malraux

9 minutes ago, 5thGenTexan said:

The issue of "overnight camping"  and how many nights are permitted under GTSS only applies to the Cub Scout Program.  It has no bearing on Scouts BSA

Does overnight change definitions depending on age? That’s my issues. If overnight only means a single night, then it should impact the wording of lots of stuff in scouts bsa. 

12 minutes ago, MattR said:

I wasn't laughing at you, but that emoticon was the closest thing I could find to "touche."

 

Sure, I'm kinda joking, but if, as @RichardB says, overnight is a preexistingly clearly defined word that only means a single night, then he is also saying that you can't backpack multiple days. Or at least the wording should be changed to reflect this.

There's a lot of BSA literature that mixes overnight and multi night events. 

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Trek Safely, the Boy Scouts of America’s recommended procedure for organizing BSA outdoor treks, applies to overnight treks of any duration.

https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/Outdoor Program/pdf/430-125_WB.pdf
Near as I can tell, trek safely is a depreciated standard, but would have been in effect in during this decades long ruling.

 

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 A short-term camp is any council-organized overnight camping program, whether one-time or continuing, that is one, two or three nights in length...

https://www.scouting.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/2023-NCAP-Standards-430-056-web.pdf
That's an NCAP definition which seems to list overnight as possibly including 3 nights camping as an overnight camping.

If longer than one night no longer counts as an overnight camping, I have no idea how to interpret the rank requirements.

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Since joining Scouts BSA, participate in 10 separate troop/patrol activities, at least six of which must be held outdoors. Of the outdoor activities, at least three must include overnight camping.

If weekend camping isn't overnight camping then do youth not count weekend campouts for this rank requirement?

6 minutes ago, InquisitiveScouter said:

The only document I can see linked from G2SS is this one:

https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/HealthSafety/pdf/680-685.pdf

Which, again, adds no clarity.

As per that link, if overnight always meant a single night, then multi-day backpacking trips are against the g2ss.

National BSA literature and trainings have multiple instances of overnight including explicit descriptions of overnight including multiple nights. If overnight only means a single night then for example two night backpacking trips are banned as per the g2ss.

On 2/3/2023 at 3:28 PM, Eagle1993 said:

So ... I'm not aware of all of the changes.  Some that may be coming 

Out of question, do you know when these changes will get rolled out? I’ve got a day camp to plan out and I’d like it if I can be ready for whatever is coming. I suspect the plan is to have these changes for next program year but that’ll start with day camp. 

The guidance against lasers in that NPS citation seems to be against using it to tag wildlife, not against night usage for stargazing. Context is everything. You wouldn't use that page to argue that flashlights are a bad idea on scouting trips because it bans spotlights.

I roughly agree that my ideal program for cubs would break the program in half roughly and have k-2 grade youth in a different unit than 3-5. The k-2 program would be a monthly meeting only. The 3-5 program would be more like a webelos program with more space to be adventurous and meet more often compared to the younger kids.
 

I also would do something to change how pack meetings are generally conceived because way too many are focused on giving out awards and being boring.

Just now, Eagle1993 said:

BSA has clear rules that the unit violated.  I'm not sure what else the BSA could have done to prevent this.  

Now, the council who owns the camp.  If any council employee was aware of this situation or gave approval, then the council should be held liable.  If it simply happened at their camp, without their approval nor seen by any employee ... then I struggle to see how they are liable.  If all the council did was having unapproved targets, I struggle to see how that would be blamed for this incident.

Unit leaders & CO ... could be held liable.  How was the barrel not pointed down range?   No safety official overseeing the range is disturbing.  Ammo on tables happens all the time and is fine.  Same with guns (though these clearly violate BSA policy).  

In theory, the BSA approves the operation of the camp as a property through NCAP inspections. The camp should have procedures to be sure that units are following procedures while on property. And while minor things can be missed, the camp should have known the unit was at the range shooting. 

Though yes, I suspect that the bulk of the liability falls on the unit leaders, the lawsuit will certainly want to show that the camp/council were not following the published guidelines.

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The suit, for example, says the camp ignored a ban on human-shaped and zombie targets and didn’t limit firearms to “22-caliber breech-loading, single-shot or a repeater type bolt-action rifles with a boxstyle magazine.”

I'm of mixed opinion on the target limitation. I'm not sure how much of that is safety related vs PR related, as there can be a lot of problematic choices of say zombified versions of political figures or controversial figures. And certainly there's every incentive to drag in the deeper pockets of the local council vs the troop leaders. But if there's a history of violations of the shooting sports rules at the camp, then they'll deserve every financial penalty they get. That said, it does sound like this troop went rogue on what they brought to the firing line.

Most dens are coed (un)officially now and will be fully official starting this summer, based on the rumors going around. 

Just now, Ojoman said:

Many parents that don't/won't sign up as Den leaders still come to the meetings and remain until time to leave. A den leader can count a spouse, parent of another child or other adult at least 18 or older as the 2nd person.  This is from Scouting Magazine, "

• Two-deep leadership is required on all outings. A minimum of two registered adult leaders — or one registered leader and a participating Scout’s parent or another adult — is required for all trips and outings. One of these adults must be 21 years of age or older.'

It can be done and it is not that difficult. If a male and female den meets together for den meetings or field trips be sure to have one male and one female present. It is advisable that all parents in a pack (registered or not) have youth protection training. 

There are no 'reasons' not to, only excuses...

This is out of date with the current version of the Guide to Safe Scouting. Two deep now requires two registered leaders both over aged 21, and because many dens are going coed, one of those leaders needs to be female.

Mixing scouting honor/service society with cultural appreciation/preservation always has seemed to be a less than ideal mix. It worked better in the past when concerns about appropriation were less and when fascination with the first peoples were more common. 

I personally haven't seen a well done ceremony in person. It's been pretty cringe inducing even back in the 90s.

1 hour ago, scoutldr said:

This was covered when I was teaching Cub Scout Basic Leader Training.  There are positions for "Committee Chairman" and "Member of COmmittee".  That does not include the CM, DL and ADL positions.  Stay in your lanes.

 

See the current Cub Scout job specific training document linked and quoted above. 

Just now, mrjohns2 said:

Does the training say they aren’t voting members explicitly?

As per the trainings and leader guide, there is no such thing as a voting member. Its not a concept ever mentioned.

FWIW, the Cub Leader Guide and leader trainings do not grant the right of voting to members of the pack committee. The different committee roles are about accomplishing various activities. The only voting described is for the events on the annual calendar.

13 minutes ago, InquisitiveScouter said:

Source?

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The Cubmaster, any assistant Cubmasters, and den leaders or other representatives of each Cub Scout den also serve on the committee. Their inclusion ensures excellent communication and planning between all leaders and committee members.

https://pdscouting.wpenginepowered.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Cub-Scout-Leader-Training-Facilitator-Guide.pdf page 35.

2 minutes ago, MikeS72 said:

Is this a relatively new feature?  I do not recall noticing it in the past.  Good to know now where to find the most current numbers.

Within the last 3 months. 

3 minutes ago, PACAN said:

@malrauxwhere can you see this dashboard.

People with district registered roles as well as council employees have access to the council membership tools, which lets you query the national database.

2 hours ago, Eagle1993 said:

100% agree ... GSUSA has 1.7M youth ... far more than BSA (who as everyone knows allows girls in).  While in my area, GSUSA is still going strong, girl troops and girls in packs are languishing. 

Is that number pre pandemic? because reporting during the pandemic was that their numbers were down to about 1 million youth.

2 hours ago, Eagle1993 said:

While it is great to see a few good examples of girls doing well in scouting, it does not appear to be widespread.  I would love to see numbers across the USA, but that is hard to find (they were highlighting those early after adoption, but no longer).   

Of the roughly 1 million youth registered, 154 thousand are female as per the dashboard right now.

5 minutes ago, PACAN said:

Okay….Cub Scout RANK requirements absolutely cannot be used for Boy Scout RANK requirements.

 

Under the current rank requirements yes. But it was never clear how to handle the AOL and scout rank requirements of earn the cyber chip for your grade. However the AOL requirement has been updated to something other than cyberchip.

7 hours ago, PACAN said:

Also cub scouts requirements cannot be used for any boy scout requirements 

Be careful with absolutes. The national outdoor award can include cub level activities.

Speaking from the Cub Scout side, I have two main complaints. First, at the Cub Scout level they should have gone coed dens from the start. All girls dens spanning multiple grades doesn’t work for most units. It’s being fixed officially soon, but should have happened sooner. 
 

second, while I understand the rules for youth protection make sense for drop off situations at the troop level, the rule that cubs must have a female scouter at the activity are troublesome at the den level. If parents are there, it’s weird that ypt isn’t covered by that situation. For overnighters I understand but hour long den meetings?

48 minutes ago, nolesrule said:

I don't disagree, but location and meeting night/time can have a lot to do with long-term success, not just the initial size of the troop. We're in the second troop. It currently has 10 scouts, but it's located in one of the outer population centers of our district. My daughter was the 5th scout on the charter. it's 12 minutes from our house. The initial "super troop" is 25 minutes from our house and requires driving past the location of the troop we joined.

I do wonder how much of that is covid related. Locally it seems like most units mostly stopped growing during covid. And I’d be really reluctant to have been trying to start a new unit in 2020 or 2021. 
 

but yes I’ll believe that many areas made the mistake of growing too slowly. 

12 hours ago, Cburkhardt said:

Timing.  The starting date for all girl troops on February 1 seemed odd.  It caused us to do everything off-cycle, such as recruiting chartered organizations.  Young people usually don’t think of joining new things in February.  It required us to work harder and through the Christmas holiday for no apparent reason.

I think the goal was to have something ready to roll out for 5th grade girls coming from cub packs. Though at the end of the day, any arbitrary date is gonna have issues.

The other issue with timing is that covid almost certainly screwed over a lot units, and it hit about 1 year after the first girl troops started.

Now other roll out question might be how well older scouters were handled. I wasn't at the troop level when it happened, but my impression is that vocal opposition was allowed for longer than I would have preferred.