Eagledad

Mmmm, that is a bit one sided, isn't it. We already know from members on this forum that families have left the BSA as a result of this decision. If going back meant gaining more members than it looses, then it's worth considering. Of course membership is not my reasoning for being against the decision. I think the BSA is asking unit members to risk pushing these youth further into mental illness. Barry

No, what I meant was that I have been scolded by the moderators for using "ignorance" in another discussions because it was misinterpreted as unscout like. Barry

I already had this discussion with the mods and they won't buy it. Barry

There is plenty of evidence that shows that genders at this age learn better in a single gender atmosphere. We've all heard, so I won't go into details. As I said, the liberal reasoning is equality through mediocrity. I don't do mediocrity or political correctness. You should be honest with us as well as yourself, either you want to really develop character, or you want a camping program. Barry

Get real! When I was a scout and a Scoutmaster, patrols could camp without adults. They can't anymore. That is huge! Watching the Canadian Scouts go through their changes and listening and participating in discussions on scouting forums the past years, I am convinced that liberals view scouting as nothing more than a "camping club". The mission and vision statement are just noble words of distant dreams. Liberals believe in equality over personal ambition through the path of mediocrity. Changing the program so that boys can no longer have the independence to experiment with their decisions takes away the advantage that Boy Scouting has over all other youth programs. I kind of saw it when I joined as a scouter in the early 90s. New Scout Patrols (NSP) and First Class in the First Year (FCFY) forces scouts through a process of growth controlled outside of the their patrol. I can't think National did it intentionally (maybe they did, mediocrity), but they turned the growth process 180 degrees. Instead pushing scouts to act out toward their ambitions using the tools of leadership, patrol method, adventure and advancement, they are now expected to react to the tasks given them. The process of growing by making decisions was taken away. The more National makes little changes that force boys out of the arena of making personal decisions, the more the process of growth is reduced. As a result, after school camping clubs. My passion for the program is guiding boys to become citizens of character and leaders of integrity. Those aren't just words to me, I live it. I'll not waste my time just teaching kids how to set up a tent. Barry

No, it's just indicative of the way the program is ran. The troop I was speaking about has averaged between 150 to 180 scouts ever since I can remember. Barry

Only once. Barry

Rare! Do you not understand female biology? I wasn't even thinking a long these lines, but TT's post reminded me of a discussion I had with my wife. She had her first period during her first (and last) Girl Scout summer camp. She was very embarrassed and remembers that camp being the worst week of her life. She quit scouts as soon as she got home. And that was at a camp with just girls and women. Imagine that same experience at a BOY Scout camp. She'd kill me if she knew I........ Barry

Somebody or somebodies sued. He didn't say who.

When I was a Scoutmaster, I directed the program so that if the patrol went on a campout in the woods without adults, the patrol would have the exact same experience they have with adults 100 yards away. I don't believe in "boys will be boys", I believe in developing the discipline of living by the Oath and Law. My approach may or may not appear realistic to many leaders, but it worked for me. However, I can understand the concern. I was talking to a professional once who told me that the high level professionals had some concerns about mixing genders at the older ages. I'm not really familiar with the camping policies of Crews today, but he did told me that there are a few scouting babies in the 90's from Crew outings and it cost the BSA dearly. He refuse to give any details other than the crews were camping without adults. So with all due respect, when I hear someone from another country tell us that it's not a big deal and the adults are just over reacting, I don't believe we are getting the whole story. Our program is turning into an after school program that has to be heavily monitored by adults. With these new requirements on sexuality at all ages, how could it not! Barry

Politics and pragmatism rarely go hand in hand. Barry

Volunteers at the district level become more familiar with the different programs NJ, so they can identify Eagle Mill type troops. Many (more than you would think) of these troops market their programs to prospecting families with organized schedules that show how their son can earn Eagle by age 14. The troop isn't purposely pushing the scouts out after the Eagle, but the programs typically don't have the maturity that encourages older scouts to stay on. So they build a Venturing Crew with an advanced adventure program to draw the older scouts. But don't assume all older scouts jump in, these crews typically keep less than 25 percent of the exiting Eagles. I used to criticize Eagle driven programs while I was a patrol method Scoutmaster because I couldn't see the growth in their programs. But when I worked with them at the district level, I found that they do serve a purpose for many families who would otherwise not choose scouting for their son. They are usually loyal camping programs and camping does develop a lot maturity in a boy. I now refer to these programs as another choice. As for wondering if these young men are deserving of the Eagle, well there isn't a single two Scoutmasters on this forum that can agree on what defines the Eagle. We Scoutmasters have egos and rarely does one ego agree with another. Barry

There are a few adult awards that require a nomination. My advise to adults inquiring about these awards is that the award seeks the adult, not the other way around. I have seen adults get overly wrapped up in trying to earn the award and loose sight of why they were volunteering in the first place. Typically hard work is recognized one way of the other. To be nominated is quite an honor. If I remember right, adults who earned the religious knot as a scout can wear that knot on their adult uniform. Kind of cool really. Barry

Yes, it's typical of troops that specialize in streamlining their programs toward making Eagles (Eagle Mills). 14 to 15 are generally the Eagle Mills age of exodus. We have an Eagle Mill in our district that averages about 180 Scouts. Imagine a troop of 180 scouts where the oldest scouts are 15. On the other side though, many of these troops have Venture Crew programs to keep the boys in the program. They are typically heavily adult run (even more than the troop), but some of the crews are successful. Successful being they don't fold inside 5 years. As much as I personally detest these adult run programs, they do have a place in the BSA. There are a large number of families that want this style of a program and the boys do get a pretty good Boy Scout experience. It's not a boy run experience of being accountable for independent decisions. But they are exposed to monthly camping and practicing first class skills. Eagle Mills are better than no scouting at all. Barry

Even humility is refreshing on this forum. Barry

That is interesting. I always took Tour Plans as more of a check list to help units perform actions they may not have otherwise thought of. I admit it's a lot of red tape, but it did develop some good habits. Barry

I scheduled a parents/leaders meeting twice a year to review the Aims and Methods along with Mission and Goals. I did that for several years and learned that 9 out of 10 parents could care less. But, I also did it so they could hold me accountable. Barry

I tried to get our CCs to attend the Scoutmaster trainings so they would have a better understanding of the program. In fact, while I was on the District Training committee, I encouraged all the troops to send their CC. But rarely did I see them in the classes. I'm glad you have a drive for this stuff, I hope you can become at least an ASM so you have more leverage with ideas. As for BORs, I would like to try the idea that a Scout's parents get to talk to a BOR while there son is doing his, so that they can speak their minds about the program. Maybe that is something you could experiment with. Barry

I am looking at your post blw2 as if you are asking how an adult in the troop can make a program suggestion to the SM? I understand the frustration. I myself have seen the frustration of bucking the SM. OK, I know bucking isn't exactly what you meant, but that is how some SM's take it. To be fair, I've always advised committees to search for Scoutmasters that fit their group goals for the troop. Everyone should be on board with the Scoutmaster and their program, so really the committee, not the scoutmaster should have the vision. The problem is that rarely do committees as a whole have much of an understanding of how the program works. So they really don't have collective ideas of what kind of program they want for their sons, much less a vision. As a result, 9 times out of 10 committees are just happy to find someone to take the responsibility and hope that all goes well. And lets be Frank about it, Scoutmastering is a huge responsibility. Anyone one who has not been a SM can't understand or respect the weight of the position. I aged 10 years in my first year on the job. It's not an easy position to fill. Personally I believe Scoutmaster's should have the humility to listen to ideas, suggestions and even criticism. Not so much to listen to committee members yammer about program ideas, but more to listen to scouts equally in stature. But if you get the humility of one, you get the other. Here is the problem of Scoutmasters listening to advice from parents, Scoutmasters in general have a vision and a plan. Does your ideas work within the Scoutmaster's vision and plan. Example: I am a boy run patrol method fanatic. I eat, breath, and live the ideals of using the patrol method to develop citizens of character and leaders of integrity. To that point, one would think that you and I could build a great program together. Yet, in our discussions over the years, you are pro NSP and Aged Based Patrols. From my experience, I don't like using those patrols in my program because they don't perform to my expectations (vision). I have a vision and a plan. Your vision and plan, while the are similar, are still divergent. Does your ideas work within his vision and plan of your Scoutmaster? You think I'm tough, there is one SM on this forum who in the years he has been here has never been wrong. Humility? How can a committee person even get to speak to him? He likely wouldn't even know your name. I don't really know of a formal opportunity in the program for expressing ideas of change, but I think you can figure out a way of creating that discussion. Still, one must approach the "keeper of the vision" with respect if you hope for an open mind to your ideas. Then if those ideas don't interrupt his vision and program, maybe he has the humility to consider your suggestion. I wish you luck because you have some great ideas. Barry

Boy run is my favorite subject of the BSA program and I spent a lot of time helping units turn that direction. Still, I tend to get in the weeds and go over the top, so I will try to keep the post simple by giving multiple posts. Boy Run in my perspective is "the practice of making choices". Why is that so important, lets read the BSA Mission Statement: The mission of the Boy Scouts of America is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law. The Mission of the Troop Program is to prepare boys to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetime. The statement also says the boundaries of those decisions are the values of the Scout Law and Oath. Very important, but we will get to that later. Experts tell us that the more choices a youth makes before they enter the adult world, the more prepared they will be for the tough choices as an adult. Experts also tell us that we humans are more likely to learn from the stresses and struggles of choices because we are forced to reason (make our brain actively work) to ease the struggle. In other words, growing in maturity isn't simply making choices, but it's making choices that force us to reason. The brain is instinctively figuring out how to get away from the stress and struggle of the context in that choice. Simply, the wrong choice we make in our early life helps us make better choices as adults. I teach adults that the more wrong choices a boy scout makes, the more his maturity will grow. But that is a tough fact for parents to appreciate because our parental nature is to protect. Give their sons the independence to screw up and then deal with the consequences of that screw up is painful. It's not easy to watch your son suffer. So they simply don't want to allow choices. But we have to get past that. I had a reputation for having a good understanding of boy run program, so I got a lot of calls from other units for advice. I got one call for a new troop of 40 scouts where the leaders wouldn't even let their scouts lead the Troop Meeting Opening Ceremony. Imagine such a fear of failure that you couldn't even let the scouts lead a flag ceremony. Fear of failure is the number one cause of adults not letting scouts make choices. Adults have to teach themselves how to get past that fear. I worked with a lot of units to help adults push those fears back to allow their scouts to make more choices. But I will get into that later. Another place where many adults also fail their scouts is in understanding that the patrol is a safe place. Not safe because the boys are protected from physical harm of predators or accidents, but the harm of be made to feel a lesser person for their choices. The Patrol is the real world scaled down to a boys size. For scouts to grow from their choices, they have to feel the patrol is safe from ridicule and condescension of their choices, especially wrong choices. A choice should be an opportunity for growth, not an instant that should be discouraged. Boy Run is the practice of making choices. The adolescent mind wants to grow and the more challenges of learning the mind gets from the choices, the more it wants to learn and grow from the practice of making choices. The brain feeds on reasoning, so it wants more. But while it wants to grow from reasoning, it also protects itself from continued stresses,so a scout will quickly learn to stay away from decisions where he risk exposeing himself to the harm of ridicule. I know you are deaf, but I imagine you have seen situations in other troops where the adults over reacted to scouts action or choice. What is the lesson the scout learned, that he made a bad choice; or how to prevent the hurtful reactions of that adult? We want scouts to learn from their choices, but we don't want the experience to push into making NO choices. Of course there are instants where adults have to react to choices, mostly for the safety of the scout or scouts. But even the scout can understand the difference of actions toward his choice. However, as the patrol and troop mature with the experiences of their choices, scouts will replace the adults where quick reactions are required for bad decisions. It is rare for scouts in our troop to approach the SM with bad behavior because through practice of reacting to all choices, the scouts have matured greatly and deal with very few behaviors that they can't handle within the boundaries of the Law and Oath. Tobe continued Barry

You are certainly welcome. I love this scouting stuff. When you have the time, I think the list here would enjoy learning the challenges of being a deaf Scoutmaster. We had a couple of deaf scouts, one of them made Eagle. We had some challenges, but none that had to do with his hearing. Barry

I'm not sure exactly what you are looking for, so I will kind of give a simplistic example of how we encourage scouts to initiate and control responsibility. Our goal is for out scouts to initiate their goals, imagine the process to the goal, and a timeline to complete the goal. With a new scout it goes something like asking the scout when he wants to learn the Tenderfoot knots. The answer can be anything, but the ball is in his court to making a choice of learning the knot. Now likely he will be asked if he wants to do it now or later. If later how about... . Believe or not, these are tough decisions for boys this age. But most say now and he learns the knot. Now he is asked if he wants to complete one of the other Tenderfoot requirements. When would you like to complete it? If later, then we show him how to set a goal and even write it in his book. This is all very simplistic for new scouts, but as the scouts kind of get used to making decisions of completing single tasks, the habit is developing and you can see him setting multiple goals with multiple timelines. Its about now that we start to suggest processes or mini-actions to complete larger task. For example, we now ask him when he wants to complete the first class requirement. That is a much more difficult goal because it requires achieving several smaller goals. But by guiding him to think in steps of knots, first-aid, cooking and so on, he starts to develop a process of setting small goals to reach a bigger goal. This all seems regimented and complex, but it's a the scouts pace and very informal, if not in passing. One scout may request teaching for first-aid and the instructor decides to schedule a class for several scouts. At that time, the scout can choose to take the class or wait for another time. The hard part is that parents are tempted to tell their son to take advantage of the class to speed up his advancement. But we want the scout to make decisions based on his goals so he can live with the consequences of his decisions. Scouts learn to build a pace by their personal ambitions in the program. Some like to advance, some rather camp. I once took A LOT flack from a parent whose son didn't earn a single mb at summer camp. But taking talking to her son, it was his best summer camp ever. However, because all his friends jumped a head in rank, he spent his next year catching up, which was not only fine for him, some of his friends admired his choices. You see, we all develop habits as we make decisions and learn from those decisions. Where most leaders in my opinion struggle is they don't allow the scouts to make enough decisions for them to formulate who they are in their minds. Making a decision tell the scout if he mastered a skill or needs to learn a skill. But I admit, standing back is the hardest thing of adults, parents and leaders. As you can see, scouts by their third year should be pretty much in the habit of initiating their objectives, developing processes to reaching those objectives, and setting some kind of expected completion time. Not just in advancement, but in planning meals, campouts, patrol meetings, fund raisers, service projects, and even summer camp. The habit of setting small goals to reach big goals makes it much easier for scouts to plan projects, major outtings and even the Eagle. A new scout looks at earning the Eagle as almost impossible because the list of requirements in his book is several pages long. But if he look at Eagle one requirement at a time, he surprised to experience that the task isn't all that hard and doesn't require near the time he first expected. We found that our scouts got to Life so fast that they took a couple years off from advancement to do the other scouting stuff. Then at about 16 and half, they realize they still have a few MBs and a project to complete. So they get back up to speed. I remember some adult asking one scout who did his EBOR a day before his birthday why he waited so long. The scout smiled and only said "I was busy". He was the OA Chapter Chef for a year of that. My point is they didn't worry about doing the last few requirements because they had learned how to complete them in a chosen time. As for accountability, there are several sources. Scoutmaster conference is one, the BORs are another. The scouts are responsibile for keeping records, but they are encourage to put each rank and advancement card in a binder with baseball card sleeves to hold the cards. They are ask, but not required to bring that binder along with their book for the BOR to review so they can see just exactly what the scout complete at the point and ask questions pertaining to his personal experience. It is rare that a scout will see the same adults in the BORs, so it's easier for them to review his accomplishments at least by looking at his scout handbook and the binder if the scout chooses. But I have personally found that peer pressure is a very powerful controller (motivator) for how the scout schedules his expectations for setting goals. I personally never set goals for my scouts. My goal is for them to learn the life long skills of setting goals and initiating a process to reach the goals so that they are reaching their expectations by their decisions, not mine. I do ask scouts to visualize themselves in two or three years in the program and to write it down in his book, In fact, I ask scouts to write down goals for us to review at their next SM Conference just so he has kind of see himself in the future. That is tougher than you would think for this generation of scouts because they live by so much by the moment. I want each scout to plan his own future, so I try to get them to see a future. They can and will change those visions and goals all the time, but settings goals is based on invisioning those goals. So you can see that see we try to guide scouts in the habit of taking responsibility for their future actions by making simple choices in setting goals. Then a simple choice for reaching that goal. The process of reaching that goals can be more complicated, but we base that development on their maturity and experience. A 2nd year scout doesn't have the experience nor maturity to plan a week long high adventure trip that a 16 year old is capable of planning. Eagle! It's just a series of goals and accomplishments over the next few years. Its a series of choices. I know this post is silly long. Sorry, I wish I could put down my thoughts more eloquently. Barry

The local news reported on this and it was all positive about how the girls are excited to be there. I think it will help membership and cookie sales. Barry

http://mashable.com/2017/01/18/girl-scouts-inaugural-parade/#_LSYzM4TTsqf It will be interesting to see the responses. Barry

Maybe, but we are taking about how a youths mind is swayed from observing a role models action. "Ignorance of the Law" is an man-made judicial guideline in the justice system. Learning by observing is human behavior that isn't set by man's rules or expectations. My reasoning is pragmatic. We learn by watching, if we don't know the action is wrong, then human nature assumes that the action is right. "Ignorance of the Law" is an attempt to sway acceptance of an opinion by using gilt. I'm an engineer, emotion doesn't come into play for me. I need logical reasoning to change my mind. Drives my wife crazy. Barry