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Do I have this right?????


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We have a new crew that my family advises. It's been hard on my husband to leave the Boy Scout mentality behind and do Venturing. I think I finally "got it" the other day and I just wanted to spin off the previous thread about the oddities of Venturing to display my idea of what I think it can/cannot be and see if I'm on the right track. If not, please let me know as I'm very new to all this, too.

 

1. Venturing is about the journey---not the destination. I don't mean this literally as in traveling to a climbing wall, but more figuratively......example: it's about teaching kids to look to their neighborhoods to see a need and "fix" it, or to plan that trip which teaches them many skills, but the reward for that hard work IS the trip--not a merit badge.

 

2. Venturing is flexible to communities. Example: I live in an extremely rural area. We cannot just pack up and go to a museum; there aren't any. We can, however, make a journey to one and use that as our tools.

 

3. Uniforming----our kids are choosing T-shirts and jeans as their "uniform" however, they are designing their own. They are learning about creativity, art, marketing, design, and cost containment through this. The uniform and T-shirt isn't the goal---it's the work going into it. We did vote to have a few official green shirts with pants for more formal functions and for meeting with officials of companies, etc. We felt the T-shirt was too informal.

 

4. We do, however, have a more structured program and award system inside the "Ranger" award which I've not seen mentioned much here. Ranger is the Venturing Eagle, as I see it and it's darn hard to get. It would take YEARS and a LOT of HARD work. I'd love to see the statistics on how many kids actually achieve Ranger. If you're into structure, try Ranger. It's very similar to Boy Scouts, but much more involved for older kids.

 

5. Rules: Have you read the Venturing book? It clearly states that if you don't "walk the walk/talk the talk" of the Venture code, that you cannot receive any awards. It is clear that your behavior is imbedded into each and every award. I liked that clear, definite line drawn in the sand. Frankly, I've seen too many boy scouts advancing ranks that are real troublemakers who are advanced to avoid conflict in the troop. This is a clear directive that says if you don't behave and follow life's rules, you don't earn awards, but we'll help you get back on track if you want.

 

What it doesn't do is provide a map or book of directions for each and every situation. The kids should write their own book and draw their own map--that's the point, I think. It also leaves a great deal of latitude with the advisor, which I'm not sure I agree with, because many advisors could just provide a "gimme" program for these kids. However, living in such a rural area, this could be our saving grace in many ways, so I'm reserving judgement on this for now. It also has goals that, while attainable, are a long way off from the inception. Some kids can't stay on track that long, but that's part of the whole of Venturing---learning to do just that.

 

Basically, this is my revelation. Am I on track?

 

Whew-------that's a mouthfull.....

 

Respects,

MollieD

 

 

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Ranger is not the Venturing Eagle. I would have to say the Venturing Silver Award probably comes the closest.

 

The Ranger Award is a stand alone award related to outdoor skills. Like the Ranger Award, there is also the Quartermaster Award for Sea Scouts, the Quest Award for sports, & the Trust Award for religious life.

 

The Venturing advancement program encourages personal development. It gives the youth the opportunity to achieve something meaningful, and to be recognized for it.

 

Each Venturing Crew is supposed to have its own specific emphasis (High Adventure, Religious, Sports, etc) based on the interests of it's members. For instance, a young person who is interested in Youth Outreach should not join a Crew whose emphasis is on sports.

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I have been a Venturing Advisor since the program began in 1998. I started with a crew of 12 youth (7 females and 5 males)and had five youth attain the Silver Award and seven attain the Ranger Award in August 1999. All five of the male members of my crew were Eagle Scouts.

 

By far, the concensus of the crew was that the Ranger Award was the most difficult to earn of all of the Scouting awards (Eagle Scout GSUSA Gold Award, and Silver Award).

 

SFMike

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hi Mollie!

I too am a rural Venturing Advisor.

 

1. Yes, Venturing is about the journey. The Crew learns the good he bad and the ugly of planning their own activities. For example if they plan a trip that is a distance away and everyone wants to go when it is being planned. But when the time comes to pay for them to go on their wonderful trip and they don't pay they don't go.If they pull it off by some miracleand go when they get home, they sit down and critque what went wrong and what went right for futue reference.

2.Venturing is Flexible in some areas.Bronze awards can be modified for you community. In Arts and Hobbies, it says to visit a drafting company the uses CAD Systems. In my town there is not drafting company. So one of my crew visited a Graphic artist instead. We don't have a gof driving range either so we substitute some thing else. You make use of the resources you have in your area.

3.My crew wear the green shirts for "Formal" wear( like Council meetings most of my crew is low income so we wear jeans with themsince the pants are so expensive.But we also wear t shirts and jeans. The crew designed their own and we are in the process of making our own shirts with a computer and iron on transfers.

4.The Silver is more the Venturing Eagle but you have been told that already. Being in a rural the Ethic in action is our hardest part.Since we don't have enough people to do a Ethical Controversy let two. We are hoping Council will help with this.Ranger is alot of hard work but if one buts their mind to it it can be done...

5.To recieve the Gold Award the Member has to go to a review committee made up 4 to 6 people including other Venturers and adults they have to review a written presentation, 3 letters of recommendation and give a interview of the Candidate.. One of the review committee asked my daughter what she did daily to live up to the Venturing Oath and Code. She told them tht as Crew President that she always looks for adventure and as a Pow wow Dancer she treasures her heritage.

 

Mollie thee are lots of books and resources on the web, just look for them and make Venturing fun for the youth and the advisors too. It is amazing at the fun I have with these young adults. My child sees me in a different light and I see her growing up to be a responsible adult. Especially when she is teaching skills to a young Bear or Tiger Cub Scout!!

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The Quartermaster Award may be the toughest award to earn, but it is not an award that the usual Venturer would try for. My point was that of the awards that my crew members had experienced, the Ranger award was the hardest.

 

SFMike

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FYI-

 

Regardless of the toughness of the Ranger Award, the Silver Award IS the highest Venturing Award, and was designed such that any Venturer in any Crew could earn it.

 

The Ranger Award is a 'specialty' award, aimed at those Venturers involved in outdoor/high adventure crews/activities. It's counterparts are the Quest (Sports/Physical Fitness) and Trust (Youth Ministries). ANY Venturer can earn ANY of these, but by the nature of the award, are aimed at the Venturer who is very interested in these particular areas, and is hopefully involved in a crew with that speciality.

 

It is for these reasons that the Silver Award has a knot and the other 3 do not and will not have a knot.

 

Michael Brown

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OK so the Silver Award is the highest Venturing Award, So What's your point? THe Ranger Award is harder to earn than the Silver is...

 

How about the Sea Scout Quartermaster Award? If Sea Scouts are a part of Venturing and Sea Scouts are one of five specialty areas of Venturing, isn't the Quartermaster Award then a Specialty Award under the Venturing Silver Award?

 

Why does the Quartermaster Award rate a knot and not the Ranger, Quest or any other specialty award?

 

SFMike

 

 

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