Here's a new one - parent wants son to go from Scout to Eagle by Christmas.

[Eagledad]

Parents are the most challenging part of Scoutmastering. National should create a course to prepare for how to respond to them. It takes practice. We had a few families leave because we didn't budge on our program philosophy. One mother took her new tenderfoot son out because I wouldn't delegate him as the Patrol Leader. But we lost several scouts because of our approach to Eagle. And, the parents of the ones who stayed despite their parents' wishes would never speak to me again, even when I ran into them at the grocery store. 

Barry

[Tron]

On 9/4/2025 at 9:03 AM, Eagledad said:

Parents are the most challenging part of Scoutmastering. National should create a course to prepare for how to respond to them. It takes practice. We had a few families leave because we didn't budge on our program philosophy. One mother took her new tenderfoot son out because I wouldn't delegate him as the Patrol Leader. But we lost several scouts because of our approach to Eagle. And, the parents of the ones who stayed despite their parents' wishes would never speak to me again, even when I ran into them at the grocery store. 

Barry

To truly understand the program and how it needs to be ran, people just need to read so much more than they want. I've turned down being SM twice, and I'm bring probed for a third offer now; by the time I know the program well enough to be a good SM all of my kids will be in college 😛

[SSScout]

Two things occur to me:  

First, "the work is done by whoever shows up".    Very often the job is given/assigned to whoever raises their hand, regardless of anything else.

Second,  I suggest as required reading,  Kahlil Gibran's book "The Prophet", in this case the chapter on Children, a portion of which I quote here:  

"Your  children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.  They come through you but not from you, and though they are with you yet they belong not to you....

You may give them your love but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, for their souls dwell in the  house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams....." 

 

See you on the trail......