jobs, especially in a time of such uncertainty. A lot of good people who don't deserve this.