CNYScouter

This may not be the right place to post this but there seems to be enough wisdom here that I could find some help.

Due to a rash of high school age drunk driving deaths and drinking and drug related incidents a local church has started to offer a Friday night Social. They decided to start with younger kids and want to start moving to older kids as the program catches on. This runs from 7 to 10PM on Fridays as an alternative to hanging out at the mall.

This routinely draws 40 to 50 5th to 8th graders.

One of the problems they are having is things have been unorganized and it has gotten out-of-control on nights when larger groups show up (60+ kids). Nothing too bad, kids jumping on furniture and getting into places where they shouldnt and we are having trouble keeping track of all the kids.

We are looking for ideas for more organized activities to do.

I know what t do if we had all boys or all girls but not sure what to do with this mixed group.

We have suggestions to do BINGO and BUNKO nights with prizes.

We tries to organized games such as volleyball and gaming nights but have not had much luck.

Any ideas for activities to do with 5th to 8th grade girls and boys?

I plan to be active in this next year as I will have 3 kids in the age group and attending this.

I have suggested starting a Venturing Crew for the older kids next year.

At this time my son's does enjoy Scouting and wants to earn his Eagle Badge so working with him to get it should not be a problem

The things he enjoys about Scouting - the outdoor activities and earning MB's are why he stays in. However, I don't need Scouts to do this stuff. We can do camping on our own and we have enough programs available around here outside of Scouting that covers just about any MB topic he would like to do.

In being an Eagle myself the older I get the more I realized that although these were the same things that I enjoyed with Scouting, and what kept me in the program, the other things like leadership, adult association and service to others, things that I felt that when I was a youth were necessary evils to participate in the program, are the things that I used most in life. These are the things I do not see him getting in the program

Fscouter The troop did discuss assigning an adult leader to advise each patrol. The thing is that this has been discussed every year for the last 3 years but never done. I do like the idea about earning the Honor Patrol.

CNYScouter

We have an ASM, who is an Eagle Scout and a trained leader that believes that we should be teaching self-reliance.

He think we should being doing more camping trips where the Scouts each have to bring their own food, their own tent and have to do everything on their own.

A while back, we discussed buying new tents.

We had another leader who thought that everyone should have same tent and each patrol be assigned these tents.

The first leader argued against this as he felt each boy should have to go out and their own tent to be self-sufficient.

This discussion was shelved and we havent got back to it yet.

I do not see where this fits into the Scouting program.

Does any see how this concept could fit into the Scouting program?

I know this topic will came up again and any suggestions on what to say when this is brought up again. This ASM thinks that we dont need to follow the program as outlined by the BSA have a good scout experience.

CNYScouter

P.S. This discussion ended before I could suggest that I thought we should be spending time figuring out how to teach the Scouts how to select a good tent and let them make the decision on what to buy.

I have been given the task to present a plan to the SM and Committee on how to improve the use of the Patrol Method in our Troop.

I can see that most of the other leaders have no concept of what the Patrol Method is.

I would like to start with a short bulleted list on what the patrol method is.

I have some ideas but would like some input from the forum.

I am not looking for ways to instill the patrol method but ways to explain what it means.

CNYScouter

This meeting turned out to not so much as a planning session as a review of last year and overall goals and areas the Troop needed improvement in.

This meeting had some good points and some really bad points.

The good points:

We discussed ways to recruit new scouts and how to retain older boys.

Areas where the Troop needed to improve, such as communication.

I was actually given the task of coming up with ways to improve patrol identity.

The bad points:

We have an ASM, who is an Eagle and trained, that believes that we should be teaching self-reliance. He think we should being doing more camping trips where the Scouts each have to bring their own food, their own tent and have to do everything on there own. A while back we had a discussion about buying new tents. We had another leader who thought that we should but the same tent and have enough for each patrol. He argued against this as he felt each boy should have to go out and their own tent. This discussion was shelved and we havent got back to it yet. I do not see where this fits into the Scouting program.

The Troop feels that it needs its own mission statement. I was told this was to create the Troops own unique culture. The problem I have with this was it highlighted which part of the Scouting program (methods) the troop wanted to give emphasis to. I didnt make a lot of friends when I asked what was wrong with the BSAs mission statement, most admitted that they didnt know the BSA had one. I was the only leader at this meeting that did not have a problem with picking and choosing which aspects of Scouting the Troop was going to focus on. I tried using the argument of where does it say that we can favor one aspect of Scouting over another. I was told I was not living in the real world and the Troop didnt have the resources or ability to give all aspects of Scouting equal treatment. (see really bad points)

The really bad points:

I found a couple of things to be especially disturbing that happened at this meeting:

The first was that these leaders felt that it was up to them to decide which part of Scouting they should emphasize. This is the kind of thing I was talking about in the thread I started Following the Program. These adult leaders have made a conscious decision not to follow areas in the program as they felt they are not as important. They saw no problems with making these decisions. I saw this type of attitude in most of the Troops I visited.

The second thing was we actually debated how close we were going to follow the BSA model of a troop. This started when I mentioned Uniforming. The Troop is always in some form of disarray. Boys wear whatever they choose, some with a neckerchief some without, some with bolos. The older boys often just wear a red activity shirt. I was told that this was part of the troops uniqueness as they have always been known as a rebel troop. This was also where we discussed if we were going to treat each method equally.

When asked why I selected this troop I showed them the list I saw from this forum Some Common Traits of Successful Troops and told them this is the criteria I judged the different troops with. I thought that this was a good guide to what the BSA thought was a successful program. The other leaders that that most of these were not true and they felt was not a good judge of a successful program and preceded to debate each point on this.

The Merit Badge Coordinator never came up. I was so caught up in other things I never brought it up. We only got as far as discussing MBs at troop meetings. We have parents who insist that we do this on a once a month basis. They said that Troop meetings and camping trips were the only time their son's had to do Scouting things. They would not complete any merit badges if they had to do them outside Troop meetings and outings.

At this point we have no where to run to.

I pretty disgusted with these types of attitudes and I am not even sure I want to stay a Scout Leader any more as there is no meaning to the program.

I'm consider keeping my son in Scouting and work with him to get his Eagle and get out. Doing things the way this troop is doing Scoutng the Eagle Badge has lost all its meaning.

My wife thinks I should pull myself and my son from Scouting as he is just not getting the things that we wanted him to get out of the program. I can do the camping stuff on our own and we have enough other programs outside of Scouting around here that equal the MB stuff.

Im scheduled to take Wood badge this summer but Im not sure I want to bother.

CNYScouter

Hey Semper,

I almost added ..."Will Robinson" to this.

I can see we have the same bizarre sense of humor

CNYScouter

I wish we could run.

I recently went shopping for a new troop because the one we were in was worse than this one.

I visited the 9 closest Troops to us and found that this was best one.

Of these 9:

3 Troops had under 10 kids, hadnt had a new Scout in few years and were ready to fold.

3 troops were even more Adult run than this one.

This left me 3 to choose from.

My top choice for a troop was run very well and put on a good program. The problem with this one is that my son was told he was not welcome in this Troop by some of the Scouts who ride his bus. I know the leaders there and we could have joined but I was not going to put him in this situation

The other Troop was very young.

They did have 3 Woodbadge trained leaders but it seemed that they needed to hold the kids hands.

The adults did seem to try and let this be boy run but there was just no older experienced kids to show the way

If my son joined this troop he would have been the oldest Scout at 13 .

Because of the ages of the boys their camping program was very weak and turned my son off.

The Third troop was the one we joined.

My does like this troop and has quickly made friends there.

So, I either have to stay and try to make changes or leave Scouting as I dont think he would take moving to another troop again

The only thing I am hoping for is that this troop did tell me they had many areas to work on and are willing to try and make improvements in the program, which I can hope I can steer things in the right direction.

Ill post an update when I get back

Tomorrow morning at 7:45AM, we are having our Troop Committee/Parents Yearly planning session.

This is to give everyone on this forum a heads up that Im sure when its over I will be ranting and raving over some of the things that have been discussed and decisions that were made about the direction for the Troop for the new year.

Now to Vent:

Earlier this month we had a Scout Eagle out at 15. Because of this, we have also lost his father who was the ASM that was the MB and Outdoor Coordinator. I volunteered to become the new MB Coordinator. I assumed would be the person that the Scouts came to get the contact information for when they wanted to take a MB.

I have since found out that I am expected to make all the arrangements for the Scouts to take MBs during Troop meeting. I dont agree with this in 2 ways 1) I dont think we should be doing MB at Troop meetings and 2) Even if the Troop is going to be doing MBs at the meetings the Scouts should be setting this up.

Right now, I am not sure that I want this position but, I think that there are more important things the Troop needs to concentrate on before this, such as getting the Troop to use the patrol method to bring this up at the meeting.

I am seeing an attitude in some of the leaders, including the SM, which I am finding to be very disheartening and detrimental in teaching the Aims of Scouting. I am seeing an attitude with the adults that they are doing many things for the boys because the boys are so busy with other things and have so much pressure in these other activities they see Scouts as a haven were they dont have to do stuff.

The SM sees no problem with the Scouts playing football for the whole meeting, as they have no other time to just play. I dont have a problem with this occasionally but 3 weeks in a row I thought was too much.

I know that I cant do this alone and there are other parents who feel the same way I do, but there are more learning the other way. One of the reasons I transferred into this Troop because they admitted that they had areas that needed work. I saw that the Scouts in this Troop (and the adults) had a great deal of potential. It seemed that they really did not have a good direction.

The Troops does do many good things but I am questioning whether I can even make a difference as I feel this type of attitude is getting in the way of presenting a great scouting program.

OK - I'm Done Venting

CNYScouter

IMHO, I think that its pretty rare to see a Troop where the leaders have great attitude, but no aptitude (training) that are running a successful Scouting program.

On the other side, I also think that it is pretty rare to see a Troop where the leaders have the aptitude, but no attitude, that are running a very poor program.

Most Troops fall some where in between.

However, with what I have experienced, the Scouting programs that I would consider successful have leaders that are both.

I have found that most leaders that have a great attitude go out and get the aptitude.

Most Scout Leaders that I have run onto have the just enough to get by attitude.

They take the minimum amount of training and are not willing to take the extra time to learn about the program. They are willing to go camping and on outings, but they are not willing to put in the extra effort it takes to put on a good scouting program.

One of the most discouraging things is that most of the leaders in our Troop are college educated. Most have graduate level degrees or higher. They all talk about how they constantly take training at work to update their knowledge and skills.

If you ask them if they could do their job after taking just a basic course, they respond of course not. However, they do not perceive Scouting the same way. They feel that the basic courses are enough and they do not need more training.

I am hoping I can spark some enthusiasm into this bunch. One reason I transferred my son into this troop was that I saw with a little effort they had the potential to turn into a really successful program.

CNYScouter

I definitely feel that there should be some type of refresher courses for Adult Leaders.

I just left a Troop where the SM had taken his training in the 1960s when he was in the Peace Corps where he was a SM for 4 years. He then became the SM for his current troop 12 years ago when his sons became old enough for scouting. Very little training since.

The 2 ASMs in this Troop took training in the late 70s during the Urban Scouting era.

These two ASMs have been in Scouting as an Adult Leader for over 30 years. Never took Wood Badge, never attended a roundtable, not taught training nor had they ever taken any type of training beyond the basic courses. Im not even sure they had bother to update their YPT.

If you ask them are they fully trained they say Yes and according to the BSA they are.

Did they need a refresher course you bet.

This troop did not use patrols (broke into food groups for camping trips), these 3 planned all the Troop outings themselves (camping only in the 2 years I was with them no Troop service projects) and the only thing that was done at every Troop meeting was MBs. In fact. When I left I was the first Leader to attend training in at least 8 years (this is when the CC started with the Troop).

I can see where some type of 1 day refresher course perhaps every 5 or 6 years for SM basics could be useful instead of having to take the full SM training over.

CNYScouter

ScoutMomAng,

I'm surprized that no one has questioned that how come the Troop Committee is making the by-laws.

If Scouting is boy-run how come the Scouts in the Troop are not the ones making the by-laws?

I thought that the Troop Committee supported decisions made by the Scouts and not make decisions for them?

CNYScouter

This is kind of a spin-off of some other posts that I saw and thought that it would make a good discussion topic:

What method do you think is the most misunderstood?

I think advancement is the most over emphasized.

I think uniform is the most under emphasized.

I think the Patrol method is the most misunderstood of all the methods. I see troops that think the patrol method is just having the scouts work in groups of 6 to 8. They routinely reform patrols for outings to make sure that each patrol has 6 to 8 kids for ease of cooking.

I also think the outdoor method is greatly misunderstood. I see many leaders who think that Boy Scouts exist to take Scouts camping. The see outings/camping as not there to teach the aims of scouting in the outdoors but the camping experience is the ends in itself.

CNYScouter

I am seeing posts on what a new training program for leaders should be.

I think that the topics covered in the SM Training course that I took were good but they could have presented the concepts in a better way.

One of the things was that was done was that part of the training was held on a week night and then 2 weeks later the rest was done over a weekend. There was not a clear connection between the topics covered on the weeknight and the ones done over the weekend.

For example: We covered the Troop meeting plan on the weeknight. Over the weekend, we had patrol competitions. However, the connection was not made that these were examples of the types of things that we should be doing at Troop meetings and outings.

Many leaders got the impression that it was just way to teach us the skills and not something to use in our Troops.

When shopping for a new troop, I noticed that very few Troops used patrol competitions at meetings or outings. Every troop I visited had multiple leaders that had taken the same training as I did, but very few made this connection. I also have to add that for the most part the more successful (and biggest) troops I visited did use patrol competitions as a regular part of their program.

Another example I saw was that anytime the QM was introduced for an announcement or was even mentioned, they had everyone cheer. Many leaders saw this as just a way to bring some fun to the training. Very few saw it as a way to take a one of the most boring PORs and make a scout want the job and feel important doing it.

I think that many people need to be hit over the head and have it explained why these things were being done.

One thing I would like to have had was to do an actual troop meeting as done with the Troop planner. Instead of having 4 different competitions I would have rather had done one in an example of what a troop meeting should consist of.

One of the biggest problems I had with the training was that the last thing the course director told us was that the things that were covered were just guidelines. He made it sound as if everything presented was optional and to find out what worked for our program. Although I agree that this statement should be made I would have like to see added to this was something along the lines of this program works. It has been developed over the last 95 years and any problems you have are nothing new and it is covered in the handbook During the training it was said that the BSA has books covering every situation but not that the ideas presented are tried and true and do work in most situations.

I did let the course director know these things at the end of training.

I dont think many leaders are purposely not following the program, but many do not or are not willing to take the time to understand what the Scouting program is actually about.

CNYScouter

Surfinwahine - One of my concerns is if I do not take the initiative on this the other Troop Leaders would be happy to just let him come to meetings and just hang around until he stops showing up. I understand, especially with volunteers, that everyone needs to contribute to the organization. I feel that this Scout has a lot to bring to the troop and I would like to keep him active.

Semper Excellent Idea. Welcoming new scouts is an area that the Troop feels it really needed to improve in and is the type of job that he can easily handle with a little guidance. Actually, I volunteered to take on this responsibility next year but there is a lot that he can do to help in this.

CNYScouter

Our Troop does an Advancement night once a month at Troop meetings. The Scouts have asked have asked for this time to work on MBs (mostly required ones) and lower rank requirements if needed.

To find out our Scouts interests I put together a handout with a list of MBs and asked them to mark the required MBs they needed and any MBs they would like to see offered.

When I complied the data (and after reading this thread) this information really showed what diverse interests the Scouts had.

Now if I can just figure out how to use this information to develop a Wood Badge ticket on diversity.

Any ideas?

CNYScouter

Hi Semper

That is the approach I was planning on taking but I wanted some suggestions in case I got the "I don't know" or "I'm not sure" answer.

He's not planning on leaving the troop when he turns 18, he wants to stay through high school. I think that he has something to offer if I can figure it out what will work.

Also it just doesn't seem that the other leaders are real attentive about things. My son been in the Troop for 3 months and still hasn't been presented with a Troop neckercheif. I asked the SM and got "Oh, I forgot".

If I leave this up to others to do something nothing will get done.

I just don't want him coming to meeting and just hanging around and not contributing.

I have to agree with a lot I am reading on these posts. I have seen that leaders that came from a good program as a youth run a better program as an adult.

Since becoming a leader myself, I have gained a great deal of respect for the leaders I had as a youth and feel lucky that I was in a good program.

I am not sure that just training is always the answer. Almost every leader in our Troop has attended training and yet there are still areas where the program is not being followed.

I was surprised to find that at our committee meeting last week out of the 9 in attendance 6 were Eagles. What I found more surprising was that 2 of these non-eagles were the SM and CC (and one Mom). They had never been in Scouts, not even a Cub.

Much of what I see is that no one is willing to put in the effort to run the program as written. I also have seen the seat of my pants or Ill just wing it style of leading. No advance planning, just make it up as you go along. It takes time and effort to plan and run a good program and I havent meet many leaders willing to put the time in to make it happen. I have found there are many people out there who want to be known as a Scout leader but do not want to put any effort in to being one.

Our council is also starting to require mandatory training for its leaders.

In 2006 for a Unit to recharter, all leaders will be required to have taken Fast Start, NLE and have YPT up to date

In 2007, the above plus all CM, SM, Crew Advisors and CCs to be fully trained for their positions

In 2008, all leaders with over 1 year of service must be fully trained for their position.

I think this is being done because we cant get our leaders to take training. Our District has dropped all training at Roundtable as no one was taking it. Our council has canceled BALOO training the last 3 years and WEBELOS Outdoor Skills for 2 years as no one signed up. I asked about taking the Trainer Development course but was told I would have to go out of council to get it as there hasnt been any interest in it for the last 3 or 4 years.

Out Troop currently has a Scout with a severe learning disability. He cannot retain knowledge. He understands the concepts when taught to him but after a day or two he cant recall it. This is so severe that he is not required to take final exams in school.

He will be receiving his last Merit Badge for Eagle next week and will turn 18 in August.

Next year he will be a senior in High School.

His Mom is very active on the Troop Committee and he would like to stay active with the Troop until he finishes high school.

After that they will most likely not be continuing on due to he will need specialized training to hold a job and he would like to learn how to drive.

I talked with his mom about him continuing past next year but he can only handle so many activities at once and his mom feels that adding scouting into his schedule will be to much.

I am looking for ideas on what type of role he could do for the Troop as an ASM in the fall and for the following year.

CNYScouter

I dont know if what I was trying to ask was answered in the last thread so to put this in a different way is that I find that many of the issues and problems that troops are having can be solved by finding the correct BSA publication and following the program.

I recently went shopping for a new troop and visited quite a few troops before making a decision. I saw many examples where a troop was struggling in an area and I could see that the cause was that they were not following the program.

For example, in one of the Troops I ruled out there were about 15 scouts at the meeting I visited. When I asked the SM how many kids they had he told me that this was about half, as they had trouble getting the older scouts to attend troop meetings. Yet, I saw an adult teaching the tenderfoot scouts (actually the UC), the rest of the troop sitting around reading their book or working on a merit badge. The CC was off setting up the activity of the night. They only did outings every other month. I could see that they were an adult run troop and offered nothing for older boys. If they had opened the SM handbook, they would have seen there is a whole chapter on dealing with older scouts and found ways to solve this problem.

Almost every troop I visited complained about declining enrollment. Yet none followed the Troop meeting-planning outline and none did any type of patrol competitions. The one Troop I did visit (too far away to us to join) that did these things had boys begging to join the troop.

I see that following the program works. I have to think that after being developed for 95+ years the BSA has a pretty good idea of what works.

In the Troop we ended up joining we are having our yearly planning session in a couple of weeks. I was just handed the minutes from last years meeting. In this, the committee had identified a list of areas in the troop that needed improvement. A lot of these are centered on working with patrols and behavioral issues.

The committee then spent the next 4 or 5 hours brainstorming ideas on ways to fix or improve these in areas.

In reading down the list, all of these problem areas are covered in the Scoutmasters Handbook and to solve these issues all they had to do was open the book.

I would like to not do this again this year.

Any suggestions on how to get the other leaders to just open the book and follow the program?

I dont want to come off as the Scouting know-it-all but it looks like I am the only one who has taken the time to read the SM Handbook.

This topic had kind of gone off on a tangent from what I thought I was asking. Anything to do with Health, Saftey and Youth Protection are rules that should not be alter and was not really the things I was talking about.

So, I decided to spin off a new topic trying to restate what I was asking

Excellent topic - excellent posts

A good book about leadership is:

The 21 irrefutable laws of leadership by John Maxwell

In this book he talks about how good leaders care for the people they work with and that a good leader should be grooming replacements even for themselves.

I would like to add a couple of more types of leaders I have seen - leaders who are leaders because no one else would and they got stuck doing it and the guys who what to be known as a Scouter but do not what to put any effort in.

Most leaders I have run into do not want to put any effort into putting together a good program. They dont want to take the time to do planning, everything is just done on the fly nor do they want to take the effort to be trained to learn how to present the program.

When I saw the suggestion to tell leaders one of the reason to take training was that by taking training it will cut down on the time spent planning things, I had to laugh because the leaders I knew where not spending any time planning things.

I see too many times, where we are just taking the easy way out. Just last month our Troop Treasurer, after being MIA for 6 or 7 months, let the committee know that she could no longer do the job due to her work schedule. The first person who volunteered to take the position, already an ASM, was given the job. Being new to the Troop I did not know many of the parent and what they did but have since found out that we have a couple of parents who are CPAs. No one on the committee knew what these people did as nobody had put in the effort in do a parent skill survey. (I think I will do something along this line for one of my Wood Badge tickets).

After spending some time on this forum, I learned that we should have taken the time to figure out if we had some one qualified for the position and approached them first before taking the first raised hand.

OK, Im done preaching to the Choir and Ill get down now and let someone else step up.

CNYScouter

Hi scoutldr,

Did I sign the form?

No, as CC I am not required to sign. The Quality Unit form is signed by Advisor/SM/CM.

Did the DE get the Advisor to sign or forge.

I don't know.

The Crew disbanded (most of the members quit) before recieving the award due an Advisor verbally abusing one of the members on a outing.

CNYScouter

I think that the Quality Unit award is a farce. Every unit in our district last year earned the Quality Unit award.

When I asked why the Troop had received the award, as I did not think we had meet the requirements he remarked, Well, we didnt but they give it to us every year anyway.

When I took over as the CC of a crew, the first thing I had to deal with was recharterng. I met with our DE to turn in our charter, he asked why I did not turn in the Quality Unit form. I told him we did not earn it. He then pulled out a form and began going down the list.

Here is how the conversation went:

DE: Did you have 4 committee meetings last year?

Me: We had only one.

DE: Close enough.

DE: did you do a super adventure last year?

Me: We had only one overnight this year due to no one wanting to go on any.

DE: Close enough.

DE: did you conduct a crew officers seminar?

Me: Not this year but we had one last year

DE: Close enough.

DE: well you met 3 other so you are now a Quality Unit.

From what I gather one of the DEs performance is rated on is the number of Quality Units in their District.

How can we judge how well our unit is doing when this kind of stuff is happening?

The BSA is heading down a slipper slope with this kind of activities.

When I see that the FBI is getting involved with the inflated numbers, as this being fraud (boosting numbers to receive more money), we will have a tough road to hoe in the next few years.

CNYScouter

How prevalent is this on a local level?

I just received an updated roster from the Troop I just left (Im still on the e-mail list).

On this, they listed as having 31 Scouts registered. Of these about 1/3 have not been to a troop meeting in over a year and about 4 or 5 I never heard of. It was the same thing on the adult leader side. There were about 25 leaders listed for the Troop. About half I had no idea who they were and 4 or 5 of them moved and were living out of state.

If things like this are happening on the Troop level, we are just starting to see the tip of the iceberg in dealing with inflated numbers.

I think these types of inflated numbers are hurting the program.

It seems that our CE and DEs are more interested in numbers than running a quality program.

On a related note, I see the same type of thing being done with the Quality Unit award.

CNYScouter

Kahuna -

I am not looking to change other unit but my own.

Recently I went looking for a new Troop as the one we were in was just not delivering the Scouting program.

I visited 6 units and spent some time talking with them about their program. I found that each had altered and bent one of the guidelines.

One thing I personally saw was that the program developed by the BSA works. During my SM training one of our Patrol Guides had a Troop with almost 80 scouts one of the biggest and most active Troops in our council. I asked him his secret. He replied, I dont have a secret, we just follow the BSA guidelines.

In the Cub Pack I am with when my son was starting his 2nd year of WEBELOS a week before the first Pack meeting I got a call from his Den Leader saying that he could not continue and could I take over. I said yes. Not having a lot of time to prepare I just got out the book and followed the requirements for AOL. 3 out of 4 boys joined a Troop and the 4th wanted to but his parents wouldnt let him (another story).

The next year we had 2-second year WEBELOS dens with 10 cubs. The Den Leaders refused to attend WEBELOS leaders training, ran the dens just like they had the previous 4 years and did very little Boy Scout stuff and did very little towards earning the AOL . Out of these 10 only 2 crossed over to a troop.

This year we had 6 second year WEBELOS. One dropped out early, but the Den Leader followed the program and all 5 that remained crossed over into a Troop.

I see that following the program the BSA has established works.

I just cant seem to convince other leaders to follow the program as written.

CNYScouter