CNYScouter

In the past record keeping has been poor at best in my council. I took Wood badge in another council. After sending in a copy of the certificate 4 times I gave up trying to get it listed in my training record Due to budget cuts my council no longer has a registrar. It is paying National to enter all registrations. All training and advancement record updates are now the units responsibility. The Unit Leader and Committee Chair both have the ability to enter records Maybe I now I can get Wood badge entered in my training record. I took Wood Badge 12 or 13 years ago and of course I

I haven't seen "Boy Talks" around here in a long time - I don't know even if the schools allow them any more Our scout district is made up of 2 large school districts. In both of these it's up to the Principle of each school to decide who gets to send flyers and be at their open house. One of the biggest things I have seen to improve recruitment is to get names and contact information of anyone who expresses interest in the program at a recruiting event. I save seen packs do recruiting events at school open houses, community events and other events that Cub Scout age boys. You th

We had a discussion about this event with our council and BSA National To our council this a considered a Pack campout. Packs can get together and do activities together. Around here it happens all the time The only thing not being a council/district event is we can not do shooting sports As the Drive-In asked for a liability insurance amount above what our council has, we had to apply to BSA national for the additional amount. The person who handles the paperwork side of things on our committee had a talk with National about details of the event for this additional insurance

This sounds like a great event. Can you share the list of what they look for?

as of last night our count is up to 60 The person who did registration put together some numbers last year 13 Packs registered as a group - all of these came the last 10 days before the event 6 of these had 10 or less - of the others, only 3 had over 20 this accounted for about 25% of the registrations I have been asking around to see what is going on - a lot haven't even starting meeting yet. School here doesn't start until after Labor Day One pack said their first meeting isn't until the 9/19, another starts 9/28 and a 3rd doesn't start meeting until after the event We he

Yes a Drive-in movie theater. There are still 338 open in the USA. 4 of them are in our council boarders. The one we go to has been open with continuous operation since 1948. The person who owned the drive-in started working there in the early 60's when he was in high school and worked there thru college. He ended up as a teacher in a nearby school district and worked there every summer. Meet his wife there and bought the place in 1987. His wife and children are now running it. back to my post. looking at registrations from the past most of the early registrations where from individ

Our pack hosts a Cub Scout sleepover at a local drive-in. This is our 6th year hosting the event and in the past the event has had 650-950 (+ staff) sign up to attend We now about are 3 weeks away and have less than 50 registrations in. Usually we have almost 300 by this time. It seems the interest in attending is there but we are not seeing the registrations We are wondering why we are having such a low response this year. One change we made was to not have registration done by Packs this year and only have individuals register. Pack registration was a headache. A lot of people ha

Back when I was a Commissioner(5+ years ago) it seemed that the units that were resistant to OA were also the same units that didn't send anyone to NYLT or Jambo or Woodbadge and the same units didn't like the Venturing program. Most had the fear that these pulled Scouts/Leaders away from their unit. This was most likely true as these units had a weak program and these other programs were offering a activities and challenges that were not getting in their units I also noticed that the stronger units were the ones where they had members fully involved in all of these.

This morning my council posted the notice about YPT and registration increase and the grumbling has already started. Last year when National registration increased my council also increased the insurance cost from $1.80 per scout/leader to $10 per. They also added a “resource†fee of $24 to each registration to bring thetotal to $60. The resource fee was to pay for the DE salary increase due the federal regulations. I know a lot of long-time scouters who dropped from the program due to this big jump. Most of these were Scouters who stayed in the program when their sons aged out and would

the BSA has training for selecting new leaders called SELECTING QUALITY LEADERS Here's a link to a copy of the training : http://www.scouting.org/filestore/pdf/18-981. One thing NOT to do is to sit at a committee meeting and say "We need a new Scoutmaster (or whatever position needs filling) - who wants to do it?" and then take the first person who raises their hand. I have many bad choices for a leader when it has been done this way.

Elections in our Troop are held in June. The newly elected SPL and the outgoing SPL get together and decide who is SPL for summer camp. Last year there was an issue because both were working at summer camp and wouldn't be going with the troop. The PLC got together and voted on who was going to SPL for summer camp.

From what we were told at the VOA meeting about creating CSP's as a fundraiser was that a CSP must be able to be worn on a uniform - they can not be created for just trading. From the link it says no cites/state names or unit numbers - I would like that BSA doesn't want units to create there own shoulder patches. The person looking into the patches went thru our scout store (national store) and they were the ones that told the VOA that the patches needed to be approved by council

Here's a link to BSA patch ordering guidelines http://www.scouting.org/filestore/licensing/zip/PatchDesignGuidelines.pdf Our council's VOA wanted to do CSP's for a fundraiser. The idea was each crew design a CSP to go around a large VOA patch - like you see for Jamboree contingents. The council (not sure who had final say) would not approve CSP's for this. The VOA could do other patches just not CSP's I would think that it would be up to someone at your council to give the OK.

BSA discourages use of unofficial merit badge worksheets https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2015/01/13/merit-badge-worksheets/

I am in one of the council's that were in the pilot program for Lions. We started with Lions over 10 years ago. I don't know how many Packs in the council have a Lions program but I know no one is forcing a Pack to use the Lions program. Most of the Packs I am familiar with use the Lions program and a re happy with it. We are seeing that burn out rate is no higher with the Lions program than it was before we started using it. I heard Pack leaders say that the using the Lion program has helped get more parents involved as it gives a year to see how things work. Here are2 Packs that

Around here when a Scout make Eagle it's the usually parents who write and ask for congratulatory letters. There is nothing stopping you from writing and asking for these When my son made Eagle he made a list of people he wanted to get a letter from. Most have a way to contact them online and I just sent them his information asking for a congratulatory letter.

I don't think they actually enforce the "Troop only" policy At one time you could specify that you were a "Troop only" MBC and it showed that on the MBC list. You can no longer specify this. Our council has a form you fill out to be a MBC. It basically asks why you are qualified to be a MBC for a MB. It also says that you must be able and willing to see Scouts from outside your unit.

This sounds like our MB list until a few years ago. Keeping a list of MBC's is a function of the District Advancement Committee. Our council also no longer allows "Troop only" MBC's. It also limits a person to be a councilor for 7 MB's. I was told this was due to there were Troops that the SM was registered as a MBC for every Eagle required MB and the Scouts in that Troop only earned earned those MB's from him. The person who was on the committee that was keeping track of MBC's just stop doing it. A new person was recruited and he spent months calling/emailing people on the list to

if you download the scorecard from www.scouting.org it says in the paragraph on the top of the second page, last sentence "The period for measuring performance will be the calendar year."

Upon further review it seems these lanterns are lite using LED's. it is also $15 for adults and $12 for youth to attend so I don't think the Pack will be doing it Never mind

We are in the middle of a discussions about having cub scouts attend a Chinese Lantern festival as a pack activity Here is a link to the festival https://www.facebook.com/NewYorkStateChineseLanternFestival/?fref=nf Here is a link to the BSA policy on Sky (Chinese) Lanterns http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/HealthandSafety/Alerts/SkyLanterns.aspx Would you do this as a Pack event?

I can fully understand "not knowing" happening. The rules from our shooting sports committee keep changing depending who is the Council Shooting Sports Director and who is the council Key 3. At least 10 years ago our council bought a trailer and set it up as a portable BB Gun range. Any Pack could ask to have it at one for their events and it was used a lot A couple of years later we called to get it and we told it was no longer available for Pack events - only District/Council events It now is only used a few times a year. Most packs had no idea this was changed. As I said we wer

One I hear all the time is the mixing up of "2 Deep Leadership" and "No 1 on 1" Heard someone over the weekend say that you had to have 2 adults in each car with Scouts. Hear the same thing about meeting - 2 adults must be at every meeting. My older son's old Troop won't do a trip unless there are 4 adults available to go. They don't want to stuck in any situation where 2 adults aren't present at all times.

I don't think they try to enforce it. There are units/leaders who heard someone say it so it must be true. A few years back when I was District Commissioner I was surprised on the number of units who thought that they were "required" to attend our council's summer camp. Not a lot of units but enough that it made an impression. I had it happen again over the weekend. I was with the Venturing Crew helping at a community service project. A women approached me and said her daughter was in a Venturing Crew but they haven't met or done anything in months. I invited her and her daughte

Got told the same thing at a Cub Scout event our pack started hosting about 6 years ago year (another Pack hosted it before then). There were shooting sports at this every year (about 8 years) with no problem then last year we were told that shooting sports are not allowed because it is not a District/Council event. It had nothing to do with qualified people or the rules or insurance (we had additional insurance through BSA national that said shooting sports were covered). The only reason given, it is not a District/Council event. As a side note - we decided just not to have sh