Eagledad

Well there you go, a family activity. These are the ideas that needs to spread. Barry

This is a great idea. There was an expert yesterday explaining that humans are social by nature and that we can't stand long periods of time without socializing. He felt our government would have to do something to satisfy that biological need. But, I agree with yknot that humans have gone thousands of years without starving for group socializing because they satisfied that need through family. And I think something valuable will came from this thing for our culture because I watched numbers of families going for walks and riding bikes together all this weekend. I haven't seen that in years. As a religious person, I have been questioning where God's nature will come out of this and seeing these families was a sign of hope for me. Family. That's me of course, but it's comforting in a time of stress. Barry

I wasn't thinking right or wrong, I was thinking that scouting is way way down on a families priority list. They can call a meeting, but even in the best conditions, who would come. Barry

I guess I don't understand; who wants to go to meetings? Barry

I believe our scouts would have a full satisfying scouting experience without summer camp. But, our average 16 year old scouts have attended at least 5 summer camps. And maybe that is indicative of our troop program because we add more program within our summer camp program. Add that our scouts are pretty much on their own with the adults in a separate camp site, summer camp is a great experience. But I learned as a volunteer at the district and council levels that there are as many approaches to running a scout unit as there are adult leaders. If, units are given full autonomy for their program, then for better or more often worse, the unit culture tends to represent the personality of the the unit leader. I would be curious to hear what district has to say of this unit. Barry

I have one that is warning me that this site has political content. I’m curious what it’s marketing, but I don’t want to select it. I’ll trade it for lingerie or golf balls. Barry

As someone who has been involved at several levels of rechartering and developing membership data, I would be interested in learning how rechartering is the greatest cause of membership losses than anything else. While I agree the current process is inefficient and could be improved, my experience is that rechartering inflates the membership data. Barry

It's a lot of fun and A LOT of work. The main difference is logistics of food. How much to buy, how much it will cost, when to purchase it, where to store it and how to distribute it. It's not reasonable to think a Patrol can manage a weeks worth of food. You will need a mature Quartermaster Corp. The other challenge is program and who will run it. We found that just about every adult is needed as a resource. The scouts lead the planning, with equal help from adult assistants. Lots of planning meetings with a lot of action items. Even Woodbadge spends several months planning and they have instructions. I will say that planning and running such a thing matured our scouts and the boy run program more than any other activity we did over the years. You will have a different troop after you are finished. Everyone will also be exhausted. Barry

Contact the DE and ask for advice. I can't imagine they won't extend the time, but there might be a process that should be followed. Also, your scout might be the reason they come up with policies for this problem now, which is going to catch a lot of scouts in the same boat. Barry

Of course, but this is still a good discussion for future references on the subject title. Barry

Call district and have them send a YP trainer for all the adults. Then you can have your meeting before or after. Coffee, donuts and fruit to start things positive and relaxed. And you don' t need to wait for summer camp, your guidelines are pretty much all the time. I ran two 20 minute parents sessions (require) each year (after each SPL election to remind them how boy run works in our troop. Of course many parents don't come after they attended a couple meetings, but the repeated policies maintain consistency in the program. Barry

As the SM, I held a meeting with parents not going to camp (mostly first year parents) about how to prepare themselves and their scouts for camp and another meeting with the adults attending camp to set the guidelines for their behavior. These were relaxed meetings intended to get everyone excited for the trip. And they was laced with humorous stories of why we have guidelines. Barry

I observation of this discussion is that this observation is tunnel visioned and doesn't consider the big picture. First off, if this is the better solution, then why is the discussion so difficult and divided. Do you really think that it won't come up and divide the adults again in the unit? Second, the solution ignores the adults all together. You know me, Scouting is an Adult program to guide youth toward developing growth. No matter what choices are made in the unit, the adults are always responsible for how they develop growth in the program. I struggle with the OP and some of the other responses that say nothing should be changed because the scouts made the decision. Right or wrong, they should get their way because they made the decision. Really? Is that the role modeling we want our youth to see? I have found in my experience that scouts will make the tough decisions when they are treated as adults and allowed participation in the discussion. My advice for the OP is start looking at their relationship with the youth leadership as a team relationship and share the rules, regulations and struggles with the situation. Then, allow a discussion of ideas. Barry

Spring break is next week here. Barry

I think the choice is going to be made for the troops, and most youth organizations. My high school teacher son said their district is telling them to expect no school after Spring Break. Classes will likely go internet. Reasoning is that schools are the higher risk areas for spreading the virus and closing the schools before someone brings it there will significantly slow down the spread in the community. Parents will continue that reasoning into their family's other curricular activities. Barry

Yep, don't start climbing that tree. Call your UC, then the District Commissioner, then the DE. And try to stop there with the solution. Curious, why didn't the two troops have separate elections? Barry

I believe friendship is part of balance. Barry

Just explain the value of balance, and they will usually get where you want to go. Barry

Yes, but we don't know what the youth want on this basically adult forum. And since we don't know what they want, we don't know who the grumpy adults are. Fashionista's or traditionalists. Barry

Do you have the resources for the canoe trip? I'm sure you do, but the misjudge the logistics required for such a trip. Food, patrol gear, personal gear and water gear add up to A LOT. Start planning NOW because this isn't a typical weekend trip for Patrols. A good place to start is to consider an outfitter and quiz them about your trip. Barry

It seems many of the ladies like the style. OK, I'm shaking my head in wonder. I miss Boy Scouts. Barry

This situation is why I'm not a big fan of NSPs, or really the process of crossing everyone over about the same time. Before NSPs (in my youth), scouts crossed over when they reached a certain age. So, troops didn't receive herds of new scouts all at once. They typically received two, maybe thee new scouts a month. Maybe even a couple more, I don't remember, but patrols typically receive one or two new scout every few months. So, patrols weren't overwhelmed with the responsibility of new scouts and advancement was done by the patrol as a whole. This week some first-aid, next week some knots. It wasn't hard or overwhelming like todays herds of scouts needing the same rank at the same time. I find the NSP process frustrating because when the patrols controlled advancement, there was not an annual troop activities agenda every year designed to get new scouts up to rank. The patrols controlled advancement, not the troop. But most troops today have a typical annual agenda they repeat every year intended to get all the new scouts up to rank. They aren't purposely wanting to make everyone the same rank at the same time, but the annual agenda forces scouts to make decisions they wouldn't normal make. This month's troop theme is First-aid, next months is Pioneering for Knots. NSPs take away some of the independence and creativity for planning activities. National wasn't trying to take away a little bit of patrol method from the scouts, but they did. They found that the BSA looses more scouts in their first year troop experience than any other age. Their thinking was that if they moved the scouts together with their friends in one big swoop, they would improve troop membership numbers. But, to counter the problem of growth (advancement and getting scouts assimilated into the troop environment), they created the Troop Guide and a program called NSPs. Again, the NSP seems to fit the Patrol Method design. It looks good from a concept, so the scouts aren't really loosing anything. Supposedly. But, one thing leads to another and the Patrol Method Boy Run process becomes more diluted into adult run and the troop program as a whole looses it's power for developing leaders of integrity and citizens of character. First, all growth has to come from the outside of the patrol. I know, TGs aren't considered outside, but yes they are. In a year, the TG is gone and the patrol is on it's own. See, in a natural ideal patrol, the young scouts don't learn by constant lectures from the older patrol mates. The young scouts learn simply by watching. 90% of everything a scout learns by 14 years of age was likely learned by watching, especially leadership. But, a NSP doesn't have the older experienced role models, so growth has to come from outside the patrol. And typically, initiated by adults. Second, National change the expectation of the patrol design from the traditional mixed age patrols to same age patrols so that NSPs would naturally continue together until they aged out. Again, from the initial design perspective, leaving the scout together seems reasonable. But, if maturity is gained from the experience of observing older scouts in action ( let's say leadership), then where do scouts with no experienced leaders learn how to lead. Well, here comes Junior Leadership Training (JLT). And who implements JLT? Adults. The problem with JLT is that training at best only highlights what a leader needs to be effective. JLT works great to help experienced leaders learn new tricks to be a better leader. JLT is terrible for teaching experienced leaders how to lead. So, who fills in the gaps of leadership when the leader runs into a situation that they don't know how to control? Adults. And it gets worse. As adults take over more of the scouts growth, the feed on it and take on more and more. I once listened to a SM explaining why he didn't let scouts young than 14 lead PLCs. They were just plain to immature. 95% of troops for 100 years let their scouts lead PLCs, but he just couldn't see it in his scouts. Is it right to blame the trend of less youth responsibility for their grwoth experience? Maybe not, but NSPs are a huge reason for it. It's been a few years, but I did look at the National numbers for new scouts and found that the NSP had not improved the first year troop numbers. It turns out that the reason scouts quit in their first year is more complicated. But we are stuck the NSPs. Barry

Quite true. When I left for college, my mother was going through a tough time after her divorce. In her depression, she sold anything that she didn't see important in her life at a garage sale, much of which was my scouting gear. 30 years later while moving her to another retirement house, I stumble across a small brittle card board box with my scout shirt, neckerchief and a few of those cards. As qwazse points out, the signatures on those cards were valuable part of the treasure. Also, for some reason I can't explain, our scouts lost their books more often than they lost their cards. And those cards save more than one scout in proving their advancement for Eagle. Of course, records are more accurate with computers today (am I really that old), but as someone who uses computers everyday in my work, I know computers only do what we tell them to do, not what we want them to do. Barry

It will be interesting to watch. Both my sons in their 30s have made some comments lately without any input from me that scouting as they knew is gone. They don't really know what it is now, but admitting girls was the final straw. I wouldn't call them conservative, political or even cultural. They see the change as radical and if they are going that far, what else have they changed. I can't disagree, not because of just the girls, but also because changes intended to protect the scouts. The differences between my dads program in WWII and mine in the early 70s was hardly noticeable. In fact, I wore much of my dads uniform. The only real noticeable difference in program from the early 70's and my sons experience in the 90s was the addition of women leaders, and the short shorts men wore (glad that's over). But the difference my grand kids will see in 10 years compared to their dads experience is already significant. And if many here have their way, the uniforms will look something similar to only tie dye neckerchiefs. Self-reliance and Independence? Well, I guess that's subjective. Self-reliance is a direct response to independence, and I believe independence is being whittled away in different forms. Instead, scouting will have to become the FUN program of group adventures with a tinge of independence, so long as two adults are near by. I'm not being skeptical, I'm being realistic. I've been doing this long enough that I have seen how small program changes start a chain of culture ideals. I don't see Self-reliance and independence as the realistic objectives because the basis for those goals is independent decision making. And I don't believe adults today trust youth enough to give that kind of independence. I'm not even sure the changing rules and policies will give the scouts enough room for that independence. I think Fun Group Adventure is the scouting motto of the future. Barry

Exactly. I created a course called "Patrol Method and Boy Run" intended to give adult leaders a better understanding of growth that comes from independent decision making. One of the lessons I gave was how to reduce adult fears that hold back scouts. Basically it is what mrkstven said, teach the scouts how to deal with the situation the adults fear. What would adults do different than properly "Prepared" scouts with a snake bite incident? In fact, my typical example in the course was Scout hikes without adults. But, it can be anything, right. I was even asked to help the adults of a new troop let their scouts run the flag ceremony during their Troop Meetings. Adult fears can be as simple as that. Barry