Eagle1993

5 minutes ago, carebear3895 said:

Venturing is easily the most underutilized asset of the BSA. It's comical how forgotten is seems by national. 

 

In my honest opinion, I wish they would drop all this STEM/Learning for Life nonsense and refocus all those efforts on building up Venturing.

I’ve had a few conversations with various leaders from council and the opinion that was shared is that Venturing is their weakest program... lowest numbers and highest attrition rate.  Some leaders from council speculated that Nationals would make Venturing the program for girls (expand the age range to 10 and use the Boy Scout rank advancement).  I’m not sure it is headed that way, but it seems from my council that they do not plan on investing much time or effort in the program.  

I’m fine with Scoutreach but I don’t see STEM or Learning for Life as core to the BSA.  Venturing seems much more core to our mission and could see significant involvement if we advertised more. Based on what I have been hearing, I don’t believe that is the opinion of leadership.

3 minutes ago, Jameson76 said:

Yes Yes - Learning for Life Scouts.  A program with great intentions and really can fit a need.  That being said, it is rife with potential for abuse and membership shenanigans.  These Scouts are 14% of the membership total for BSA (2016 numbers).  The councils and nationals solicit monies for their membership, so in many cases no real cost to the participants.  They may not even know they are involved in Scouts. 

Actually in some cases they did not know because the groups never met and were paper only units.

Is that what he meant or did he mean Scoutreach?  I know our council spends a lot of time on both L4L and Scoutreach vs Venturing.

1 hour ago, ItsBrian said:

Your day camp does not provide bussing?

No it does not.  Some Packs did get together to do bussing in the past but there was limited usage as many kids weren’t excited to spend 1.5 - 2 hours per day on a bus.  Plus if there was an issue on the interstate it could take much longer (in order to get to the camp you really need to take the only east/west interstate in the area and an accident can significantly impact the commute time).  The in town day camp ended up being a more successful solution.

One highlight from my Council is our in town day camp.  Our council camps work great for some scouts, but they are 45 min to 1 hour commute from some areas of our council.  That commute time does not work well for Cub Scout day camp.  So, the council added some camps closer to the areas of the council that are far from our camps.  One is held at a parish school.  They have a lot of great activities including  shooting sports (inside the school).  They also do 1 field trip to camp for water sports.  This has really helped more scouts attend a day camp.

One somewhat funny story.  They were originally going to hold this in town day camp at an US Army Reserve base; however, the city where that base is located does not allow any discharge of weapons (which include BB guns).  So, they changed locations and the B.B. gun range is in a parish school basement.

I think those skorts are too short of those religions.

I’m sorry to hear your experience with the PWD didn’t go well.   While we don’t allow parents to adjust cars during the race (PWD is already crazy enough), we would allow quick minor repairs especially if a car does not make it down the track.   I’d recommend talking with the den leader or Cubmaster to provide some feedback.  

Our Pack also awards the 3 slowest cars (for this who unintentionally or intentionally are slower).  The slowest car wins Ess Car Go.  That is a fun adder for those scouts and it keeps more kids engaged during the entire race.

As far as tools to help, there are various tools that help ensure the axels is inserted correctly with the correct spacing.  You could use this the add a bit of glue to ensure the axel doesn’t move later.

http://www.hobbylinc.com/pine-car-pine-car-axle-placement-guide-pinewood-derby-tool-and-accessory-p4611?source=froogle&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI5faYqYWw2QIVRbjACh3jggONEAQYBiABEgKpY_D_BwE

Good luck and hope future events go well.

We just had an issue in January where my Pack charter was held up as the Troop (same CO) listed a new and different COR. The council eventually let my charter go thru but they made the Troop change their COR back.  So, I think this is still the rule.... at least in my council.

6 hours ago, RememberSchiff said:

Police now advise/teach teachers and students to run, hide, fight. Should BSA add this training to YP?

Yes.  I was thinking of our Blue and Gold banquet and if a disgruntled/deranged parent would come in shooting.  Would we and our scouts and scout leaders know what to do.  Probably not.  It’s sad that it should be considered but I believe schools have this training and so should Scouts and their leaders.

10 hours ago, 5thGenTexan said:

Yesterday in a FB cub leader group someone suggested that maybe BBs should be removed from cub scouts as a way to prevent school shootings.  BSA shouldn't be promoting the use if firearms or something of that nature.

I wouldn’t be surprised if someone outside of scouting would think this but a cub leader.. that is just sad.  I would think everyone would want their kids to learn gun safety and proper operation in combination with the Scout Oath and Law.

Our Pack had 12 den leaders and only 3 are female.  That said, those three are some of our best leaders.  One of our female den leaders spent a semester in NOLS and spent a semester camping out in Denver area.  She is was teaching several dads techniques to stay warm and dry clothing overnight before Klondike.  She somehow manages our den of 26 Tigers.  She will be our future Cubmaster.  Not sure how common our male/female ratio is in our district....

I agree that keeping den leaders energized is very difficult and a leader that may work out well for Tigers is not the same leader that works for Webelos.  I think re-evaluating den leader decisions each year may be a good practice.

@Eagledad  what was the program changes that you made that helped retention?  Overall ours isn’t bad but I’m always interested in hearing ideas that could improve the experience of leaders and scouts.

Yep. I saw their memorial in Washington DC.  Oh wait...  Point is that attempting to say we need to arm all Americans with AR-15s in order to fight the government is ridiculous.  There are a few groups that tried arm conflict with the US government recently (WACO, Oklahoma City bombing, 9-11, Bundys come to mind).  Those efforts failed and will continue to fail.  No amount of AR-15 will allow citizens to fight the government... they will always have more firepower.  If your not happy with the government you vote. If you want to keep high power rifles with large magazines legal, that is fine, just don’t use some sort of lame excuse that you need them to fight tyranny.  Several of the arguments in this thread are much more valid.  

Hmmm... we had the 2nd amendment but yet both of your examples still occurred.  I’d point to MLK or Ghandhi as examples of those who gained rights and freedom through non violence without the need to arm mentally ill teenagers with AR-15s.

11 minutes ago, Gwaihir said:

because it's people, responsibility and application that matter, not the object.  

I just find it funny that Donald Trump is literally a dictator, Mike Pence is going to electrocute homosexuals, cops are racist murderers who prey on black Americans and yet the tool one would need to fight an oppressive tyranny, everyone wants to restrict to only the government use.  That seems like a not so smart strategy. 

Actually, the tool to fight tyranny is called a  ballot.  You’ll have much more success than going after Pence or Trump (or any other so called Tyrant) with an AR-15.  I would not recommend that approach.

We had parents of one of our scouts present at the Las Vegas shooting.  The father is a hunter and immediately recognized the sound of bullets going thru the air, so he and his wife ran immediately out of the area being targeted.  The mother comforted one of the victims who was shot through the neck.  It was incredibly traumatic event for both involved.

I remember as a youth when we only did Tornado and fire drills... now these kids perform lockdown drills.  It really puts the problems in your life in perspective. 

53 minutes ago, The Latin Scot said:

This will be a crazy year for packs implementing both girls AND 5 year-olds! I am honestly relieved my CO isn't accepting either, LOL.

It is a lot of work...and honestly they are very young.  Multiple times I’ve felt something on my leg and it was a Lion giving me a hug.  Kinda sad but I’m not comfortable with that at all, I get self conscious that the parents will think I’m a creep.  So I gently pull the young one away and get him back on task only to have the other leg attacked by another.  If your parents already think of Cub Scouts at Tiger age then I wouldn’t recommend it.  For us, I feel that it helps to get the kids and parents together at a young age in prep for real Cub Scouts.  I think of it as  more of an early sustained Join Scouts Night than a real Cub Scout rank.

I’m good with the changes they made. I definitely recommend the minimal Pack activity so as to not burn them out over 5.5 years.  We also limit Tiger activities in some cases as well.  I agree with those that burn out can be a concern, so adding additional activities as Scouts age is critical.  This takes a lot of work but with a larger pack is manageable.

Our first year we had 18 Lions.  15 made it to Tiger (we added 9 additional Tigers who were not Lions).  This year we have 12 Lions (excluding girls).  Typically we would only see 8-10 Tigers join each year.

I think we lost a lot of potential scouts in the early years as parents start setting up their sons activities at a young age.  Dasies start at the same age as Lions and prior to Lions I had to turn away parents who were confused when Cub Scouts started.  Several of those parents never returned.

14 minutes ago, walk in the woods said:

Well, not really.  The change back could just as easily be, existing members can continue at their will, but we will no longer accept new female members.

You’ll make hundreds of these VERY happy with this strategy.  

Not sure if this helps, but in my.scouting.org Organization Manager there is a new Family Scouting section.  There are start and end dates and if you are a Boy only, Girl only or Boy and Girl unit.  Part of me thinks that BSA is simply using the term Family Scouting instead of coed.  If you are not an early adopter Pack it simply states your unit is not participating in family scouting.

Go to the BSA website. Cub Scouts membership states “youth” while Venturing, Sea Scouts and Exploring is listed as “coed”.  They are trying to emphasize that Cub Scouts (and BS4G) are not coed.. they are for the entire family (both boys and girls).  It is a messy and confusing message and brings with it to concerns referenced above.

These seems like speculation on speculation but heck, I’m game.  Once BSA admitted girls and stated that the program will work with them expect a loss at the Supreme Court if any attempt starts to kick them out.  I think you would see the significant loss of FOS contributions and BSA bankruptcy.  This isn’t rewriting a handbook and leadership retirement.  These are individuals our organization invited to join and kicking them out at a later date would be likened to (and have the same result as) kicking out Jewish or black members.  Like it or not, this change is permanent.

3 minutes ago, Tampa Turtle said:

(1) BSA National has made the announcement and cannot go back.

(2) BSA has announced a "Separate but Equal' policy.

(3) A few will try "Separate but Equal", some will ignore it and go "co-ed", and most will lack the manpower to pull it off.

(4) Some units who try to stay "Boy Only" will face a PR disaster when some girl gets turned away. Only if a religious based National C.O. backs them up will this be tenable.

(5) National will have no choice but to "relax" the policy on separate units. It is only a temporary tactic.

(6) None of this will change the fundamental problems (program, culture, program, finances)  BSA is facing. In fact it is a distraction.

Agreed.  The most aggressive Troops in my area plan to go full coed (paper Troops if necessary), #3 definitely true.    Based on a message on Facebook group I am a member of, the buzzfeed article and quotes from my local council spokeswoman #5 is already in process.  Also, I’ve seen several coed countries remove the local option after an initial launch and require all units to go coed (other than for religious reasons) so #4 is likely in a few years.  

I think a great topic is #6.  What does the BSA need to do to meet the needs of today’s youth while making it fun and cool to join?  Some Troops and Packs do this well but Nationally it is not happening.  Could the UK loan us Bear Grylls for a while?  

12 minutes ago, gblotter said:

For co-ed Scouting programs, perhaps that is true. Many boys don’t last long at all (as reflected in the low percentages of UK Scouting and Scouts Canada). 

What data are you using for UK scouting?  From what I can see, they have a higher percentage of youth in Scouting than USA and they are growing vs the continuous BSA decline.  I’m even including the Learning for Life I’m the BSA numbers which I don’t believe is really Scouting.  I also expect BSA will see a big drop as older LDS scouts have a new program (impacting Varsity and Venturing numbers).

@Mattosaurus

First, your Eagle Project sounds great.  My wife and I have participated in similar food  packs and the experience was rewarding and fun for the volunteers in addition to providing desperately needed nourishment.

I completely agree with Backpack.  Work to rectify the documentation as quickly as possible.  Admit you missed this requirement and already started collecting the funds. I don’t believe you would run into an issue unless there are significant concerns regarding your fundraising method.  Talking with my father who runs EBORs there are frequent paperwork issues.  They would much rather have scouts own and rectify the issue. Attempting to fudge data or having mom or dad run cover (make up fake excuses) is not a good method to address the gap.  

Keep up the good work and good luck!

1 minute ago, EmberMike said:

Anyone can cherry-pick any scout organization they like to make their point. There are over 50 million scouts around the world in various organizations. We're talking about 3 organizations in particular here, which collectively make up less than 3 million scouts. 

The scouting world is pretty big, and a lot of it is co-ed. I have no idea how co-ed affects overall membership, and I doubt anyone here knows either. Although I'd be highly impressed if anyone could compile info from numerous scouting orgs and draw some scientific conclusions. 

Agreed, but I am interested as to why the Canada Scout membership dropped.  I don’t think it can simply be explained as coed as UK numbers appear fine.  BSA is going coed, that decision has been made.  Are there mistakes Canada made that we can avoid and best practices that other coed scout organizations made that we should follow?

I believe the UK scout org is coed.  They have about 457,000 Scouts and a population of 5 - 19 year olds of 11.18M.  So they have 4.4% of their Scout age population in Scouts.

USA has 63.1M in age range of 5-19 so roughly 4.1% of their Scout age population is in Scouts.  

Note I’m not counting UK girl guides or US Girl Scouts in these numbers (or any other scout organization).

If this is handled similar to how our council is handling Cub Scout camps (both day and overnight) there is no separate weeks for boys vs girls.  The council simply states that if you meet the age requirements and are registered them you can attend.  They’ll handle the added requirements due to multiple genders.