AwakeEnergyScouter

I thought we scouts were bougie. Are we not? Lederhosen is not saying otherwise. And 'King/Queen' is still in a lot of Scout Promises... Just sayin' 😉

Time for a REI x BSA collab? 😄

Been telling my scouts that exact thing in the context of the Internal Spirit Award... You can tell it's a scout shirt because it's a Western shirt with two front button pockets and a bunch of badges worn with a necker, even if you don't recognize from what country it's from. Without the badges... Fails scout shirt sniff test

That's how scout shirts are meant to be!

Now that you say that, a parent was complaining about that at our last campout. I mean, I get it. Sewing new badges is yet another thing on the to-do list. The incredibly long, winding to-do list. Blargh. If you just asked me out of the blue, I'd say I don't like sewing on badges either. But that doesn't mean I think that we shouldn't have patches that need sewing on. Not loving every aspect of everything I ever do for scouts isn't the same thing as wanting to change the program. Everything in life is a mix of things you like and dislike. And seeing as scouting is a spiritually based

National didn't poll my scout, who hates taking the belt with all the loops on and off and therefore mostly refuses to wear it. They're not wrong - the loops end up scattering all over the floor a lot. It doesn't have the right vibe. Plus, what kind of a scout shirt isn't covered in patches? And aren't all the sewing avoidance methods already offered enough? 🤦🏼‍♀️ And then there's the ecological impact. I thought the reason for the move to belt loops was just a consequence of that they wanted to move the awards to adventures because the awards were earned by less than 1% of scouts. C

I didn't realize it was no longer available. I thought it was still an earnable award for all. Well... In this exact moment, it is. But since the awards are being replaced by belt loops, and it doesn't seem like there's any adventure called something like what's in it, I'm working under the assumption that it will be discontinued June 1 for cub scouts. I'd be happy to be told that's a misunderstanding.

That's a great idea, @OaklandAndy. I'm mourning the loss of the International Spirit Award more and more, as we go through it as a pack. I see the scouts understanding scouts in the bigger picture for every activity we do, and it makes me sad that we can't do it again. But who says? When the scout shop runs out of badges we can make our own 😄

Welcome to the forums, Kelsey!

Apologies, it wasn't my intention to bait. Perhaps I wasn't clear. I meant that in order to stay on the civic side of the line, we all have to self-monitor, which the GSUSA scouter may have failed to do. Political issues one is very touched by are ones one might have to consciously stay far away from the line on. For Palestinians, the Gaza situation is going to be very "hot" for natural reasons. Not a problem per se. But that means needing to figure out how to not let the fire burn when in the role of scouter.

It does feel a little sides-taking. I still think it's better than 'Palestine' bracelets, but absolutely better than the 'Palestine' bracelets in the show of support to wear category is something like those peace bracelets you linked. But in both cases, I don't understand why they didn't go the support scouts in the conflict zone that are already on the ground delivering humanitarian aid route. Clean, simple, loyal. It's probably not hard to guess based on general information about me how I feel about the full-scale invasion. But just because it's easy to guess who I'm hoping will win, an

This is a lot closer to the line, and as such interesting to consider. My feeling is that supporting other scouts is always ok - so fundraising for an Eagle Scout project is ok because it's generally recognized not just as a good turn but a development exercise for the scout. Compared to the bracelets, certainly Eagle projects deliberately stretch scouts' abilities in a way making bracelets doesn't. The first aid kits seem much closer to that line - and might be over it. I don't think so but I could probably be convinced otherwise without too much trouble, particularly because the co

This right here is also what sets scouting apart from a lot of other youth organizations. Or should, at least. We need to stick to the basics of what's made scouting successful throughout the decades, and that's the patrol method with the implied trust in the capabilities of the scouts. The last thing they need is more helicopters or snowplows. Separate paper troops and even separate sides of the campground all just seems to add more work for... Nothing. Learning how to lead boys and how to get them to come along was one of the most valuable life lessons I got from scouts, and I want the

I read the article to mean that it was outside that window, but you're right, it doesn't explicitly say so.

Yeah, exactly. And it's for good reasons. It's not greed, actually. If scouts, like civil servants, weren't allowed to engage in political actions even as private citizens (not using any scouting logos, not in uniform, etc) then that would undercut the movement's goals, and the mom's frustration would make total sense. But that's not the case. The problem isn't fundraising for a cause that isn't scouts, the problem is associating the movement with political causes. Like you say, which cause doesn't really matter, but IMO it's worse when the cause is very divisive.

It does seem a little harsh to threaten immediate legal action, but I understand it better in this case than in suing the BSA over giving girls the option to scout there as well. GSUSA seemingly, if not actually, getting sucked into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as taking a side could set a whole chain of destructive reactions into motion and tarnished the reputation of the scouting movement as a whole. The same political tensions that are bouncing around politicians (can't please both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian constituents) would follow into scouting, and promptly create a rift betwee

I just saw this article, and because I can see this going a lot of tense and/or political directions I'm putting this in Issues & Politics. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/st-louis-mom-says-girl-scouts-warned-troop-stop-selling-bracelets-pale-rcna140257 St. Louis mom says Girl Scouts warned her troop to stop selling bracelets as Palestinian fundraiser A St. Louis, Missouri, mother said the Girl Scouts organization threatened her with legal action after her troop sold bracelets to help Palestinian children. Nawal Abuhamdeh said her daughter's troop decided to make br

In preparing for my first Blue & Gold as Cubmaster, another former scout committee member and I wanted to put together something more extensive about BP and the history of the scouting movement. I checked out the online museum of Swedish Scouting as part of the compilation process, and found this piece about a stained glass window of the trefoil-fleur du lis Scouterna (The Scouts, but in Swedish) logo as a metaphor for the scouting program. The picture is attached and the text translated below. A picture of scouting In the stained glass mosaic window, the glass pieces create a pa

I hope you get reinstated. It's a tricky balance, but not trying to walk it and just falling to one side or the other won't do, no matter how hard that balance is to walk. We want to kick out 100% of the dangerous people and 0% of the non-dangerous people. Gotta keep trying.

That's why we who have youth scouting experience have to share our experiences with anyone who will listen. I mean, what's the alternative, keep the patrol method a guarded secret? Of course not. Nobody's saying that the patrol method needs to change. At least I haven't heard that. That would be nuts. My purpose in reminding people of what they already know is that in order to keep up the good work, sometimes we need to refresh ourselves and raise some windhorse, create some feeling of flow, so that we don't get beaten down. Reconnecting to our purpose can help with that. Each

I - and I imagine everyone else here - thinks that holding on to the patrol method and preventing Webelos 3 is essential to delivering a quality program and, therefore, creating a culture of growth. This phenomenon of less scout-led pops up a lot here. The question is, what practices and what organizational culture will create the conditions for quality scout-led programs for not just select units but for the BSA in general? I think other who have been in the BSA longer than me have better opinions on specific organizational practices, but we shouldn't forget that what gets measured

Agree completely. And like I was saying way back, I think de facto blended troops will become more and more common, making the situation less and less tenable, as groups of cub scouts cross over. I can't know for sure, of course, but I think it's going to turn into a situation like the one-night camping for cubs where the rules are widely ignored because they don't make sense to neither the people running the program (those who want what I think of as normal scouting in this case) nor the scouts themselves. Like we were also saying before the suffering of impermanence segway, the command struc

Your posts above are neither. As you quote me telling you previously above. Asking you to stop attacking a fellow scout's character is frankly something that shouldn't even need to be said at all, yet here we are. Attacks are not nice. Being asked to stop attacking isn't not-nice. Every time you say girls are ruining the program for boys, you're reducing our chances of growing membership and creating a culture of growth. You're spinning that wheel of cause and effect every time you say that here. So please stop. Let's move forward.

@Eagledad I see that this transition is hard for you. I hope you can find your way to equanimity. But girls and boys scouting together isn't new for me at all, and I personally had nothing to do with BSA changing its policy on that. I'm here because BSA is now providing the scouting experience I wanted for my scout, that's all. If somebody forced and intimidated the BSA, it wasn't me. To the generic insult of my character, and that of past generations of scouts as well as current scouts, you now add personal insults of my leadership? Not getting friendlier. I just want you to be quiet if you c

Gender equality and everyone scouting together isn't some newfangled progressive ideal, it's the faît accompli mainstream of the scouting movement. At a movement level, it's not controversial in the slightest, it's the status quo. 95% of WOSM NSOs scout together. 95%. I'm not proposing or doing anything new at all or trying to intimidate you. BSA has been in the 5%, so I understand that in your personal experience it's new, but that's not the same thing as it being new in scouting as a whole, and both WOSM and WAGGGS embrace gender equality as a goal to strive towards and that scouting is mea