CalicoPenn

 

I am sure bringing girls in will make the Boy Scout program more family friendly, bring more car camping, bring more smart phone apps, more safety, much less adventure and it will not be the fault of the girls at all, but with the new leaders that will be coming in with them in massive numbers. . . 

 

 

Can I borrow your crystal ball?  I'd like to get the winning lottery numbers for next weeks Megamillions and Powerball.

Ok. So survey the other 2.1m of us. It’s our organization and not some old guys in Dallas or wherever.

It costs about $15 per person to do an e-mail survey, $30 per person to do a mail survey.   Do you want to sell Philmont or Seabase?

I think I can help you with a bit of practical advice.  Two bits of practical advice actually.

First:  Don't read more in to the requirement than is already there.  Just about every "problem" with a requirement is caused by people reading more in to the requirements than what is there.

Let's take a look at that requirement again:  Jump feet first into water over the head in depth, level off, and begin swimming.   Do you know what it doesn't say?  It doesn't say Jump in to water over your head in depth so that your head is underwater...  It only requires on to jump in to water deeper than they are tall.  Now if we got that out of the way, there is a way for your Scout to jump in to water over his head in depth, level off, and begin swimming without going completely underwater and that leads to the second bit of advice.

Second:  Ever hear of a rescue jump?  Or a lifesaving jump?  Or stride jump?  Or whatever it might be called nowadays?  Its actually pretty simple to do - and is taught to lifeguards so that they can jump off docks, piers, etc. while always keeping an eye on the person they need to rescue - can't very well keep an eye on the victim if you end up fully underwater.  

This is how it is done - jump in the water with your legs spread front to back (as if you are in the middle of a running stride) and with your arms held out to the sides level with your shoulders.  When you hit the water, you bring your legs back together and your arms to your side.  If it goes right (ie your timing is good and you don't bring your legs together before you hit the water), you will have jumped in to deep water without getting your head wet from anything other than the splash.  You won't be dunking your head under water.

You can try practice this skill in shallower water (about 5 feet) to get used to the movements (of course if the Scout is 4'9" and is successfully practicing it in 5' water and is leveling off and swimming, he's pretty much passed the requirement).  It can even be practiced on land.  It might help this Scout if he sees other people doing it and succeeding.

Try that instead of getting his parent to "order" him to do it.  The Boy Scouts isn't the military and he'll learn a skill instead of resentment.

_{First:  The Boy Scouts of America does NOT define what "Duty to God" actually means.  They leave that up to each individual Scout.  The BSA only states that in order to advance, you must believe in God (or any other higher power) and that you are Reverent.}

_{Brian - I guess you missed my earlier post.  Maybe I need to be clearer.  NO ONE CAN DEFINE WHAT DUTY TO GO MEANS TO YOU.  I'm going to tell you a secret - it's really not a secret but no one wants to tell folks this.  God doesn't care if you go to church or not.  In fact, it was God, speaking through Jesus, as told by Matthew (6:6) who said that when you pray, go in to your room and shut the door to pray to him in private.} 

_{Heck, if a Scout answered that question from me with "Matthew 6:6 clearly states that worship should be done in private and what God and I discuss is none of your concern, I'd accept it in a heartbeat.}

_{But as I said in my earlier post - don't limit yourself to church going or church activities.  Think about the things you do everyday.  I dare say that if you follow the Scout Law in your everyday life - if you are trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent then guess what - you're doing you Duty to God - because those are the things that God values.}

Will existing scout masters be expected to run the girl troop as well as the boy troop?

Why should they?  Why can't the "girl troop" recruit their own Scoutmaster?  

 

On the Cub side most packs have enough challenge to effectively staff dens, much less double up the dens for co-ed operations.

If you double up on dens, you potentially double up on recruits to lead those dens.

Would you make the argument that a all-boy Pack shouldn't try to recruit and double the size of their pack because they won't be able to find enough leaders?

Utter nonsense.

We had a Hodag stalking us when we did a night hike to the bog at Makajawan one year.

I met a bunch of Venturing Scouts a few weeks ago at a community fest - all female and all in full uniform - not jeans and a uniform top - full uniform.  Some of them worked at Owassippe for the summer, some at Napowan - all of them love Venturing and were proud to wear the uniform.  In fact, thinking about it, its just a little disturbing that the female venturing scouts were much more proud of the uniform than the Boy Scouts at the same fest were.

I've heard of it, but have no idea what "learning for life" is.  

I honestly thought it was just an advertising tag line for the BSA truthfully.

so

based on that and as a long time FL resident I am thankful to Gov Scott at the moment.  Sounds like yet another bloated thing paid for by the government that really is no business of the state government....  Sounds like he's right on the money to me, based on what little I know (only this thread)

 

Now I  am open minded and ready to be convinced otherwise.....

In the late 1970's and through the 80's, a number of Councils ran a program called "Scouting in Schools" - it was an after school program that provided Scout skills without the trappings of traditional scouting - and was open to girls as well.  In 1991, the BSA created Learning for Life which was essentially the same program with a different name - partly to prevent confusion between traditional Scouting and "Scouting in Schools".  From the beginning, LFL has been a character building program.  In the late 1990's, LFL absorbed the career-based Exploring Posts, including police and fire posts, and kept the Exploring name while the high adventure/avocation Posts became Venturing.  This change was made because of controversies over whether public schools/government entities could sponsor BSA units, including Explorer Posts when the BSA's policies on discrimination contradicted their own.  By making Exploring part of LFL - which was always 100% non-discriminatory about anyone (No triple G (God, girls, gays) issues in LFL), it saved the Exploring program.

As t the situation in Florida, my take is that the State has mandated an in school character education program.  LFL just happens to have a character education program, ready to go - for a price of course.  The school districts ad no character education program of their own, so they purchased it from LFL - and the state provided the funds to the districts to do so.  What Gov. Scott has essentially done is stopped the state from paying for it leaving it to the School Districts to pay for it.  It sounds as if his thinking is the school districts have to do character building so they should be able to do it within their regular curriculum for no extra charge.  Of course, the School Districts don't have it as a built in curriculum because they've been relying on LFL so now the School Districts will either have to pay LFL out of their own budget, or spend money to develop their own internal curriculum.  Either way, what Governor Scott has essentially done is just change who will pay for the mandated program and has suggested that school districts should do so without raising taxes which of course means they should cut spending elsewhere for it.  Sounds good on paper until you school district cuts out music, or art, or something else parents think is important but is just not mandated.

"The best example of this is that it is no longer required that a Scout learns how to swim to advance to the rank of Eagle."

Really?  Sure, Swimming Merit Badge maybe an optional required badge (meaning you can earn swimming, hiking or cycling) but in order to become an Eagle Scout, you still have to pass the BSA Swim Test.

"I still remember getting blasted at summer camp when a few members of my pack and our leaders went out to canoe at night. Full moon, no wind, we were all in life jackets and all passed the swim test. It was an awesome experience and when we canoed in the waterfront director wanted to kick us out of camp and worse for our leaders."     Did the pack have permission to take the canoes out that night?  If the waterfront director was that hacked off, I think its probably safe to say no.  Your Pack was properly busted - not for canoeing at night but for stealing the summer camps canoes (that's what taking property without permission is called - stealing - not borrowing - stealing).  

I showed some mom's at work they BSA FAQ chart that showed the Boy Troops and Girl Troops side by side. They have scout age boys and girls. They were outraged and said on the news it said nothing about 'Separate but Equal'. I remember one comment well: "So Girls can now earn Eagle as long as the stay in their Girl Ghetto". I then said there may be an option for Girl patrols and Boy Patrols in some Troops and who knows what in the future. They were of the opinion that anything short of mixed sex Boy Scout patrols next year was NOT what Boy Scouts was talking about. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned all that. 

 

I think National has a herculean task of aligning what their proposed policies are what the perception is of the change is going to be both in and outside of scouting. Boys think one thing, scouters another, and the outside public something else.

 

Jumping the track indeed. They have or on the verge of losing control of the conversation and in the middle of the muddle is this thing called 'Family Camping' the train is heading for while everyone is looking elsewhere.

Interesting choice of words - "scout age boys and girls" - not boys who are Scouts and girls.  Have you ever asked them why their boys aren't Scouts?  I wonder if the whole "girl ghetto" comment could be a clue.  This is illustrative of what the BSA is seeing out there that volunteers on the ground may not be paying attention too - more and more, parents are avoiding groups like the Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts because they are segregated.  If you are only paying attention to your Troop and having been humming along at 35 Scouts and not seeing big drops in your numbers, you may not be paying attention beyond your Troops "borders".  Yet there are a lot of Troops and Packs out there struggling - we see a lot of anecdotal stories in here - Troops of 4 boys, Webelos Dens with 1 boy.  My suburban Chicago city of 26,000 people once had 5 Boy Scout Troops and 7 Cub Scout Packs - it's down to two of each - and this was happening long before the "gay decision.   We've seen Councils selling off camps over the past decade or so - and while we gnash our teeth and lament the loss, we don't pay attention to details.  Sometimes the Council is just being inept (such as Chicago Council trying to sell Owassipe) but sometimes when you look at the data, it makes sense - such as a council with two summer camps that was running a 3 week session at one camp and a 1 week session at another because they no longer have enough campers to support both camps.   I've been repeating this for years - society is changing, if the BSA doesn't change, it will be severely diminished as an irrelevant organization.

Is it inevitable that we'll have mixed Troops?  Probably - heck, we may have that in practice long before the BSA develops a policy about it (and please understand, it is highly unlikely that the BSA will enforce their policies by removing charters - they don't do it now and this won't be any different.  They have these policies but they run on the A Scout is Trustworthy model.  The DEs are likely to know what's going on but will ahem and cough and maybe even harrumph but at the end of the day will pretend its not happening, and commissioners don't have any enforcement powers so really, a Troop is going to do what a Troop is going to do.  Lets be real frank about this - the policy (if indeed it is not to allow mixed Troops/Patrol) is designed for one thing and one thing only - to insulate the BSA from liability - if a Troop does a co-ed camping trip with Co-ed Patrols and something wildly inappropriate happens among the youth and a parent sues, the BSA is going to deflect all the blame to the Troop for violating the policy and the CO for not making sure that the Troop was following policy.

I've tried to stay out of some of this discussion but since "Family Camping" has been brought up again, I have to comment - we already have family camping - it's an official part of the Cub Scout program.  I've not seen anything in the discussion on going co-ed that Family Camping will be part of the Boy Scout program - I think there are people reading things in to what is being said that just isn't there.  If your Troop wanted to do a "family camp" outing right now, they could - it's not part of the program, but it isn't barred as part of a Troops program - if a Troop wants to have an end-of-summer before school weekend fling and camp as families, nothing will prevent that - just don't treat it like a Troop camping trip with patrol camping and separate activities for the Scouts and the families/siblings. 

Advancement?  I've not seen the BSA make any suggestions that they are going to "water down" advancement requirements - that's all coming from folks commenting.  Girls that want to join the Boy Scouts want the program that is being given - the exact same program that is being given now - wouldn't it be a bigger risk to have these enthusiastic girls decide not to join because the BSA watered down the requirements to accommodate something they never asked for?

A Den Leader can remove a Cub from the Den - but not the Pack.  The Pack would the be responsible for finding a new Den for the boy.

If it were the Cubmaster, the boy would stay in his Den with a new Den Leader.

Just my opinion, but generally I think that FOS barks up the wrong trees. Why on earth would you ask the families that are already supporting Scouting at the Unit level to contribute more to the Council? They should be working like the development arm of any other non-profit, and target businesses. Go for deep pockets, and stop the nickel and dime stuff.

They already are.  There is a common misconception about the Friends of Scouting campaign and that is that it just asks families of Scouts to give.  What most Scouters know of Friends of Scouting is the presentations that are part of the family enrollment campaign but the Friends of Scouting campaign has other prongs to it as well, such as asking local businesses for money and local philanthropists (aka the rich guy in the corner house that seems to have a brand new car every other month).  Want to be on the Council Executive Board?  While it isn't necessarily pay-to-play, the Councils run like many other larger non-profit executive boards - if you're on the board, expect to pony up some cash - back when my father was on the executive board, it was expected that board members would give a minimum of $1,000 to FOS - and this was in the 1980's.  You should check out some of the members of the boards of things like zoos, botanic gardens, museums - many are on those boards because of how much they're donated.  Want to be a life-time member of the Board of Directors for a zoo?  Donate a building.

Have you heard of the rule that Units are not supposed to ask for cash donations from businesses to support their unit?  The reason is because Council may be planning to approach that business to ask for cash donations as part of the Friends of Scouting program.  The thinking on that is that you walk in to Ray's Heating, Cooling and Waffle House and ask for $100 for prizes for your Pinewood Derby and it makes it more difficult for the Council to walk in and ask for a $1,000 donation.  There's a lot of truth to that too.

The BSA isn't necessarily hiding that from us either - they're focusing on the family enrollment campaign at the District and Unit levels - and most of us won't make the time or effort to check any further in to it.

If you start digging around, you can find some interesting numbers.  Most Councils get the biggest chunk of their funding from Friends of Scouting - usually in the 35-45% range.  At the same time, the family enrollment campaign provides about 20% of the total Friends of Scouting funds - that means that the Professionals and Council Board is raising the other 80%.

The first thing you need to do (and yes - the Scout needs to do but you are involved too as the advocate for your son) is sit down with the Scoutmaster, Eagle Coordinator, and/or District Eagle guru and discuss this.  Review the plan - it may be ambiguous but that might not matter.  You need to engage in some help to work with this beneficiary.

I would be really curios what the role of the person is who doesn't like the primitive look of the chinking on a primitive structure.  It sounds to me like your son did quite a bit of research to re-chink the building in keeping with a historical building.  Lesson learned for others - if, in a situation like this, a beneficiary wants a modern look to chinking a historical building - run - just run.

If the Scouting folks you meet with can see the project in person (though photos can help) and think it meets the proposal - they may decide its best to go forward without the beneficiaries signature - its actually unclear if this meets the definition of a BOR under disputed circumstances - follow their lead.

What does it mean to be a man?

A Man is: Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave, Clean and Reverent.

What does in mean to be manly?  I have no idea.  There are too many converging opinions out there on what it means to be "manly".  People who hunt with civilian versions of AR-15s think they're manly.  People who hunt with shotguns and rifles often think they're the manly ones and that the AR-15 wielders are children.  Of course, people that hunt with bow and arrow often think gun hunters of any kind are wimps  So tell me, what is manly?

In high school, I was a skinny little geek yet no one picked on me.  I learned at my first high school reunion that the word had gone out not to pick on me because I was the only guy brave enough to make friends with a girl with muscular dystrophy that was being mainstreamed in to high school with us during freshman year.  The manly jocks were terrified of her.  So tell me, what is manly?

I know dads who love to work on their cars - a good manly pursuit - who gag at thought of changing their children's diapers.  So tell me, what is manly?

Don't get me started on this whole "feminization of men" BS out there - that's being pushed by misogynistic people who want to keep women in the kitchen. 

No.  This is a Board of Review - key word here is REVIEW.  You are reviewing the Scout's Scouting career - his path to Eagle.  This issue has nothing to do with his path to Eagle.  If you want to ask in conversation after the BOR - once the BOR has made their decision, that would be ok - but not in the BOR where his answer may trigger a negative response from someone sitting on his board who decides to fail him based on his opinion. 

This is still a political issue in a lot of ways - and that does not belong in a BOR.

 

But, asked, “How do you tie two half hitches�

 

Not a clue. Has been taught many many times, and has done it many times.

 

 

Are you sure he doesn't have a clue how to tie a two half hitches?  I know adults who tie clove hitches all day that don't remember the name of the knot.  I know Scouts that shrug when you ask them to tie a bowline but know immediately what knot to tie if asked if they can tie the rabbit knot.

People tend to remember the things they're interested in or that they're exposed to a lot.  They also often file away things in their brains under their own labels.  What is the context of this Scout having tied two half hitches many times?  Is it in the context of learning how to tie the knot, or is it in the context of using it every time you camp when setting up tents?  Maybe he remembers it as some other name - like tent peg knot.   Or maybe he just finds knots boring and hasn't seen good examples of their importance. 

We had a similar experience so our SM had a scout give the presentation. It was off the cuff and pretty funny. He had bullet points to read from but he got nervous so he winged it based on what he knew. He had everyone laughing.

I'll bet he had everyone giving too.  

Its interesting how this thread is playing out.  A lot of people are up in arms about the whole thing are still wringing their hands over how its going to affect people in the field and here it is, less than a week after the announcement, and there are already people in the field thinking about the practicalities and getting ready to do what they need to do to make it work.

If one looks at the fact sheet and faq, it makes clear that the options for Packs will be to remain an all boy pack, create all girl packs, or have co-ed packs with single gender dens (it also makes clear that there will be separate Troops for girls and boys - no co-ed troops as an option).  That will be the policy.  What is the BSA's means of enforcing that policy?  The Scout Law - in particular, as Numbersnerd points out - a Scout is Trustworthy.  The BSA is going to trust us to follow the policy.  They are going to trust that you don't run co-ed dens.

Is that going to be practicable?    Clearly not - we all know it won't be.  National knows it won't be.  But the policy is designed to be as simple as possible (really - how complicated is boy only packs, girl only packs and co-ed packs with single gender dens?) without delving into oodles of "what ifs?" (the kinds of questions the field, practicable folks like yourselves are already asking).

Every policy that the BSA has, every rule, every advancement requirement - everything - works on one principle - a Scout is Trustworthy.  They trust that Den Leaders won't just take a Cub Scouts handbook and sign off on every requirement without anything being done.  They trust that Packs will follow family camping guidelines.  They will trust that Packs will follow the policies on single gender dens - and if circumstances prevent it from being practicable, they'll do what they always do as long as it doesn't threaten the health and safety of the Cubs - turn a blind eye.  No one on the professional staff is going to be inspecting your units to make sure you comply, and the volunteer commissioner staff doesn't have any power to force you to comply.  Like the lone wolf in a bear den, things sometimes happen.

While a Scout is Trustworthy, there is another important component that comes in - The Scout Oath, specifically "On my Honor, I WILL DO MY BEST...to obey the Scout Law.

Its good to see folks discussing how to move forward - let's all remember that all we can really do is to do our best to make it happen.

Unless you believe the mission of the BSA has been changed with this decision.  Then the appropriate, logical and mature response would be to resign gracefully and let the new leadership take the reigns.

From the BSA website:

The mission of the Boy Scouts of America is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law.

Before anyone tries to claim that the BSA must have changed their mission statement this year to admit girls, I have found references to this very mission statement back to 2011 and that's just a cursory search - it likely goes back much further - possibly to a time when girls were admitted to Exploring.

I see nothing in this decision by the Boy Scouts of America that changes their mission, as stated in their mission statement, unless someone wants to argue that girls are young people.

The field of candidates was pretty narrow and most of those Scouts are now in other roles like Scribe, Librarian, QM, etc.  The vast majority of Scouts in our troop that are not currently in a leadership role are the new Scouts (most are still working on Scout Rank).  Election time fell right before "school round up" night this year.

I guess you have to ask - what is more important, a Librarian of a Senior Patrol Leader.  If the QM, Scribe or Librarian is elected, they can always appoint someone to their old position.

Typically, the ASPL steps in to the role.  If the ASPL does not want to do it, I would hold a special election for any boys that are interested (did you have a field of candidates last time?).  The one thing I would not do at all is have the Scoutmaster/Committee appoint someone - that is not their job, or their responsibility. 

Agreed, and for those who point out you can still keep an all-boy Pack or Troop, please tell me how long you think that will last and how much volunteer input will influence the next round of changes.

 

It is indeed no longer BOY Scouts.  No girl wants to be a BOY scout.  Scouting USA, back after 40 years!

We'll probably be able to keep all-boy packs and troops for another 50 or so years until a newer generation decides that separating the genders is just stupid.

No girl wants to be a BOY Scout?  Never use an absolute - there are people in this thread telling you how excited their girls are to get the chance to be a Boy Scout.

Going by the majority of the responses in the boyscouts and bsachief Twitter feeds, the BOD really didn't exactly have the pulse of the general public on this.

 

As a numbersnerd, you should know that people who want to complain about changes on social media will always outnumber people who like the changes or the people who just don't care either way commenting in social media- by significantly large numbers - so I take any twitter or other social media comments with a very large grain of salt. 

 

Now with this change is it possible for someone to challenge and revoke the Congressional Charter? It explicitly states,"...the ability of boys to do things for themselves and others..."

You can argue that yes, it will still serve boys. But between the purpose of the charter and the very purposeful name BOY Scouts of America, how likely is it that someone will attempt (most certainly in the near future) and succeed (that's the real question) in getting the charter revoked? The argument being they have strayed from or abandoned the stated purpose in the charter.   Sure - some conservative congress critter could decide to try to repeal the Congressional Charter - it likely wouldn't get very far because congress critters are at heart politicians and know that by election time, no one will remember why a congress critter voted to repeal the charter, they will only remember (because it will be featured as a sound bite in an ad) that "Congress Critter X voted AGAINST the Boy Scouts of America" - and very few of them will want to face that - no explanation in the world would be short enough to counter that.

 

The resultant effect is that if this were to happen, would it then be possible for other organizations to use the imagery and terminology (Scouts, Scouting, et al) to promote their program if it passes muster with the WOSM? I've seen the sentiment that for Scouting to get back on track, the volunteers need to take the program back. This would be the beginning of that effort I would think.  No - actually it wouldn't be possible for other organizations to use  the BSA's terminology.  It is not the Congressional Charter that protects any of these - the charter is pretty much just a honorary charter - Congress doesn't even issue charters anymore.  The BSA's trademarks, etc. are protected by US Copyright and US Trademark laws - they are registered with the necessary federal offices to keep those protections.  Losing the charter would not affect those at all.

 

Just musing.