FScouter

"As I mentioned earlier we are slowly settling for 75% Meetings and 50% campouts for attendance ..." Adanecito, just a couple of thoughts. How long is the time period you would include in the attendance calculation? Just this year, since the kid's last rank advancement? Since he joined up? Does Cub Scout attendance count? Will the mechanics of this be spelled out in the bylaw? What action will you take if a kid drops below the minimum? If you make attendance a formal written "bylaw", what will be the punishment for violations? If a kids attendance percentage is currently well above the minimum, do you think he may decide to blow off a few activities because he would still be over the minimum? Has anyone analyzed why the kids dont attend meetings and activities? Is an attendance bylaw the best way to fix a poor attendance problem? Will an attendance bylaw inspire kids to be more active in their patrol and troop? Will an attendance bylaw improve Scouting for kids?

"Yah, OGE, then yeh have to understand what it means . That is to say, how it is properly interpreted." Well, it sure is comforting to know that we can safely ingore what it SAYS. Just hop on an internet discussion forum and there will be someone there to tell us what it really MEANS. Better yet, why not just tell people to ignore anything they disagree with and do their own thing? Isn't that pretty much the Beavah philosophy?

Who said anything about dying on a hill? You can dismiss the Insignia Guide if you want. It wasn't written anyway for those that ingore "guidebooks" and do their own "thing", "knowing" that the rulemakers would do the same. The courteous thing to do here would be to quietly clue in the poohbah at the CO that a custom patch on the uniform just makes them look silly.

I would wonder what the troop scribe and troop quartermaster would think about 2 or 3 other kids running around wearing his patch.

Gee, responders to the original post have nothing more to go on than what was posted. We dont know the background, the personalities of the individuals involved, the kids, the parents, the history, the extenuating circumstances, or the other side of the story. If responding posters withheld comment until they get the whole story, these forums would be nothing more than a collection of original posts. Its not fair to characterize responses as attacking an individual. If the original poster relates a story about bad, belligerent, bullying behavior, responses are directed to the behavior, not the nameless faceless, individual. Its not even important how true or embellished the story may be; responses are to the story presented, not whatever the unknown truth may be. No apologies are warranted.

My grandmother always said the best way to clean an aluminum pot was to cook up a batch of tomatoes in it.

"Does the BSA not care? As long as you have a troop they are happy to let the troops do whatever they want as long as they do not hear any complaints." Of course they care. In addition to what they already do to keep volunteers on the path, what would you have BSA do? Perhaps they should take leader selection in-house and do annual performance reviews?

It's an uphill battle. All the more reason to keep working at fulfilling our mission.

"Am I to understand that you are advocating that this Scout should just accept that all the work on the merit badges he earned at summer camp was for naught... " Hey, whatever it takes to show "respect" for the leaders that took a lot of time out of their personal lives to run a sorta Scout program without a whole lot of regard to supporting the Scouting program they promised to uphold. Just because a guy volunteered doesn't mean he should be supported. Support Scouting, not the individual wearing a Scout shirt and holding his custom policy book.

"They deserve our support." Sure, as long as they are open-minded enough to continuous learning and are willing to adapt their processes to follow the Scouting program. Otherwise, off with their heads. Scouting doesn't need adults that dismiss Scouting in favor of their own program.

It's very difficult to change a camping club into a Boy Scout troop. You could try asking a few questions at the troop committee meeting like "what's the plan for the annual planning conference, or "does the SPL have a copy of the SPL handbook", or "how many boys shall we send to NLYT".

I haven't heard of any whining from BSA about this.

The city has not been ignoring a law. They wrote an ordinance in 1928 which set up the arrangment whereby Scouts would use the building in perpetuity in exchange for maintenance. The deal has worked fine for 79 years. Now the city has written a new ordinance essentially undoing the existing ordinance with the intention of ousting the Scouts.

It is worth pointing out here that there is no "right" to free speech on these forums.

Everybody's got an opinion, and it's interesting to compare opinions. When it comes to action, MTM had the right advice: follow the specific instructions of your council.

Since it mentions "pack", maybe it should go in the Cub Scout forum. The program forum seems to be a catch-all. Advancement, Training, Summer Camp, Fundraising, Camping; they're all "program", so maybe those forums should be eliminated and everything moved to Program. Then on the other hand maybe Program should should be eliminated and those posts moved into the other forums.

The guideline needs to focus on the significance of the project rather than the quantity of resources used to get it done. Of course it would take a little more thought effort on the part of those approving the project and more effort from the board to evaluate what was accomplished. Any fool can approve or deny a project based on the number of hours. A kid could spend 150 hours on a project to paint the city curbs red, but that doesn't make it an Eagle project.

It's too, too, easy to spout "we need to keep up the 'Standards', and the way to do it is to block advancement to Eagle." If the problem is that "not enough" hours are being expended on an Eagle project, focus on the project approval at the Scoutmaster level, not at the Eagle BOR level. If the Eagle candidate doesn't yet understand the importance of wearing the uniform at his Eagle BOR, the fix might better be focused at his Scout or Tenderfoot Scoutmaster conference, not as a block at his Eagle BOR. What this really says to the boy is that, his leadership failed him, but we're taking it out on you. Put the blame for failing the standards, if there is any, where it belongs.

Hey, if you could negotiate a $1 lease, who would say "no"? So, if now if the lease term is up and the landlord wants to bow to PC pressure instead of supporting an organization that provides a proven benefit to society, well tough luck for Scouting and society. Calico presented a good picture of the realities of market leases. The solution here is to sign a new lease at market rates and up the annual reg fee by a buck or two to pay for it. This ain't the end of Scouting in Philly.

Rumor I heard was that it`s Al Gore`s doing. But I could be wrong. Or maybe it was Snidely Whiplash`s latest plot. Who`s to know?

''''It''''s interesting that Bush seems to actually practice conservation, while Gore seems to want to buy his way out of his obligations.'''' I wonder which of the two of them has had a bigger impact on conservation worldwide, net of their personal house, car, and personal habits.

"... he has been removed documenting when & why & keep a copy in the unit records. When sent via snail mail, a return receipt should be used." Why document it? Why keep a written record? Why get a mail delivery receipt? Why???

"Each and every one of our Scouters, including myself, are volunteers. I can beg, plead, bribe, and can do all but force them to go to trainings. But the bottom line is I walked myself into training without coercion. " Yes, we should not have to mandate training, and it would be ideal if every volunteer could see the value in finding out how to be successful in the job they volunteered to do. Most adult leader prospects understand a little bit about the job they are being considered for. They expect to they will be required to pay the $10 fee, fill out an application, be subjected to a background check, buy a uniform, buy (and read) the handbook. So why don''t they understand that attending a training course is part of the deal? Probably because they were told about the application, $10 etc., but nothing was said about training, or worse, were told "you don''t have to worry about that". It would really help things if the COR or committee would make it understood that training can do nothing but help the new adult leader, and register the new adult for training at the same time the application is turned in. And if the new adult refuses training, maybe the wrong adult was selected for the job.

"I think I would revisit the scout spirit thing by having them do some service to the troop. Plan and carry out a specialty campout or high adventure activity, mabey. Do the COH. Inventory the adult supplies. That kind of thing." Those all sound like good things for Scouts to participate in. I don''t know that they should be prerequisites for re-joining the troop, or for earning a rank after an absence. But if they are assigned projects they could be presented in a positive light such that the boy not perceive them as some kind of punishment for taking time off. I suppose there could be some elements of Scout spirit there. But Scout spirit is a really different fish altogether. Of course I could be wrong. I''ll have to look that up in the index of the Boy Scout Handbook.

Gee, maybe it was those untrained adults failing to deliver the pronise and driving away boys that was keeping a damper on membership growth. You think?