Basementdweller 608 Posted October 15, 2012 Share Posted October 15, 2012 And Seattle speaks up in support of JTE just like the district fellow he is... It's about DE raises..... Even with the trainwreck of a troop I am involved with we currently meet gold standards. We have serious problems.....We do not deserve even a bronze rating......But yet on paper we are gold.... Link to post Share on other sites
Eagle732 27 Posted October 15, 2012 Share Posted October 15, 2012 I'm going off the 2012 JTE. Assume a unit is at max and can not grow then you can't make the increases needed in 2, 3 and 9. Add a few other items and you're not gold. Item 1, unit is not rank driven and/or holds high standards for advancement - 75 out of 300. Items 2 and 3, all retention related -150 of 600 pts. Remember unit is at max. Web transition - 0 of 200 pts. Again a unit is at max. If your unit only holds 1 big COH dinner a year - 0 of 100 pts. If you don't do a budget - 0 of 100 pts. Same unit short term camps 12 times a year, does a variety of trips including canoeing, backpacking, climbing, etc. Does 1 long term camp a year. Does one High adventure trip every 2 - 3 years. Most boys advance although not within the First Class / first year BSA goal. Holds PLCs 2 -3 times a month since the boys actually plan and carry out the program. SM and all ASMs are all trained. So this unit doesn't make gold. You have to ask yourself why are they at max? Now all of this is easily corrected. Pencil whip a budget. Advance some boys even if they don't meet the unit's standards. Add a few COHs. Hold a few Webelos events even though there's no room for them. Recruit and grow bigger than you want to be. But why? Link to post Share on other sites
SeattlePioneer 144 Posted October 15, 2012 Share Posted October 15, 2012 > I speak up for the JTE because I see it as a useful planning and leadership tool. If you don't find it useful, don't use it. I'm not twisting anyone's arm. Link to post Share on other sites
Gunny2862 11 Posted October 15, 2012 Share Posted October 15, 2012 As a relevant aside: "No Combat Ready Unit has ever passed Inspection". attributed to Joe Gay. Link to post Share on other sites
Second Class 49 Posted October 16, 2012 Author Share Posted October 16, 2012 So I pulled out the JTE sheet and decided to do a quick run through. With low estimates on each line I was unsure of, our number was 1,650. Gold. With a little research effort, I'm pretty sure we could get into the high 2,000's. Might be a good tool for some, and I'm sure it is. But for us, not so much. I'll turn it in, regardlesss. Link to post Share on other sites
Brewmeister 132 Posted October 16, 2012 Share Posted October 16, 2012 We are all volunteers who run franchises of BSA's program, and this is what BSA has decided makes a good franchise for them. It has nothing to do with what makes good scouting for youth. If I decide to run a McDonalds franchise, I expect to be held to quality standards defined by the corporation. And, customers to my store come for Big Macs, not tofu. I'm not saying the J2E is necessarily spot on, but neither do I think it should be dismissed out of hand just because it comes from "corporate." Link to post Share on other sites
Basementdweller 608 Posted October 16, 2012 Share Posted October 16, 2012 When the District REQUIRES IT for your charter to be turned in then what???? OR Your DE fills it out for you then what...... The BSA has a huge fraud problem...... I stood up at roundtable last year and asked if it was still voluntary......I was told to sit down.... Honestly who cares if the District is gold or council??????? Does national give them more money to run the program......huhhhhh Just guessing here but NO. An SE in a gold council has another line on his resume for the next better paying job. That is the bottom line my friend........ If the BSA was a serious about the quality of it's franchises it would be run by paid employees and not some award happy mom whose advancement signing pen won't run out of ink till her son gets eagle, advertised skills or not. Link to post Share on other sites
Beavah 205 Posted October 16, 2012 Share Posted October 16, 2012 AIIEEEEEE! Yah, not da dumb McDonald's franchise thing again, Brewmeister! Children are not hamburgers, and if yeh know anything about franchising agreements, then yeh know that da BSA charter is not a franchising agreement. I don't know where this silly analogy got started. Anyways, to my mind da JTE thing is just a tool. I think like all da previous Quality Unit incarnations, it's designed and used more as a tool for councils and pros than it is for units, and I have qualms about that. It's also true that da metrics are more symptoms of a good program rather than causes of a good program, eh? So if yeh just treat da symptoms by upping the advancement rate or penciling out a budget yeh aren't really helpin' da program at all. Still, as a tool it can be an OK thing to have a conversation around for a unit that is small but stable. In other words, a unit that has some of da necessary ingredients in place but needs a bit of push or goal-setting. For a unit that's larger and successful, I agree that yeh hit a ceiling effect and da thing doesn't necessarily capture a strong unit's style or goals. For a unit that's strugglin', I agree that JTE isn't goin' to help them either, eh? They know their recruitment or outing level or whatnot isn't great, da problem is findin' da people and resources to improve those things. So it's a tool that can be useful, but not for everyone. Don't be too down on it. Use it if it helps, or skip it if it doesn't, or quick-whip your best guess just to help out your district or council team. I think da biggest complaint I get about JTE and its predecessors is how much work it takes for volunteers to fill out for not a lot of benefit. Most units don't make it a focus at all; instead they treat it as an additional hassle at recharter time, when da recharter process is already a hassle. Particularly for bigger units, da hassle of both recharter and JTE is bigger. It seems we could streamline the whole thing quite a bit if da councils filled in most of it, and da UC added most of da rest, and then it became a 15-minute agenda item for a TC meeting unrelated to recharter. Beavah Link to post Share on other sites
SeattlePioneer 144 Posted October 16, 2012 Share Posted October 16, 2012 > Personally I wouldn't spend a lot of time researching or calculating numbers. Honest ballparking seems perfectly reasonable to me. Link to post Share on other sites
Brewmeister 132 Posted October 17, 2012 Share Posted October 17, 2012 Sorry Beavah, I had actually never heard that analogy before. Sorry to cause you an aneurism. Be happy to send you some Tylenol. Won't happen again !!! Link to post Share on other sites
Brewmeister 132 Posted October 17, 2012 Share Posted October 17, 2012 My only point in that apparently overused analogy is that the corporation is obviously concered with protecting its brand through some level of consistency. Units should be concered with operating as the program intends; if not, why be part of the program? And consumers should have some level of assurance that things should be reasonably the same from one unit to another. So, if not J2E, what? It's easy to complain but complaining is not a solution. Link to post Share on other sites
Basementdweller 608 Posted October 17, 2012 Share Posted October 17, 2012 You want to actually fix the problem... Paid professional staff at the district level... All advancement done at the district level only by the professionals.... All Record keeping at the district level.... Any time you put parents in charge of their childs records or a competitors records there will be problems. Link to post Share on other sites
qwazse 4342 Posted October 17, 2012 Share Posted October 17, 2012 BD, only if our SPLs. Can get paid for the job! Otherwise, I think our adults are actually helped by getting a sense of our boys' progress. I know in youth sports we sometimes pay referees, but scouting is a different kind of sport. Link to post Share on other sites
OldGreyEagle 5 Posted October 17, 2012 Share Posted October 17, 2012 Great Ideas BD, only where I live we could not afford it Link to post Share on other sites
Basementdweller 608 Posted October 17, 2012 Share Posted October 17, 2012 We can't afford it either..... So in reality we are getting our moneys worth Link to post Share on other sites
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