EagleInKY

Scoutnut had a good solution. Work through it, be understandable, and keep the program going. Make sure it's interesting for the boys who stick around, so they don't get discouraged. Make it a big enough carrot that the sports kids want to come back as soon as possible. (But, not too big a carrot in that they may get discouraged.). Case in point, I've got a 2nd year scout going up for First Class BOR tomorrow night. That's almost a whole year later than his peers. But he chose to play competitive soccer in the spring and fall and basketball in the winter. He missed lots of outings, thus slowing his advancement.

This thread is like our own episode of Seinfeld. Much talk about nothing.

Hey Beav, it balances with the 10 minutes I spent creating it. We obviously have too much time on our hands today. Hey, if you are interested in being real geeky, you can get a semaphore font. http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/bitstream/semaphore/semaphore/mac-t1/183451/

Even in August I think you can hit that 30 degree mark at some locations. I think it's a pretty solid recommendation. I took a 10 degree bag each time I went, and never had an issue.

A special message for you Beav! http://www.troop153bsa.org/downloads/semaphore_message.png

Semper my friend, that was one of the best things I've read in a long time. With a relatively rough week of "issues" on the scouting front, I found this uplifting. I hope you are okay with me sharing it with my leaders. (I'll give you all the credit.) The article needs a good name... How about "Scouting, A Counter-cultural Revolution"?

A helpful site for those struggling to follow along: http://morsecode.scphillips.com/translator.html Maybe we should do all correspondence this way? I bet it would slow down some of the political rants.

At times I'm amazed at what parents will pay for. I can't imagine paying the fees for a program my son or daughter hadn't been involved in for two years! We have a lad that joined last summer. He's very inactive. He typically comes to about 1 meeting every two months. He's attended two campouts - summer camp and a weekend campout. He's literally joined at the hip with his dad. (It's actually kind of scary, but that's another topic). We hadn't seen him since November and were in the midst of rechartering. I had sent out a few e-mails, but no responses. One of the ASMs ran into them at Walmart and asked where they'd been. They showed up the next Monday night and paid the recharter fee. I was amazed. We didn't see them for another month after that. Last week his dad was asking "what could he do to help him advance?". (He still hasn't made Tenderfoot in 8 months). We told him, "Let him participate!".

Welcome to the party Justin. Your old man's a pretty good guy. (At least we think so.) We look forward to getting to know you too. We like getting the youth perspective on things.

Actually, "..." = "S" To quote my good cyber-friend Barry: ".. .-.. --- ...- . - .... .. ... ... -.-. --- ..- - .. -. --. ... - ..- ..-. ..-." .-.-.-

It was discussed on this site a few months ago. Try a search for Lion Cubs in 2005.

I'm not sure when it started, I think it was around 1990. Your questions: 1) Who is suppose to be the Patrol Leader. Shouldn't that be a job for an experienced scout? Troops take different approaches. We use the Woodbadge approach of rotating the job on a monthly basis. The Troop Guide is "joined at their hip" and serves as that experienced scout you ask about. In my experience, the Troop Guide operates almost like the PL and the rotating PL is more ceremonial. But it gives the boys a sense of responsibility. 2) Is not part of our program to help boys mature by having them help/teach younger scouts. Correct, and that shouldn't change. We still use our older scouts to teach the younger ones. Some of the older experienced scouts serve as Instructors and are responsible for certain topics. We also have a "Tenderfoot Weekend" campout where the 2nd and 3rd year scouts teach basic skills to the new scouts. 3) As I understand it after about a year the NSP is broken up and the boys are placed in "regular" patrols. So you break up a team that may have developed an identity and ability to work together with spirit and maybe even the beiginnings of traditions and place them into a foreign group? Unless you have a troop that works almost autonomously in patrols, there is a lot of interaction between the scouts. They'll make new friends on campouts, at troop meetings, fundraisers, etc. We do a total reshuffle which allows for all ages to get mixed together. You'd be surprised how the new guys will break up into smaller groups and attach with some older guys. 4) Might not some WEBELOS den leader who come to Scouts with their son not be register as leaders and stiil feel ownership of this group? Might not this lead to a) an Webelos Patrol run by an adult or b) conflict between troop and new volunteer? I find this to definitely be a challenge. The Webelos Leader, who is often asked to be the ASM of the NSP is often ill-prepared for the boy-led model. This year we decided before anything happened that we would have an experienced SM work with the NSP. If the Webelos Leader wanted to become an ASM, we were going to partner him up with them.

I appreciate the kind words by all of you. Things are fine with my ASMs. We've seen each other at Scouts Monday night and B&G Tuesday night and all is well. Nothing more said, although I'm sure we'll have some good discussion at our next SM pow wow. I also plan to discuss the topic further with the PLC to make sure the learnings stick. Of course, as soon as we had this issue put to bed, we discovered an issue with our Webelos leader. It became quite clear we're all back on the same team again. But, I don't think I can handle two ventings in a week, so I may table it for a few days. Thanks for letting me vent.

I may use "Youth" when speaking in a 3rd party context, I see it as a more formal, cold, uncaring term. I usually use the term "guys", "fellows" or "scouts" more than anything else.

Had our B&G tonight. Several Webelos Activity pins were not available at the Scout Shop yesterday. That's fairly typical, unfortunately. On the other hand, I will complement the staff at truly being exceptionally courteous. They cannot help the policies of management. I can't say anything negative about the service they provide.

Grape Juice!

I received e-mail notification that we made it in the Seabase lottery. We'll be sending two crews on the Coral Reef Sailing adventure down the Florida Keys. We currently have 9 boys and 6 adults signed up. Anyone else make it in? (Maybe we can meet up in Key West )

"The SPL and ASPL also will start eating with the adults on the campout this weekend. " Mike, We do that as much as possible. It does strengthen the relationship between the adults and the senior leaders. I've noticed it especially with the adults that aren't around as much. They really show more respect to the SPL when they see us treating them more like adults.

When we have a new scout start as a Webelos, we advise them to go ahead and by the tan shirt.

A few troops recruit in the schools. Most rely on crossovers and individual recruitment. It's as much a measure of effectiveness than anything. You can put hours of effort into recruiting in schools or other venues, and you are probably lucky to get 2 or 3 recruits. I believe that is because scouting has a certain "nerdy" image to it by the time they get to 6th grade. On the other hand, if you spend a few hours recruiting with your local pack, and you're probably going to gain many more boys for the effort involved. Right now I'm not sure how many we're actually going to get in crossover. The number could be pretty small. If so, we may take a shot at recruiting next fall to pull in a few more.

We've done it both ways. It usually depends upon a variety of things - the schedule, who's going, what the guys are cooking... If the guys are doing their normal things (hot dogs, mac & cheese, etc.), then we are more inclined to do our own thing. Sometimes eating the food cooked by the boys does give them a sense of accomplishment. We've had contests where we recognize the patrol that cooks the best meal. On the other hand, the adults often cook more creative menus that may inspire the boys to try something different as well. We sometimes give them a little taste to whet their appetite.

Deep.... I'm not sure how to reply.

Mark, I appreciate your desire to be open and honest. I also congratulate you on your accomplishments. I'm as much a uniform junkie as the next guy, but I'd say "too heck with it, I'm getting trained soon". Now, if the training falls through and gets delayed to the fall, do the right thing and remove it.

I don't work for a scout shop, nor do I play anything like it on TV. But I do know some folks that have done so in the past. My understanding of it goes something like this. When the council scout shops have been taken over by national, usually the same folks have continued to run them. However, national seems to have a different POV around carrying inventory. In short, they don't like stores to do it. In the "old days", if you needed a blue-headed widget with gold embroidering, they would have it. Even if they weren't on the shelf, they'd have some in the back. Now they've replaced all the management with folks they've brought in from other stores. In fact, most of the workforce has been replaced as well. No inventory in the back, everything is on the shelf. Your unit has a particular neckerchief you wear, you better plan on ordering it. Need more than a half-dozen anything, you better plan on a wait. Need anything out of the ordinary.... you get the picture. That's my understanding. Not sure if it's all true, it did come to me with a certain bias attached.

Welcome to the forum. Leave it to Semper to tie in one of our latest fiascos as a new initiation ceremony. We'd never do anything like that to you. Now, report to the snipe hunt at 10:00 this evening and you'll have a full appreciation of what we are about.