EagleInKY

I'm with 2cubs, they normally earn the AOL at the end of the Cub Scouting time. They cross over and should have their Scout rank almost immediately. As I see it, the only additional requirement is the parent's Youth Protection conversation, which we encourage them to do right away.

I grew up in scouts as a "son of a Scoutmaster". Now I'm a scoutmaster and dad of a scout. Scoutmaster Ron mentioned in another thread a question that was asked his son in a BOR regarding how many merit badges his dad had signed off for him. That sounds like someone is hinting that there could be some favoritism going on. This hits close to home as my son deals with that from time to time. I also remember that when I was a scout. Some of the other boys occasionally make comments like "yeah, but your dad helped you...". You've probably heard it as well. I started the thread because I'm sure several of us have dealt with this, and probably learned a few dos and don'ts. What do you do to eliminate the appearance of favoritism with your son? What practices have you seen (good or bad) with Scoutmaster/Dads that you've worked with. Here's some of the things I do: I don't sign off anything for him at home. He has to bring it to the troop meeting just like anyone else. I typically don't remind him of specific things he is supposed to do. The most I may do is say "is there anything you need to do for Scouts this week?". I probably "bend over backwards" for other scouts far more than him. At meetings or activities, I try to treat him as just one of the boys. Any other ideas or suggestions?

Cubs - Where do you find authority to have a non-registered leader on the BOR? Everything I've read says that the BOR is to be comprised of members of the Troop Committee (not ASMs or SM either). Ron - I'm going to spin off a new thread about your comment.

I saw this quote this morning, it reminded me of this thread: ''Leadership is getting someone to do what they don't want to do, to achieve what they want to achieve.'' - Tom Landry Sounds like a good job description for a Scoutmaster. ;-)

If it's possible, check with some established troops in your area. We had several dining flies given to us when we started last year. With so many troops going to the enclosed canopies, everyone seemed to have spares. Now, we have an enclosed canopy, so even we have a couple of spares. As for poles, we had a couple of partial sets, and secured them to trees. Of course, that won't work in the middle of a field.

This sounds very fishy to me as well. Sounds like someone looking for an easy path to something that is not meant to be "easy". I don't konw how long this boy has been "hanging around", but it needs to be put to a stop. You (technically, your CO) has the right to establish membership standards. I would talk with them to verify that this young man is not meeting them. I would assume that you wouldn't let a new scout get away with these actions? Our troop invites boys who move into the area to "visit" for 2 months. We set that as a reasonable time for the scout to get to know us and vice-versa. After that point, he needs to make up his mind as to whether he is going to transfer to our troop or find another one. To put it another way, I feel obligated to offer our program to a new boy, but not to the detriment of the boys who have committed themselves to the troop. Whether you see it or not, this boy is a detriment to the troop. Leaving campouts to play video games, "hanging around" at troop meetings and not taking part in activities is sending bad signals to the rest of your scouts. By allowing it to continue, your silence is telling your other boys that the behavior is acceptible. If you "help" him get to Eagle, you are telling them that it is not only acceptible, but rewarded as well. Sorry for the bluntness, but if I'm understanding your posts directly, I would have very little patience with this young man (or his parents). Good luck.

TP - Yes, there's a lot of information there. Being a troop of first year scouts, we're not doing any high adventure yet. I'm hoping to go to it next year so I'll be better prepared. Where are you located? We're looking to go camping down around LBL this spring. Trying to decide where to camp/what to do. There's lots of stuff there.

We're doing Powderhorn here (Louisville). I can't work it in my schedule though. Sounds like a good experience. Are you going?

Hey Mark, You read my mind. We've been giving him great gear advice, but forgetting that he's a den leader. I have discouraged packs from investing lots of money on camping gear if they are only going to camp once or twice a year. It would be much better for them to borrow from the troop, or get some old items donated to them. When we were in Cubs, we borrowed a couple of tents and a dutch oven from a troop. The rest of the gear was provided by families. We did not have any Pack or Den gear. Good luck Its Me

Uniforms - At our BORs, the committee members are typically not in uniform. It's simply because most of our committee members do not wear the uniform at all. Every family member is encouraged to have a member on the committee (we're a small troop). We debated "uniformed committee members" a while back and decided we would rather have involvement from a greater number than inforce a uniforming standard that would scare some away. (We do have a full uniform standard for SM & ASMs). I don't think that is a problem to explain to the boys. They understand the difference between "the scoutmasters" (the uniformed guys who help run the troop) and committee members, who help administer the program. On a side note, I was thinking about Eagle BORs. Our district conducts excellent Eagle BORs. The panel includes civic leaders (in business clothes), scouters (in uniform) and is lead by the District Advancement Chair, who is a police officer and wears his Police uniform. The boys understand that they are being reviewed by a cross-section from the community. Scheduling - When we have boys ready for a BOR, I notify the Advancement Chairman. We set a date at least two weeks out. I then confirm it with the Scout. We try to group them so we have 2 or 3 at the same time, but it doesn't always work out. For instance, last night, we had a BOR for one scout. We're having a COH this weekend and we wanted to get his BOR in. The boys understand that the BOR doesn't happen immediately, and that they are scheduled in this manner. Another troop I'm aware of has a designated night for BORs. For example, if it's the 4th Tuesday of the month, that is when all BORs are conducted. If a boy completes his requirements on the 4th Thursday, he knows he has to wait a month until the next BOR. If there are no boys ready for a BOR, then it is not held. This is a good way to "force" scheduling to happen.

Right on, Old Salty-haired One! Couldn't have said it better.

"I do have a specific question about who can attend a BOR. " Bob addressed it: "To serve on a BORs (except for Eagle rank) You must be a member of the troop committee. " The SM and ASM should not even be there to observe. If the boy has issues with the adult leadership, he won't feel comfortable saying it in front of them. (It's unlikely he would say it to any adult, but that's another issue). The BOR may sense that the boy thinks the troop should camp more, work on advancement more often, offer a MB class, etc. This can be good feedback to the adult leaders of the troop. There have been some interesting threads around who can attend BORs. Some troops still use scouts on the BOR, which was stopped by the BSA back in the 80s. I don't want to re-open that thread, but you can search for it. As for our troop, we try to conduct them according to how Bob described it.

OGE - Not at all, under the circumstances you laid out. I'm talking about a troop that always did it as an "official event" and not continue to do it "unofficially" in order to get around G2SS. I've heard some rumbling about that locally, and got a sense of that from some of the earlier posts.

Trail Pounder - I'm not a sailer, but I know the guy that runs our Sea Scouts program here. If you PM me, I can try to put you in touch with him.

And why must this be a Troop activity again? Why can't you just go as a group of friends... The only concern I have is whether it can still somehow be construed as a troop activity. Maybe one of the legal eagles or rule experts can give us some guidance. Hypothetically, let's say a troop always went to laser tag on a particular day, say Groundhog Day. This year, since it's against the G2SS, they did not do the activity. However, most of the boys in the troop still got together and went to laser tag on Groundhog Day. In fact, only members of the troop were invited to this informal event. They even talked about it informally at troop and patrol meetings. But, the PLC in no way coordinated it, nor did the troop endorse it. No uniforms were worn. No tour permit was given. If something were to happen, would the troop be in a tough situation? With the right lawyer (on the plantiff side), I would say it's possible. I really like Korea's point regarding later enforcement of a G2SS (or any other) rule. It certainly puts you in an awkward situation.

This is one of my favorite "lists", and I do agree with a great deal of what it says. As a "geek" myself, I like rule 11. But I've known for some time that it was an urban legend. I didn't know until today the actual source of it. That's great to know. As for the initial question, "Does Scouting prepare kids for life?" I believe we do a pretty good job of it. The leadership experiences, moral lessons and overall social skills gained through scouting experiences are great training experiences for life. In fact, I think we do a much better job than our schools in this regard. I've had parents ask why we don't take the summer off, or why we have meetings on days that school is out. One answer I like to give is that we are trying to prepare the boys for the real world. And, in real life, we don't get breaks every time you turn around.

I've seen troops take just the JLT guys on the campout. They'll call it a leadership retreat or something like that. There's an advantage to getting the boys completely away from all distractions. The only problem is that the effort of camping & cooking can then become a distraction. Using cabins, such as the ones at our scout camp, which has electrical outlets for the TV, is another good option.

Several troops around here make an annual laser tag or paintball event. They're just starting to find out (usually after the fact), about the change in the G2SS rules. It demonstrates the importants of the adult leaders to stay current on the BSA safety rules. nldscout is correct, if something happens on the event, you and the other adult leaders could be held liable. It's best to stay away, as a troop or patrol activity, that is. (I, too, have no problem with either activity. I don't necessarily agree with the policy, but I'll adhere to it.)

I agree with the previous two posts. Gifted & Talented programs are essential for developing the best and brightest of our kids to their fullest potential. These programs help build the leaders of tomorrow, just as Boy Scouting does. The difference here is that it is education-oriented, and should be part of the school program. It also helps to prevent these kids from getting burned out (or is it "bored out") of school.

There's not an easy answer to this. That's because it depends upon a lot of factors we don't know. If I asked you what you preferred to cook with at home - the stovetop, the oven or the grill, you would probably ask "what am I cooking?". The same applies here. There are some great dutch oven recipes, but 24+ is a lot for one. A griddle is great, but you need a bigger stove (I agree with the Camp Chef recommendation - they blow the Coleman's away). The truth of the matter, you probably need more than just this, and it's not cheap stuff you're needing. As for the den size, you do have a concern. You need to sit down with your parents and get some help. Splitting the den would be preferable. We've had "co-leaders" before in this type of situation where we were unable to split the den.

KS - I agree with you to a large extent. I occasionally "throw the switch" to prevent a train wreck as well. I've seen the "boy led into the ground" troop and it's not a pretty site. It can destroy a troop. One troop near us is struggling with that now. When our sons were Webelos and we visited their troop meeting, it was an absolute embarassment. I had heard stories about how out-of-control their meetings were, but I had no idea. We didn't join that troop, and few others have. The good news is that they are trying to get it straightened out. We had a "controled failure" recently. Our boys wanted to have a campout where they just went to "have fun". They didn't want any organized activities. The adults tried to convince them otherwise, but they really wanted it. So we let them. By Saturday afternoon they were asking us what they could do. They complained of being bored. I used it as a lesson to them about planning a program and getting the most out of these opportunities. I don't think we'll have that idea come up again for a while. Sure, we "lost" an opportunitity to do something more productive, but that's less important than the lesson they learned about program planning.

I think JLT is a great program - both in the troop and at the council level. But, I would hate to see it become a requirement for rank advancement. It may be impossible for some scouts to participate in the council level week-long camp. For example, we are unable to send any of our guys to it this summer because one of the weeks conflicts with school (we have an extended year/shorter summer) and the second time conflicts with our troop's week at summer camp. I could also see conflicts with boys who have to work or participate in other activities that tie up the summer (band camp, football, etc.). However, I do think troops can introduct their own level of quality control. We offer JLT in the troop every year. We "require" PL and SPL to participate. The boys know this and agree to it if they run for those offices. I see it is as a responsibility of these positions to participate in the troop's JLT program, so I have no problem making this a requirement.

Since your church may not be real understanding of Scouting, I would work it in slowly. Your presence alone will probably speak volumes. Getting the worship leader to recognize you would be a great plus. Here are a few other ideas that are fairly basic, that you may not be ready for, but may work up to in future years. 1. Let the boys serve in some way. Our sponsor has Scouts pass the offering trays. 2. Write a summary of the past year (highlighting community service, advancement and religious awards). Publish it in the weekly bulletin or have it read aloud. 3. Have the scout leader stand and thank the church for its support. 4. Highlight scouting's religious aspects (A Scout is Reverent, duty to God, etc.) in some way.

There are several decent looking products on the market. The last time I looked at them (2 years ago) they were all DOS based, so I decided to wait. One thing for sure, scrap the double-elimination. Use one of the round-robin methods. You'll be surprised how fast you can get through the process. We had to fight with the naysayers about 5 years ago, but eventually prevailed. Now they are all supportive of the format we use. We also do not use a timer. We have a 3 lane track. Each boy races once in each lane, against different competition. He gets 3 points for 1st, 2 points for 2nd and 1 point for 3rd. We total up the points at the end of the round. If the group is larger than 6, we take the top 1/2 of the finishers and run through the same process again. We keep this up until we settle on the winners. If we have any ties for 1st, 2nd or 3rd, we run them off using the same method. All of this still takes place faster than double-elimination. Also, IMO, I don't liked timed races. It's difficult to explain to an 8 year old why he finished first in 3 races, but didn't win overall (because he was racing against slower cars). Our method prevents that from happening. FYI - we used a spreadsheet to manage it for several years. Send me a PM if you'd like me to e-mail a copy of it to you.

Just be careful. If you have it too hot, the heat will melt the plastic. I had to surgically separate the basket from frame the first time we took one with us. We've now got the proper heating down to a science. And, we bought a backup just in case!!!