fred8033

As people said above ... You absolutely have the right to do it. You should not be embarrassed to sign off for them. They should not be penalized because you are the scoutmaster. The main reasons to NOT do it ... Perception. Avoid perception of favoritism or your son had it easier. Growth. Your son will grow more by working with people other than their parent. So ... if you can have someone else work with your son, great. BUT, don't penalize him. If there is no one else and your son would be penalized, I'd sign off

Fully agree. It's not gender specific. People want to spend their time in a meaningful way. Advancement for advancement sake is not meaningful. Hiking. Camping. Fishing. ... "ing" is meaningful especially when it's a new experience. I agree. Parents invest and drive their kids to things. They want to see a measure that the investment is worthwhile. They see it in the rank. I see it every time there is a slight bit more maturity in my kid after a scouting activity or event.

I'm betting 90% are paired with a pre-existing troop for equipment, committee and probably also a scheduled of activities and events.

Agreed. ... IMHO, the scout should find pride in their journey, not just a rank. ... In my mind, I'd even argue "rank" is not a great measure of skill of a scout. I think other measures are much more telling. Number of nights in a tent. Number of nights in a tent below zero F. Number of miles on a river. Number of miles hiked. Number of high adventures. I disagree. Even fifty years ago, Eagle scout was prestigious and magazine cover art was around earning Eagle. IMHO, the higher percent of Eagles is because the bottom has fallen out. Fifty year years ago, youth asking to be in scouts because it was a great way to spend their time. To be with their friends. To camp. To do fun things. Now, scouts don't like the idea of an outhouse or "roughing it". Their idea of roughing it is sleeping in a friends basement. So the current pool of scouts has a much higher number of scouts chasing rank or being pushed by their parents. I don't think this is a BSA promotion thing. It's market dynamics. If you are in scouts, you expect a reasonable path to earning Eagle.

Thank you. I always think I know everything. I'm corrected and appreciate the information. It was once explained to me as a measurement of the whole scouting journey Tiger to Eagle. How many join and how many finish. The number seems much more reasonable then. I trust the number of Eagle is fairly steady (maybe growing), but the expectations are better defined and youth have many more resources. Then add that the number of members has drastically dropped resulting in those that are in the program are probably from families that really value scouting. And, thus want their kid to earn Eagle.

Your metric isn't probably that bad as I think national's number is based on scouts joining as Lion and Tigers and all the losses that happen during Cub Scouts and before switching to the old scout programs.

@thrifty I don't like labels either. "Eagle factor" is a shallow snide label not worthy of a scout leader. Be specific in what is wrong wrong or what should change or don't say anything at all. ... Nothing against the original poster. It's just a term that has been thrown around too loosely for way too long. One statement in the article hit me. "“I think it’s a credit to several things but mainly the boys themselves have made the troop a fun activity within their curriculum, " ... Magical mixtures of scouts and scout leaders happen that make the program shine. In my 15+ years in troops, the most recent was the best. Scouts became best friends. Built close friendships. Kept busy with many activities. The SPL really owned his leadership and kept getting re-elected. He worked to make the troop a fellowship of fun and they did things. More than once they'd ask us when they could camp next or do specific activities. The scouts built connections that us adults had a hard time knowing when and how they were communicating and coordinating. But they were doing it. These scouts did a lot, earned MBs, helped each other and almost all earned Eagle. Plus, I'll proudly boast what they learned about leadership, responsibility, boy-led, etc against anything any adult leader tries to shove at the scouts. Some might look from the outside and call it an Eagle factory, but they'd be wrong. It's the natural result of these guys having a great time. The Eagle rank is just not that hard if you enjoy the path to get there and your friends value it too. I truly believe so many earned Eagle because they had fun ... enjoyed the fellowship ... wanted to be like their troop mates who also earned Eagle.

I fully agree. And a 17 year old scout can knock off lots of requirements quickly because of maturity and the ability to focus.

Your mileage may vary ... but I've seen this done many times. My experience is this. ASMs are often not as experienced as SMs. It takes years to learn a more relaxed attitude and learn to sit on your hand to let the scouts really take charge. ASMs don't provide a consistent message from the SM. ASM attendance is far less consistent than the SM. You might have one or two dedicated ASMs, but then the rest will be hit and miss. ASMs often work agendas thru their patrol at the expense of the patrol members. ASMs look for voids to fill instead of letting the scouts work it out. I really hate the term boy-led, but I'd really ask who's program is it? My experience is kids live up to your expectations. If you expect they will need an adult present, than they will need an adult. If you let them work through it, they will blow it now and then, but they will learn.

... some ... it can be noticed fairly quickly. SM should adjust as things are noticed. My point is this should be treated as a situation to address, teach and grow. The possibility of this happening should not be used as an excuse to insert adults into the youth program.

I've found some very good comments here. My sadness is the ideal is hard to achieve and hard to maintain. Leaders change. Life happens. Adults don't always agree. More importantly, I truly believe the scouting program that I want my son to be part of rarely looks like the ideal troop.

I agree. At some point a measure of reasonableness needs to be applied. Here is my thought process. Two - So that a single person can't act in issolation. Registered - So that background checks are done. 21 years of age - Creates separation between the scouts they are protecting. Including meetings - To make it clear that when scouts gather, we want two leaders. My reasonable view is based on a common scenario that has happened multiple times. If we take the 20 scouts camping with two valid adult leaders, then we can't be everywhere at all times. Scouts go get water. Scouts go on day hikes and explore. Scouts find activities to do. This is something we want. We want scouts to go off independently. IMHO, this is just like a meetings. We need two adults to open the building to enable scouts to gather. But it is ridiculous to expect those two adults to be everywhere at all times. Instead, apply the G2SS rule prohibiting one-on-one contact. It's okay for one adult leader to go into a meeting with the PLC (multiple scouts). It's also okay for two adult leaders to meet privately with the SPL. It's the one-on-one situation to avoid.

Two adults do not have to sit in the PLC. The troop may need two adult leaders to open the building and have the scouts gather, but you don't need them in the room with the PLC. That would be like going to summer camp and two adults have to escort each and every set of scouts everywhere. It's not the point or the expectation. Have a special room for the PLC. Adults and other non-PLC scouts stay in the main area or another room. Troop committee could even meet in yet another room if you have that running concurrently.

I've seen different ways that PLCs are run. In my view, the best PLCs are where the SM guides the SPL outside the PLC meeting and doesn't even attend the PLC. Essentially, PLC is for youth. Troop committee meeting is for adults. Before the PLC, the SM meets with the SPL and asks what is being covered, what needs planning, etc. He also asks the SPL what the scouts need from the troop committee. Then, the SPL runs the PLC and the SM listens into the troop committee meeting. Sometime during the troop committee meeting, our SPL reports to our troop committee that is meeting at the same time as the PLC. When the SPL is ready, the troop committee simply pauses their meeting to hear the results of the PLC. Ideally, the adults have been coached to stay as quiet as possible during the SPL report so that the adults don't take over the SPL report.

If the PLC voted on it, it seems like you need to respect their wishes. Sort of boxed in. The question is the dynamics of the situation. You can expect people to listen for a few minutes to something they are not involved in. But if you ask them to spend 20 to 30 minutes, you waste their time. Wasting their time can result in bad behavior. IMHO, respect peoples time and they will respect yours. Waste their time and it comes back at ya.

Had a scout who liked to bring metal working equipment and brought a hatchet to camp. It's not that he brought the hatchet. It's that we didn't take it away when we returned at 1am from the ER. On the positive side, we had ice and clean cloth.

Dry ice. Don't pack Friday's COH ice cream in dry ice. You will have concrete and not be able to eat it. Bicycle. Scout disassembled and had each of his friends pack a piece of it in their gear. Then it was reassembled at camp. Hard to hide.

I agree trailer has more issues, but COs are reluctant to let scouting units build sheds. Some are very supportive. Most are not. It's something about treating charter orgs as the church doing a good deed for the community. That the scouting unit is more of a community group than an integrated part of the church. Perhaps other units are more lucky. My experience is churches are willing to let the trailer be chained up in the parking lot, but not willing to build a shed. ... but that's my experience.

A shed is a great solution. Our troop proposed one. Our troop had the money. The CO said no. Even if we built one, I suspect it would be quickly filled with church stuff. The challenge is a shed is a permanent structure that requires someone to take serious ownership. Charter Orgs are often only someone involved with the troop. When the troop asks to build a structure, the alarms go off and eyes open.

For me, it was a scout from our troop. Reviewers met monthly to review submitted proposals. He got bounced five times. Five months to get the proposal approved. They lost the project book one time. Fifth time it was bounced because they wanted a map to the nearest hospital added. Project was organizing an usher closet and adding shelving. Of everything I value the most in Eagle projects, it's the hand-drawings and items that help convince me that the scout was in charge of his own project. If you require CAD, you get adults doing the project.

I'm not sure what it makes us look like, but the intention is not to limit the scout or make his job harder. The intention was to put more constraints on the adults that approve the projects. The workbook was created to enable the scout to focus on doing his project and less so on the paperwork. For example, ... if we didn't have the workbook ... I could easily see a return to the past where adults only approved project proposals with multi-page descriptions and detailed plans and detailed cost and .... The constraint / inferences was never meant to be a constraint on the scout.

So ... not to be the slow guy but ... I'm assuming you're joking. ... I'm asking because it would be really cool to regularly camp with horses.

Reasonable answer with caveats. #1 Uses the same outline. The delivered result should be easily recognizable as what is expected. #2 It looks like a quality product that reflects the quality in the scout and the quality in the project. One benefit of the form is that it constrains the adults involved in coaching the scout or approving the proposal. Another benefit is it promotes the scout seeing his writing as a quality product. I fear plain ASCII document would cause scouts to deliver a shoddy product that would not promote pride in the scout or confidence in the EBOR.

I'm a fan of the 2011+ era Eagle Service Project Workbook, but lately I'm seeing a lot of issues. Confused about saving the PDF to the hard drive before they can see the form. Many scouts have chromebooks that can't run Adobe Acrobat Reader and thus can't edit the PDFs. Many scouts find web sites that cache PDF files and end up using those old instead PDFs instead of the current workbook. Some scout families don't want to run Adobe Acrobat reader due to security concerns. I'm not sure those are currently valid concerns. There may have been security concerns with older versions. There is no Word document version. there is no Google Docs version. There is no other format. It seems that BSA should Have a Microsoft Word version Have a Google doc / form version Remove PDF restrictions blocking non-Adobe PDF editors Create a web site that enables form-based authoring. Another solution? Are other leaders seeing scouts having trouble using the current PDF version?

Very true. Focus on the intention of the rule. IMHO, rounding issues are noise. ... Also ... ever use a one person tent? Nothing bad happens in a one person tent. A two person tent or three person tent, yes. One person. No ... because two people don't fit in a one person tent.