Buffalo Skipper

That said, there are many pros and cons for having or not having troop tents. There are some out there who say that if you dont have ownership of it, you will not take care of it. I dont buy that flap. There are innumerable times in our lives from school age through employment and retirement that we will be required to take care of things which do not belong to us. I feel it is important to instill a sense of value in things we do not own but are responsible for at an early age, and this covers that very effectively.

I feel it is important to consider all angles when deciding on tents, and I do mean ALL angles. Does your troop backpack regularly? You will probably be looking for a lightweight, smaller tent. These can be more expensive. Where do you live? Will you camp in warm or cold weather? You will need to consider a tent with plenty of mesh or all fabric walls. I agree with perdidochas, that putting too many scouts in tents does leave room for a bit more chaos. Also, the larger the tent, the more volume and the greater difficulty you will have in keeping warm in cold weather. Also consider your patrols. If you have 7 scout patrols and 4-man tents, how practical is it when 5 scouts show up? Smaller 2-man tents are easier to manage with odd numbers.

Another important consideration is how will you care for your tent? This is an issue which has plagued our troop since we began purchasing our current generation of tents a year and a half ago. We are just now getting into a groove on setting up tents AFTER the campout to air them out. None have mildewed yet, so we are still ahead of the curve, but it took a while to figure this out. If you have a 4- or 5-man tent (some local troops here do), how do you dry them out after wet campout? Does you charter provide you with a space which is usable to set up tents? If not, is the option to send a 5-man tent home with a 12 year old scout to set up in his yard? Tent care and expectations can play a big factor in practicality far beyond the campout.

And of course there is the ultimate deciding question, how much money do you have? Cheap tents can run as little as $30.00, but those are not really durable tents. Many troops like the Eureka! Timberlines (2- or 4-man), and admittedly those are excellent, well made tents, and thought not at the high end of the pricing range, they are far from the low end. Our troop opted for Alps Mountaineering. They give scouts a 45% discount on the listed price, and their prices are reasonable to begin with. Their website is

http://alpsmountaineering.com/

For specific details and registration for the scout discount, see their companion site

http://scoutdirect.com/

Alps has a large variety of tents in different sizes and for different purposes. We have been using the Taurus 2 man tents (with vestibule), which is one of the lower priced products. We have found the quality to be very sturdy, and in 18 months have had zero rips or holes, no zipper issues (beefy zippers!) and no leaks. I can only assume that this quality translates to their higher end lightweight and backpacking tents. The area provided in the Taurus (37 sq feet) is appropriate for 2 scouts, and with the vestibule, gear is not an issue. Others may recommend different tents, and I would probably not disagree. But we have found that the qualityprice factor of the Alps Mountaineering products is difficult to beat.

We charge new members a one-time $35 equipment fee, after joining. For this we offer that we will keep their scout in a tent as long as he is in the troop. We do allow scouts to bring their own personal backpack tent on backpack trips. And once a scout crosses over into the Venture Patrol, they may bring their own tent to all campouts. This gives the younger scouts a sense of unity, but allows the older scouts the feeling of individuality. It also allows a scout to have several years of camping experience before choosing a personal tent, which hopefully will give them the knowledge to make a wise choice. So far, this is working out well for us. Your mileage may vary.(This message has been edited by Buffalo Skipper)

Gutterbird, check out these discussions we have had in the last year.

http://www.scouter.com/forums/viewThread.asp?threadID=262351

http://www.scouter.com/forums/viewThread.asp?threadID=260014

That should get you started....

Camperships were a part of our troop for years but have been nonexistent for a dozen years or more. We are trying to rebuild the system. Our situation is interesting in that our Treasurer is vehemently opposed to Camperships because he believes all scouts should work for the good of the whole, and that the troop should not support individual division of labor. Because of this, one committee member has stepped up to be a "campership coordinator," and a another has stepped into the role of "fundraising coordinator."

The Campership coordinator is my wife, and I want to help her out with her accounting. I want to help her out with a spreadsheet plan which may facilitate good recordkeeping. I could certainly create a complex Excel file to do this, but I only dabble a little with spreadsheet development. If anyone out there is already using a good Excel file for this and is willing to share, please PM me and I will pass back my email address to which you can forward the document.

Likewise, I am open to discussion on how to best accommodate this. I want to keep my fingers out of it as SM, but I would like to get some good information to pass on to others who will be involved with this.

Thank you all for the information. That is really what I was expecting to hear. It can be done, but it is not convenient to do. I will contact the original council and request the records to be sent to our registrar, but if she refuses to act on them there is little I can do. Prehaps I can request that be sent to me and I can try to upload that into Troopmaster as well. Eventually I can then upload that to Scoutnet, I will just have to do that with the new ID.

OK, all you current and former professionals out there (and anyone else who wants to throw in their 2. I have some questions about how to receive records on a scout transferring from another council....

I just spoke to our council registrar and was advised that when a scout comes in from another council, they are starting fresh (records wise); that Scoutnet cannot "transfer" or "accept" his records from another unit and that he must be assigned a new BSA id#. Is this correct?(This message has been edited by Buffalo Skipper)

Each area states under the requirements "...approved and under the auspices and standards of the Boy Scouts of America..." As such, I would say this excludes family camping.

If we follow the premise (which has not been discussed, by the way) that this award replaces the National Camping Award, I think this makes sense. The NCA (along with the Camping MB) just this past year was rephrased to include only Boy Scout camping, both of which had previously included non-BSA experiences, such as camping with the family.

Prehaps "most" was a misleading word. Sure, Blue Angel patrol is cool. I still have my BA patrol patch from about 1980 that some mom sewed for us; coming from the hometown of the Blue Angels, this is especially cool to me.

Scouting was founded on the principles of the outdoors with a good dose of American Indian lore for good measure. Creative names such as Thunderbird, White Wolf and Salmon (based on PacNW Native American imagery) are all well and good. I can even appreciate the Jackalope, Border (patrol) and other "cute" patrol names. I tend to draw the line with some like the "Vampire Teddy Bear," "Red Bull," "Swine Flu" and similar exotic names. I just don't see the premise of these as being ground in Scouting. That is just an opinion. I don't necessarily see this as being an issue of black and white; the is plenty of grey inbetween.

I never did like the coffee "singles" or dunkers. They just didn't taste right. Now I know why. Thanks for the info.

For ease of coffee making in smaller quantities, I would highly recomend a French press. This makes "cowboy" style coffee (with grounds boiled directly in the water) but is equipped with a strainer. You have to learn how to balance the water quanitity, amount of grounds, and cooking time. This is some of the best coffee I have ever had.

I am looking into a titanium french press (Snow Peak) for backpacking, and having it double as a small boiling pot.

Two of the best I have recently seen were the Sharks, with the yell:

"I am a nice shark, not a mindless eatin' machine. If I want to change this image I must first change myself...Fish are friends, not food." OR just "Fish are friends, not food" for short.

Another which was considered by one of our patrols was the Seagull patrol with "Mine, mine, mine, mine, mine-mine, mine...."

Another is the Hound (or dog) patrol. Their yell could be "SQUIRREL!"

Beyond the standards offered by BSA, there are two major suppliers of non-standard patches I have found online.

http://patchtown.com

and

http://store.classb.com/patches

Both offer quality patches at a reaonable price. Patchtown hast the better selections, but most are pretty outlandish, and outside of what I believe a scouting patrol should be.

I am not LDS, nor am I in an area with a particular large representation of LDS units. However, being experienced with our district Commissioner corps (I have been a commisssioner for the past 5 years and stepped down last spring), I can tell you that we do have one Asst District Commissioner who is specifically over LDS Commissioners. These LDS Commissioners are do come from the respective Wards, and have the "blessing" of the Stake, if I understand it correctly. They are largely assigned by unit type (Pack and Troop--we have no Varisty units in our council) not specifically to the units at their Ward.

Locally, the wards are not as large as other church COs, but many of the units are active and involved in district functions, both on the Cub Scout and Troop levels.

I hope that was at least a little helpful and presented accurately.

I would not consider that to even be in the category of "adding to the requirements," as whatever organization he is serving would have no authority over seeing that he has or has not met the requirements.

As a leader (and father), I would strongly suggest that the project be taken a different direction. Such an expectation, on bahalf of the benefitting organization is outside the scope of such a project. I may have to confer with our district's advancement chair (were I in that position), but I feel that the committee might not approve such a project if that were a stipulation of the benefitting organization.

Interesting perspective, from the Venturing side. Though in my own mind, I had thoughtlessly dismissed this as a Boy Scout only award, I immediately came to realize that this IS very much like a venturing award: the Ranger. Remember that the Venturing Silver is the highest award on the Venturing side, and that the Ranger is a separate recognition following a different track. And there is a similar level of commitment between the two awards (exceedingly high!). Now that I think about it, it may be more appealing if they had given it a more snazzy title; "National Outdoor Achievement Award" sounds a little dry.

Eagle92, for the camping award (rocker), yes, this is easy, and possibly intended so for the purpose of making this achievable by a great number of scouts. It falls more into place when you look at it from the perspective of the NOAA, which requires that the scout earn the silver level of the camping. That is 125 nights. Our troop hasn't seen an Eagle scout meet that requirement alone for as long as I can review our records (maybe 10 years). And I don't think any one of them would have earned more than a single rocker in aquatics and nothing else. But to earn a camping silver and TWO golds in each of two other areas?

This is truly a significant award. We have some active scouts in our area, but I doubt that one in 100 or more Eagles in our council would qualify for this. Those of us who may have quietly been thinking that BSA standards are becoming more and more lax should put those ides to rest when considering the National Outdoor Activity Award. (Man that is a mouthfull...)

Has anyone seen this new award?

http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/BoyScouts/Youth/Awards/NOA.aspx

It looks a little more complicated than I would like to see things, but pretty all all encompasing. At the higher level there is a medal to be awarded (National Outdoor Achievement Award) which according to one site is said to replace the National Camping Award. http://www.boyscouttrail.com/content/award/national_outdoor_achievement-2112.asp

However, if you look at the requirements, The Outdoor Achievement Award is far beyond the National Camping Award!

Your thoughts?(This message has been edited by Buffalo Skipper)

ROTF LOL! Thanks Jet. I needed that today. I have a CH-47 family coming out to the campout to watch their NYLT trained son be acting SPL for the first time at a campout this weekend. No joke, really.

"Why would a patrol hike on any other day count as a patrol activity but if done during a campout or at summer camp it would not count?"

Actually I agree with this. Key word, though, is "patrol." If the "troop" is camping, and the "patrol" organizes an activity, then

I see this as a separate action/activity. We have 3 patrols, and at most campouts, each patrol holds a separate meeting, which is recorded in our troop records as a separate meeting (does not count as a 2C/1C activity). But if one patrol organizes a hike and the other patrols each organize something different (or nothing at all), then I would count that as a "patrol activity." I have recorded this as such in TM, but I don't think it got anyone to FC any faster.

Playing the devil's advocate here, I can see why Swimming may have been left off. Team score is based upon individual performance, not on a cooperative team effort (except for medleys). I would equate swimming to "Track and Field" which is also absent from this list.

This is not to say that bowling, for example, is not based upon multiple individuals' composite performance. Tennis and cross-country are similar, but not the same.

I am not against including swimming, just presenting a different point of view.

You prompted me to look up our troop history. Our troop has been continually chartered for 73 years. During that time, we have had 26 scoutmasters. Some facts:

Average time served: 2.8 years

Longest time served: 9 years

SMs serving 1-2 yrs: 16

SMs serving > 5 yrs: 6 (but these 6 SMs cover 39 years of troop history, over half the age of our troop)

6 of the 25 previous SMs are still involved with the troop, dating back to 1960 (who is now our COR who is much more involved than just being a name on a sheet of paper)

Not really useful, but prehaps informative. I agree that often times the length of time is often (but never always) representative of the long-term health of the troop.

Let me add that one of my favorite expressions is: "Scoutmasters, like diapers, need to be changed every so often, and usually for the same reasons."

Signalling is indeed a difficult badge. I had a scout who started studying his Morse Code and Semaphore as soon as the requirements were released. The badge was offered at summer camp, and we ended up moving some capeable swimmers (who mysteriously could not pass the swim test the had "aced" two weeks before camp) from the Swimming MB to the Signalling MB (the only one at the camp with openings that period. Amazingly, they all earned the badge by Thursday (just over 3 hours of class time). But it was signed off, what could I do? I did complain to the camp PD, but it fell of deaf ears. But that is another thread.

Interestingly, 25 years ago, my inability to do Morse Code was the only thing which kept me from making Quartermaster. Maybe if they had offered Signalling as a Diamond Anniversery Merit badge I could have gotten credit if taken at camp....

evmori is right. The idea is that many units may just pruchase badges and never submit advancement reports. Then when a scout goes for Eagle, nothing is on record. Certainly this has happened multiple times in every district around the country.

One way our scout shop enforces this is to prevent any "troop account" to be used without an advancement report. An individual can purchase badges, though they may have to put up with a stern talking to....

I find this policy to be difficult. We are told "immediate recognition," but even though our unit may submit an advancement report monthly (on the first day of every month), we "cannot" purchase the patches until the advancement report is submitted, often a few weeks later. We get around this with our "stash." We hand out the rank right away, and replace our supply at the end of the month when we turn in our advancement report. As I said, the ridiculous 2010 rank patches are making that difficult for us, at least for the next 4.5 months; it will be nice when that is over with.

From a personal perspective, I like TM. Any product has a learning curve; some are more steep than others (remember that a steep means quick). Having used Packmaster, I found Troopmaster easy to follow. Do I like all the features? No. I do wish the POC section was better organized, or could be customized.

I have little interest in setting up stuff through a Blackberry or iPhone. And, if I want information quick, sitting at the computer during a meeting will usually deliver what I need in seconds, and it sure is easier to read on a computer screen than a phone.

Is this product for everyone? No, but it works for me so well that I would probably not consider even looking at another product. Scoutgroove, I am not trying to be negative, only reinforcing that TM has what we need. We have 20 years of records on TM, with almost 1000 entries dating back to January 1990. It would not be practical for us to attempt to transfer this information. Others may certainly feel differently.

Certainly most of us have seen the award ceremonies presented in Program Resources.

http://www.scouting.org/filestore/pdf/33588.pdf

We have used these over and over, and I would love to hear from the gang about what other ceremonies are used, both for Rank and for MB presentations. I have heard of some troops doing this for both meetings and/or for Court of Honors.

How does your troop do it?

Guy,

For some reason I missed your first comment regarding the poor Cub Scout style of once a year presentations. I can relate to that, as when I stepped into the troop, we did a once a year CoH, which they turned into a big heavy hors d'oeuvres/pot luck following the ceremony. The troop was a bit smaller then, but one of the first things I did was to get 2 CoH the first "year," then blend it into 3. As we are now growing, we are now in a position to have them every 3 months.

The troop has always had a "stash" of rank badges on hand, and we have presented ranks immediately following the BoR (often the same meeting). We now have a national scout shop at our office, and they are particularly strict about selling rank patches without an advancement sheet to be turned in; with the "special" 2010 Centennial rank patches, this has become a real pain. Luckily, we are almost past that sillyness. We used to hold onto all Merit Badge patches until CoHs, in spite of the fact that we also had a "stash" of these as well. We now work hard to present MBs at the meetings, often times the same evening that blue card is turned in. For less common MBs this happens no later than the next meeting. We only hold the "cards" to present with the awards ceremonies, for both rank and MBs.

I am also a programmer. I in fact, work for a school district, doing mainly HR, Certification, and Payroll. We are on an ancient, cobol based system, which is stable and very functional. We are looking to migrate to a new system, probably a web based operation, so I have a particular appreciation for what you are saying.

I, personally would not like a web based system, and I can sum it up in one word. Connectivity. Our troop has a great building, but there is no phone or internet, nor is there a reliable wireless network in range. Likewise, I would probaly not be able to access the system at work (during my free time) due to security policies on our network. These conditions to which I am subject are not likely to change in the next decade. It would be of almost no value to me.

For TM, we use their dot.net service where TM stores our database, and we access the information via FTP. This works for me because we can back up the database to a local source, save the file to a flash drive, and upload it at the scout hut where we have no internet access (or also at the workplace, as I cannot access an FTP due to security features). Though this means I must upload and restore the file before every meeting, it is neither a difficult nor timely process, and is just a part of my routine.

Of course, being able to save advanement files and upload to Scoutnet is very convenient. Of the 45ish troops in the district, I could count on one hand the troops which update their advancement directly to Scoutnet. Considering the sometimes unreliable entry taking place at the local office, it is reassuring to know that our troop has the most files on record in the area.

Troopmaster has all the features I need. Would it be nice to know all the data elements and have something like "Crystal Reports" to pull out custom formatted information? Sure. Do I need it? No. Do I really use the reports features from TM? You betcha! If I have a spare 15 minutes to look over some things, I may veiw 3 or 4 reports a day. But remember, I am an HR programmer, so I already think in those terms.

That's the way it should be! Glad to hear that your troop's BoRs are on track.

Not to hijack this thread, but when talking about troop tents, I like Perdidochas's approach. We have troop tents (nice new Alps, with which we are pleased). We are up to 12, 2-man tents, and expect to buy more this spring. We are just in the process of forming a Venture patrol, and it has been our intention to invite scouts in the Venture patrol to use personal tents. Two of our expected "founding" members of the Venture patrol already have personal, lightweight backpacking tents.

Back to the original discussion. I do not like silicone products for one main reason. Silicone has no UV resistance. If you use a silicone sealer, every time you dry it in the sun, the sealant is breaking down.

I worked in the marine restoration industry for several years. Almost all the boats which came in with leaky seals had been caulked with silicone. (There are other reasons I do not use silicone in a marine environment, but these are not applicable to tent repair and restoration).

Another trick I have used is a 10% ammonia/water solution in a spray bottle. The ammonia acutally kills the mildew. Spray on (while the tent is set up) and allow to dry. Reapply to particularly dark spots. When dry, almost all the ammonia has evaporated. Then wash as you please. Remember: DO NOT MIX AMMONIA AND BLEACH. Once the ammonia solution is washed off, following up with the above mentioned bleach bleach is perfectly acceptable.