CCbytrickery

I would have done ice cream at the campout, not at the meeting. Reward at the meeting for those who did it, and encourage those who didn't to go finish up so they can be rewarded. It's...unfair?...to those whose parents weren't able to take them or let them go for whatever reason. Talking about the campout, sure. Sharing photos or handing out belt loops, sure. There's a big difference between those and ice cream....I wouldn't want my son to feel left out like that, because mom or dad couldn't get off work to take him on the campout.

That's an odd policy. Our pack goes camping: In early October, we have our newbie camping. We work on camping skills, Bobcat clinics, etc. We have Cubaree in early November. We have a January campout, usually up in Georgia at some cabins. We have a March campout. This year, we were at the local Military base (they have a campground there) and the boys got a kick out of hearing the big guns go off all day Saturday. We also have a May thing. This year, it's an overnight at zoo (in another city). In years past, we have camped at a science center, camped at Cape C

Let's see--over the last two years, we've had: Fake Snakes hidden in the women's cabin Fake cockroaches and spiders hidden under sandwiches, in napkins, etc at mealtime. The Web 2's hid a fake spider in the shower head at that campout, and loosened it so barely hanging on. The other Web DL and the ADLs hid in the other stalls, and acted like they were using them when the DL went to go shower. They said he screamed like a little girl...... One mom's stuff (including bed, bags, etc) was taken out of her room in the cabin and set up on the porch. Same mom had her stuff toilet

Nothing, because the CM refuses to let anyone else do anything, and disregards the committee's decisions. I have sent information on the scout campout at the baseball staduim (AAA team, sleep at the stadium after the game), the arena football team game in July (that is buy an adult ticket, get a kid ticket free), and in August, we do our welcome back dinner. These are the items we've agreed upon--as a committee--and the CM insists he will make all the arrangements. We have one week before the baseball campout is to be registered for--and nothing has gone out to the pack. He hasn

http://www.9news.com/news/article/267641/188/Father-claimed-Scouts-candy-money-stolen-video-told-different

While I am not an atheist, I do not attend any church. Our pack is chartered through a Methodist church. Up until joining the pack, neither my husband nor myself attended church, nor did our children. (I was RC, husband Southern Baptist--yeah, what a combination we are!) After joining, my son decided that he wanted to try church. My husband and son have started attending the church where the pack is based, and both are happy in their decision. I am struggling, myself, about attending, due to a series of negative events that caused me to leave the RC church many years ago. Any

Shortridge: So, the song God Bless My Underwear is out also, then? Talking about alcohol and drugs? But one of the belt loops has that as a requirement. Singing because you wore a hat into a meal, or because you forgot a tent pole? That can be considered hazing, right? So the Cake toss thing can be considered wasting food. Ok. But I think the heart of the problem is that Council (and therefor, Districts), in their ever constant changing PC-ness, keeps changing the rules and they come in conflict with the actions and other portions of BSA guidelines themselves.

What if the rules were that the boy had to come up with the idea of his cake and make it with minimal help from the parent? Is that acceptable? What if it is optional--that the boy can choose to not smush the cake, that they can take it home or that they can share it with their fellow cubs? Is that acceptable? What if it raised items for the local food pantry? i.e. if you wanted to throw the cake, you had to bring in a nonperishable food item. Is that acceptable? There is no hazing--no one is doing anything to any cub scout. The den leaders can choose to not participate.

I love getting new ideas from parents! sometimes they see things that we can't (because we are too close to the situation). Now, if it's a truly bad idea (against regulations, usually), I'll let the person know we'll discuss in committee--which we do, and then laugh it off. Our campouts are more like yours--kid friendly food (spaghetti, chicken fajitas, etc), and we give them free time to just be boys. We added in a pre-Cubaree campout, where our Webelos work with our incoming scouts on their Bobcats (and we give the new parents a small taste of camping)..our Cubaree this year h

As CC, it is my job to make sure everyone has the correct--and needed--information. When I started last year, I had no idea what we were doing, what was needed, who was who...and I was completly overwhelmed. So, I make sure I'm able to answer questions via phone, email or face-to-face; that I have the paperwork they need or know who is who. As CC, it is my job to try to get parents involved. I do the usual "chain emails" so that everyone has an idea of what is coming, and then if no one bites, I go to the face-to-face "your scout needs you to be involved with this" speech. I very r

We have specific roles for each den in our pack. One does set up, one does flags, one handles (and provides) snack, and the last cleans up. If you aren't cleaning up, you are either leaving with your adult, or you are standing in one specific area, waiting for your adult to finish what they are doing. the DLs boys are usually there 30-45 minutes after the meeting, while we're cleaning up/doing a quick recap or whatever needs to be handled then. They can play around, but it's only a few of them (some go home with their other parent while one stays to get things done).

You need to sit down with your CC and lay out the problem. Then you both need to sit down with the parents and the Scout, and explain the way of the world to them. If they don't like it, or give you grief, then they can move to another pack. We had 2 boys in our pack (1 Webs1, and 1 Tiger) who couldn't behave if their lives depended on it, and the parents were bad bad bad. They changed packs when the dad didn't get a DL position (and I told them why he wasn't getting the position--if he couldn't control his 2 scouts, how can he control 14?) My husband is the wolf DL for our pack, a

We are doing our summer calendar this weekend. In June, we will start planning next year. We'll map out pack meeting days and committee meeting days; if we have the school schedules for next year (for 3 different districts), we'll use those to plan. We also make sure we have our open positions filled (the only one we usually get a late start with is the Tiger DL, and this year, we are trying to hold a "come see what scouting is about" event during June, to introduce scouting to incoming 1st graders. In July, we'll finalize the calendar (but we do stay flexible, because councils

We do. At our pack meetings, we try to have some special event and theme. One month was on emergency prepardness/safety; at another, we had the local zoo come in with some exotic animals. Usually our themes are: August is our "welcome back pack" dinner. Sept starts off popcorn Oct is for Cubaree Nov is for ? Dec, we have Santa visit Jan is ? Feb is PWD March is crossover/camp cards April is ? May is Cake Bake Then we try to have our pack meetings June/July. We do something (last year, we only managed one meeting, at a minor league baseball game...bad planni

Firefox, on a PC, no Java enabled, slowed to a snail's pace, and only half the boards are loading. This is what it was like on IE--I switched to FF so I could get on here. Now it's not working (and I am not getting Chrome--we had it and it crashed the computer.)

This story doesn't have to do with camping, or even Boy Scouts for that matter (since the boys involved are Cubs) but I think that it lends itself to my thought process. We have a young Wolf in my husband's den, who is on medication for ADD. Gets very--rambuctious--if his meds wear off or if he forgets to take them. He likes to bully the other scouts--and his little sister gets bullied as well. Dad and mom are divorced, split time (each has the kids 3 or 4 days a week), but dad is pretty useless--no discipline ever, and mom is busy partying it up. My husband finally had enough o

Our theme changes yearly. Last year was "litter to glitter"--centerpieces the boys made from recycled materials, kid friendly food (chicken nuggets, mozzarella sticks), etc. This year, we have a birthday party theme--balloons, streamers, a balloon making guy, games like pin the tail, fishing for goodies, things like that. After dinner, we are holding the rank ceremony (Bobcat, Tiger, Wolf and Bear all move up in rank, and the Webes get the AoL--Crossover will be in March at our campout). Dinner is BBQ and cake. Our cake bake is done in May--the boys bake the cakes and either tak

Our AC (new this year) has finally set down a policy with the leaders: everything gets entered into Packmaster by xx date (usually the week before our pack meeting). Once that date hits, they cannot enter anything else until after the pack meeting, and the ONLY things that get handed out are the items put in before the xx date. Also, DLs have to email her the day of the report (which she does around 9pm, so they have plenty of time to enter in if they fail to do so earlier) by 9am, saying they did their job entering the information. IF not, she sends them an email. They have until 5

They are big for the size. I just use the button thingy on the inside waistband. Word of warning: WASH THE LEG PARTS EVERYTIME YOU WASH THE SHORT PART! Otherwise you will end up with a faded blue pair of shorts with the dark bright blue legs! My son loves his though. I get him 2 pair whenever the legs get too short w/o a hem (skinny little thing that he is, but he has long legs), and he wears them to school and everywhere. He would rather wear them than his jeans, because he can make them shorts in the afternoon (when mean old mom makes him wear pants because it's 37 out in th

Our RT CS commish is one of our pack's former Webelos leaders, so I have an inside track on things (mwahahaha). The assistant commish is also from our troop, the assistant leader from our 2nd Webes den. They are both very organized, very communicative, very over the top. In a good way. Communication is very important--we can only give information out to our DLs and parents if we have it ourselves. She themes each month around a specific topic (like Seattle does); this past meeting was about Blue & Gold, with different themes and ideas. She brings in examples of t

Our Wolf den does snack, since we meet from 7-8 pm and the snack serves as their dessert for the night. (I'm married to the DL, and we have a Wolf scout.) We have 15 active boys and 6 more registered but not active in this den alone. We do this at the end of the meeting, to calm them down and give the DL a chance to speak to the parents and scouts. We charge $1 a meeting, which covers the snack and part of the expense for other items (crafts or things we need for them); we don't buy everything--for example, the scouts needed to either purchase or give us the money to purchase a w

We were under a tornado warning and severe thunderstorm warning this weekend. We had just finished with our campfire program Saturday night at camp, and were sending boys off to bed, when it hit. We were sleeping in cabins (but very rugged cabins) and had everyone in the bathhouses, tucked into the shower stalls. You can fit 14 boys and 4 adults into 3 shower stalls, btw. Only a few boys really panicked and only 1 mom and 1 grandma freaked out. It ended quickly, and safely, with only a good amount of rain and wind hitting us.

Last year, at our B&G, they had a "kid friendly" menu. I'm all for it, but frozen chicken nuggets and corn dog nuggets (barely warmed) and frozen mozzarella sticks (not warm at all) just isn't cutting it. The salad would have been fine, had it not been just iceberg lettuce--not a carrot or celery or even a romaine leaf in site. This year, my DH (WDL) is in charge, and he has a plan. Yes, it will be kid friendly, but kid friendly doesn't have to mean frozen nuggets or fish sticks. Why not compromise, and have that Boston butt, but also have grilled chicken or even hot d

Our district roundtable has a general session, where both boy and cub adults get information from district, on things like PWD, popcorn sales, etc. They do raffles, get paperwork done, etc. Then we break out, Cubs to one room, Boys to another. In our Cub sessions, we talk about Cub specific things. Also, our chair has a table she has designated as "the sharing table", where you can bring in things your pack has done or things you have found and used. She does handouts on various items, emails regularly, and is always available to answer questions. (She is our former CC, and her a

Our pack just started a Scout closet and Scholarship program this year. Our rules are pretty simple: the family must apply (questions like why do you need this and are you willing to do fundraising/be on committees--nothing financial or requiring documentation). Then they must meet with their DL, the CM and at least one of other Scholarship committee members, who then make the decision. We are willing to help with recharter fees, pack dues, uniform shirts (we give out neckers/slides/books to new boys), camp fees for the scout and one adult. In return, the scout must attend meeting