69RoadRunner

1 hour ago, RememberSchiff said:

I hope that was old video - no masks or social distancing and a high risk old fart walking around! If not, a pox upon us.

The BSA should insist covid scout stories use new video showing what safety measures being taken. IMHO, all news video should be time and location stamped.

Perhaps a story comparing safety and fun of maskless people packed in at the beach vs masked scouts at camp. A scout is obedient, follows the safety rules.

My $0.02,

It says File at the beginning, so I assume it's file footage.  

Scouts are supposed to be obedient. But we know reality is that there will never be a case where 10-17 year olds are perfectly obedient all the time. However, I'd bet the scouts did a much, much better job than at any massive protest or recent parade.

27 minutes ago, mashmaster said:

I talked to my wife who is a swim coach about this and does our swim tests.  She says that most backyard pools aren't big enough to realistically conduct swim tests because on the amount of time spent in the turns.  She suggest finding and open neighborhood pool or YMCA pool to conduct the tests in. You still need to abide by the Covid restrictions for your state so you might need to schedule times to keep it the scouts distanced.

This is a very valid point.  Here in VA pools CAN open with those restrictions. Our neighborhood pool did, but many others are closed all summer, including all county pools.

Some people were critical on social media and some state officials visited the camp.  I have to wonder how many of them were critical of protests and parades that had zero screening, zero social distancing and while many wore masks, that was not enforced.

https://www.wvnstv.com/top-stories/state-leaders-address-covid-19-concerns-at-summit-bechtel-reserve/

If you can meet the rules, I can't see why you can't use your pool.  Keep in mind, unless you have a really big pool, you'll need them to do more laps to meet the distance requirement.

https://www.scouting.org/health-and-safety/gss/gss02/

One of our ASMs, texted me this, today. So far, all the reports I'm getting are extremely positive. They were issued all brand new tents and cots.  Very high praise for all the staff, too.

I think an organization in bankruptcy shouldn't spend a lot of money on something that will have little to no impact on membership. If this were an idea where the benefit exceeded the cost, then consider it.  I personally don't see it.

5 minutes ago, yknot said:

While I agree with the ridiculous trend of re-parsing language so it is less offensive to some, I have to say, Scoutmaster and Cubmaster are weird titles. At least I've always thought so, especially for an organization that is in such trouble because of youth protection issues. I don't have a problem with "master" when discussing technology, music, computer science, electronics,etc. I just really don't like it when we are talking about a youth organization where the use of the term kind of implies that youth are in a subordinate position to adults in a non educational sense. I'm fine with leader, advisor, coordinator, instructor, organizer, etc. ... 

I've never encountered anyone in person who ever commented on the title in any way, positive or negative.

I get the impression that the vast majority of people give it no thought beyond it identifying who holds the position.  Maybe people have felt otherwise but haven't spoken about it.

It doesn't seem to me to be worth the time and money to change to something else. 

Do I now have to call the master cylinder on my vehicles the "brake fluid pressure thingy" now?

I might be good with being called El Jefe.

I'm in Fairfax County, VA, and the school district sent out a survey with 2 choices for the upcoming school year. 2 days a week in school and lots of homework or all virtual classes, which was a disaster this past school year.

It's sounding like the elementary school we use for meetings won't be available, so we will have to scramble to figure out what to do.

2 minutes ago, yknot said:

Well, as long as the camp staff and employees don't leave Summit for the summer and bring it back to their families and communities. Keep in mind that temp taking is mostly a feel good measure because a significant percentage of COVID cases don't have fevers or don't develop them until after they are infectious. It's more predictive where you came from and who you might have been exposed to, which is why the histories are probably the most effective tool. That's good if they actually tell people to stay home or leave. Also, questionable protester behavior shouldn't inform scout behavior... we're supposed to be more civic minded.  

I understand the need to get kids into some kind of normalcy, I'm just not seeing why 

But the public health experts told us the protests were fine.

3 minutes ago, yknot said:

I also hope your scouts and scouters have a great time and stay in good health. 

I also wish the same for everyone they encounter in West Virginia as well and hope they are mindful that the county you are traveling from has five times the COVID death rate as the entire state of West Virginia. Compared state to state, Virginia has 17 times the number of deaths as West Virginia. According to CDC recommendations, we were not supposed to be doing this -- sending kids from higher transmission areas into lower transmission areas. West Virginia has so far escaped the worst of this. I am hoping that Summit is completely self contained and that everyone gets through it safely. 

That is the way they described Summit. It's basically a self-contained community.

Our crew was only to stop for a bathroom break. They took bag lunches. They all had to take their temps for 5 days leading up to arrival. Any adults who were just drivers had to remain in their vehicles at dropoff.

They will have no interaction with the residents outside of camp. 

The changes they made to prevent spread of Covid-19 at camp are extensive.  Little time will be spent inside.

Virginia is about to go to phase 3 of reopening.

If massive outdoor gatherings with zero social distancing is allowed for protests, these kids should be able to attend summer camp where there are a great deal more protections in place.

4 minutes ago, David CO said:

Robert E. Lee High School?

For now, but not much longer.

They apparently rejected my proposal of Geddy Lee High School.

17 minutes ago, sst3rd said:

69RoadRunner,

    I really hope your scouts have a great time. Even though I've never liked "merit badge" themed programs, I've had to learn to get over it. There sounds like lots of opportunity for fun at this camp as well.

You mention Camp Powhatan. I have many memories of that camp, as well as Camp Ottari. I'm from elsewhere in Virginia, but as a long time scoutmaster (now former), these programs always excelled way beyond our local camp, and we considered them our home camps.. That, and the fact that my parents are from that area and I got to visit a bit during the camp week.

Somewhere along the line, units will be able to start meeting and going on camping trips again. I'm concerned that in my area, many units will not start up again. They'll say they want to wait until the fall and gather themselves. That ain't going to happen. If the troop that I support starts meeting again, I see many challenges to getting its program back to where it was. I also will be surprised if half the scouts show back up. That prior statement is based on my experiences as a scout leader, and the fragile economic state we are in.

Power on 68RoadRunner. Keep the spirit alive.

sst3rd

Thanks. We're actually from just outside DC in Springfield, VA, but since I've been in the troop, we always went to Ottari. This year we were going to change things up a tad and do Powhatan.

While this part of Summit is a merit badge camp, it is not exclusively that. There are many activities for scouts to try.  I'm of course hoping everyone comes back healthy and telling stories of the great time they had. I hope they all learned valuable scout skills, particularly our new scouts. My son and our Troop Guide worked with most of them to get their Scout rank (or most of it).

I'm thankful for our ASM who did so much work bouncing between camps and dates to make this happen. So much has been canceled for these kids.

When Camp Powhattan closed for the summer, we took advantage of the opportunity to transfer to Summit's merit badge camp at the same price. During the pandemic, I started with a new company (doing the same job), so even though I'm the scoutmaster, I don't have enough PTO to do both this and Northern Tier (fingers crossed).

Summit had multiple Zoom presentations and I have to say I am very impressed with the people who are running the program. We've never been there, but they certainly give one confidence.

I'm of course hoping that all the evidence that outdoor activities are safe and kids rarely (not never) have problems with Covid-19 holds true.

We have a fairly big group of first year scouts doing the Brownsea Island program. Of course they did not have an opportunity to be a part of our troop as they usually would due to the pandemic. Everyone will be tenting solo as one of the many Covid-19 precautions, so I hope all of these young scouts do well with this new experience. They did do a Wild Webelos campout that was not family camping, so it won't be their first time without mom and dad.

Wishing all the scouts and scouters a great time and good health!

Part of the difficulty of removing the Lenin statue is that it's on private property and isn't that some lovely irony.

A couple of people were murdered in CHAZ/CHOP by people with guns. They also established a wall to keep out undesirable people and there's some more irony for ya.

In Harpers Ferry, WV, the mob defaced the statue of John Brown, showing incredible ignorance.

4 minutes ago, Kudu said:

I'm in favor of requiring Scouts to demonstrate virtue signaling, so long as it is done in Morse Code.

Or flags.

No one born in the 1800s and back can meet the woke progressive standards of today's far left cultists.  There's no room for nuance or imperfect people who also did many good things. It doesn't mean you don't discuss the bad things, but you don't erase people like the USSR.

The latest update from NT says we need 2 thermometers. No contact ones are ideal for a mixed group out in the wilderness, but the lowest cost ones have poor reviews. The good ones are rather expensive for a troop to purchase 2.

For anyone else going this year, what are you doing to meet this requirement? My other idea is 2 cheaper digital oral thermometers and get disposable covers. I'm not sure if they're going to ask us to check everyone every day. That would require a lot of covers and wipes.

Few people born in the 1800s can pass the purity tests of today's woke culture.

However, there's a statue of Vladimir Lenin still standing in Seattle.

Just now, Navybone said:

I think we are both trying to say the same thing.  I agree with everything you say and was not trying to imply otherwise. 

Sorry for the misunderstanding.  All's good as the kids say.

11 minutes ago, Navybone said:

I do not see the restrictions due to COVID on businesses and families and the seemingly disconnection with the protest as related.    Governors are caught in an interesting dilemma- Public health, economic development, and protest due to civil injustice.   All three are pulling at each other and none are necessarily supportive of the other.   
 

from a scouting perspective - look at the conversation we can have as part of Cit Nation, Cit Community, and Public health.  How restrictions and wearing masks are helping the greater community. And how protestors are so upset, they are willing to take risks to themselves to protest inequality based on race. Interesting times.   

The virus does not distinguish between reasons for people gathering. Either it is safe or it is not safe.  If it is killing grandma to gather for one reason, it's killing grandma for all reasons.  If it's safe to gather for one reason, it's safe to gather for all reasons.

The Constitution guarantees the right of the people to peaceably assemble. When there are extreme circumstances, that right can be temporarily restricted, but the government does not get to decide based on whether they like or dislike the reason. 

The rules for this pandemic are now Calvinball.  Governors are extending lockdowns while participating in massive events with no social distancing.

Tracing is impossible when people are gathering in large numbers at protests.

Schools reopening in the EU has not resulted in an increase in Covid cases, and that's indoors where it's more likely to spread, unlike Philmont.

9 minutes ago, yknot said:

 You are proving my point. For the most part, routine national travel for business or pleasure has not resumed.  Businesses other than local are not sending their employees across the country. People are not traveling to weddings and graduations, and college students are not returning home from school because they are already there.  People so far have not resumed vacation travel. And we've been relatively OK. A trend to send people farther afield from one region into another will likely paint a different picture.

 

 

You're speculating.