Stosh

One would think that just because an adult shops, preps, eats and cleans up on their own, it means they spend more money, eat better food, or have some advantage over the boy''s. Not true. It also sets an example of experimentation and creative cooking for the boys to try something new. First of all, there are times when I eat better than the boys but I am always aware of actually paying the same amount or less than they do. The "example" I set moves the boys off the same-old same-old menus and experiment in something new and different. Steak? Yep, but that means oatmeal for breakfast. It''s just an issue of allocation of resources, not abusing an opportunity to teach. As a matter of fact, I always find out what the boys are expected to pay and never go over that amount for my purchases. It always costs more for an individual to purchase than buying in bulk for a whole patrol. However, it can be done. It also reduces the cost of the same meal for the patrols because of this dynamic. If the SM can cook a certain meal in his mess kit, the boys know for sure they can do it for the patrol in a dutch oven. This is not something that is done all the time, but on occasion I have done this. Another side to this issue, this dynamic also allows for the boys with eating restrictions not to interfere in the patrol cooking. No patrol will want to go vegetarian or sugar free for the weekend. Occasionally the boys invite the SM to eat with them and occasionally the SM cooks up something nice for the boys. Somehow it all seems to come out even in the long run. Stosh

I''d never sign it. First of all, some of the requirements of the leader are not in his/her arena to accomplish. If the boys don''t want a minimum number of campouts and it''s a boy-led program, the leader is not going to make his quota. Then there''s the fact that if the boys really like a leader and they have to leave after so many years, that could be a problem. Once you lock the process into a contract, it opens up a really big can of worms. Stosh

After 3 pages of responses, may I ask a question? Are we talking a lightbulb in a light socket, or in a flashlight? Some of the bulbs are pushed in, held in with pressure and others are screwed in. Am I taking this forum thread to seriously? Stosh

I find that rather strange that the older boys don''t want to play with the little kids. This last court of honor we awarded 3 Den Chief Service awards to 3 boys all having the rank of Life. Of course just because they got the award doesn''t mean they ceased their DC activities, they are planning on at least finishing out the year, that would mean June of next year. By then some of these DC''s may in fact be Eagles. How many packs/dens can brag that they have an Eagle Scout for a Den Chief. Stosh

Ok, I''ll play Devil''s Advocate here.... Why do the adults have to cook as a patrol? The patrol method is for the boys, the adults can do as they wish. With my mess-kit and $10 I can have my own gourmet meals. $5 bag of briquets will last me the whole year. I have done this for 9 years with my venturing crew and no meals are planned except for what the boys bring on their own. Being a venturing crew they do not follow the patrol method. In my troop, as far as my menu goes, I often try out new receipes and if the boys are observant, often times come and ask me what I''m making so they have new ideas for their own patrol mess. Why is it that the only time many boys ever cook for themselves is for advancement. One often wonders why that requirement is in the book if they never again cook for themselves in their mess kit. It''s either 1) the requirement is totally useless, or 2) learning to cook for themselves builds independence. By the way, my very first Boy Scout activity was when I visited the troop in town as a Cub Scout. They were going on a 10 mile hike. I had a potato, a steak, and a can of corn. I made my own fire, cooked my own meal and got my 10 miles in along with having a fun time. No one taught me or showed me anything. Sometimes learning to be independent even before joining Boy Scouts goes a long way towards taking care of oneself. At age 57, I''m still cooking out of my mess-kit, but now it''s blueberry muffins, sweet and sour pork over rice, and when I''m in a hurry, fajitas or sloppy joes are quite tasty in pita bread. The old mess-kits on e-bay also have the old metal cup that still works great for camp coffee. Stosh

One must also remember that body language, intonality, and other vital parts to conversation are absent in the forum interchange. Immediate feedback is also absent and "further clarification" is absent in many instances. When addressing a person face to face, these parts of a conversation are just as important and often times more important than what is actually being said. For the most part we are blind to the depth of conversation that face to face offers. Stosh

I find that if a boy is trained in servant/lead by example leadership they have no need to lead by intimidation/direct command. While it may work once or twice, as soon as a boy gains the reputation of bossing or bullying, they have to start over earning the follower''s trust. They may be able to pull off direct commands at 16/17, but why when they are not necessary.

Most leadership styles today aren''t what works in an individualistic society such as ours. People will not follow someone who isn''t looking out for their welfare. The PL handbook references this with phenomina as "servant leadership" and it does work. Leaders that boss others around to get a task done rarely evoke a happy follower. But a leader who is perceived as working for the welfare of their followers will always get whatever help they need. Lead by example always is better than lead by demand. Adult leaders automatically invoke sufficient fear that whatever they ask gets done. A youth leader can never pull it off, so don''t expect the other boys to follow along as if their word were the same as an adult''s. They aren''t. I need some help with the dining fly, Eagle patrol, can you came and help me get this up? (lead by example). Bear patrol, you don''t seem to have your meal started, is there something wrong? Do you need some help? (servant leadership) Owl patrol, the new boys are having trouble getting their tents up, would you be so kind as to help them? (teaching "lead by example" and "servant leadership" to others) Direct commands don''t work for 13-year olds, don''t expect them to master that until they are, say 21-25 years old. :^) Leadership skills are teachable and easy to use. A young SPL has a great opportunity to get in on the ground floor if taught correctly.

I teach my boys that the patrol ID, flag and yell are just as important of a Tfoot requirement as the Buddy System. When the troop is to gather for any reason, the APL''s grab up their flag, move to a clear spot and begin their yell and wave their flag. Each flag and yell identifies to the patrol members where they are to gather to form up the patrol to fall in with the troop/set up camp/gather for an activity/whatever else patrols do. It has a functional purpose if used correctly can facilitate a lot of wandering around looking for patrol members when something has to be organized. Once the boys realize it''s importance and purpose and quit looking at it as a joke, they use it just like a troop bugler uses his bugle calls for the troop. If a troop as 5-8 patrols and need to form up for the opening flag ceremony, I would think a system of patrol yells/flags would facilitate that process quite a bit. Stosh

When I took on the Webelos boys they were notified that during the course of the next year, each requirement would be "taught"/gone over twice. This was to insure that everyone had a second opportunity if they missed the first time. I held den meetings every week and most of the boys attained AOL in 6 months, the others filtered in over the next 6 months of review. All were done by the end of the year. The problem I had with this was I did this during Webelos I. Then Webelos II became nothing but parent/boy campouts, road trips, day camps, hikes, bike hikes, etc. Nuttin' but FUN. The boys loved it and once the pressure was off to "accomplish" something we often times went back and redid a third time, some of the requirements just for fun, ie. readyman, outdoorsman, etc. We added the Tenderfoot requirements during that second year so that when the boys got to Boy Scouts, they went through Scout and Tenderfoot in the first 30 days. The only pin that was done "on their own" was Family Life. Were the boys bored having "done it all" as Webelos? Probably not, 4 of the 8 boys went on and earned Eagle. I figured I did OK if I did better than the national average. One of the things that I noticed with the process I used, that even though they earned AOL, they still wanted to stay with the den and finish out the second year of fun, kind of a precurser to getting their Eagle and staying with the troop until they turned 18. AOL to these boys didn't mean graduation or the end of their cubbing experience. One doesn't see many Cubs running around for a whole year with an AOL patch on their shirt. Stosh

As one who has had a lot of boys coming through the troop with ADD, ADHD, and Asperger's Syndrome, education is the key. The more you know about the disability the better one is able to handle it. Unless there is an issue of safety, the situation can be salvaged. If you are a SM that has only well behaved and obedient scouts, good for you, but you are a vast minority of SM's. For the most part we are all working with a variance of problems that deal with defying authority to medication resistant syndroms. A SM can be a positive mentor to these boys and can work with them just like he can work with "regular" boys. Some SM's can't even work with regular boys. Those that choose to accept the challenges of boys with problems, my heart goes out to you. It is difficult. LisaBob - if you have special ed professionals on your committee, have them work with the adults of the troop to give them the resources necessary to help this boy. Up until there are actual threats of physical violence, these boys can be guided and helped develop through scouting. Once they become a danger then others with more skill and education than the troop have to take over. A Scout is friendly. Stosh

Those in the hobby will have some idea. They hear rumors about them all the time. They crop up, run a while and then collapse on a regular basis. The crew I'm with has lasted 9 years and is probably the longest running one around. I think there may have been one in the Kansas City area, another in the Chicago area. I have heard of one in the Florida area and one "out east". There was one in northern IL attempting to get going, but never heard whether they got it off the ground or not. Each era is unique with little crossover, so you would need to know your era before researching for units. A buckskinner group wouldn't know if a Civil War unit was over in the next town. What area are you in and what era are you interested in? Stosh

I have always been an avid outdoors person since I was 4 years old. I have camped all over North America and traveled by car, train, bike and canoe to get to the camp. I spent 4 years as a youth as a Cub Scout and never received the Lion or Webelos badges. I aged into Boy Scouts and spent another 4 years there having earned 1 merit badge (stamp collecting) and attained the rank of 2nd Class. The lesson I learned was when I became a scout leader I would never do to a boy what had happened to me. Thankfully my father kept the excitement of the outdoors alive in me through these growing years. After 20 years of scout leadership as an adult I often wonder if there are boys out there that think of me as I remember my scout leaders. I surely hope not. Stosh

We use a Yahoo Group for our web communications. You don't need a web master, no need for any special education/software, it's free and maintenance is a no-brainer. Anyone in the group can process information and it comes with a lot of nice features, i.e. calendar with reminder announcments, etc., polls for finding out who's going on a trip or not, files section that we use for advancement/troop info reports, pictures section and e-mail messaging/postings for all member in the group. I run a group for my present troop, my former troop, my crew and my sponsoring organization and spend about 5 minutes a month on maintenance. When I upload a advancement reports, it takes maybe 30 minutes for 30 boys. Stosh

We have been looking into this for some time now but are having problems with the historical accuracy of the uniform. Was it a WW I military uniform or a scout manufactured uniform? How long did scouting exist before an official uniform was adopted? Was the scout uniform the wool tunic over the cotton shirt or was it the cotton summer tunic? As a CW reenactor, the research is as important as the uniform. When they are made they are reproduced with the utmost care to make sure it could look exactly like the original. So far from pictures, etc. it seems to be very similar to the WW I style tunic/pants but with a very different legging than the military. If anyone comes up with information on patterns, fabrics, buttons, etc, I would definitely be interested. Stosh

MB patch immediately, card with public recognition at COH. Rank at COH.

I am 58 years old. I have been camping regularly since the age of 4 years. I have never had a poison ivy reaction until just recently when I walked through a field where someone had just mowed poison ivy. Try that on for ID purposes! Can you recognize poison ivy after it has been mowed? Next really scrub out your clothing by hand, then wash, and then when you put it back on thinking it was safe, you react again to your socks! There is no such thing as too much instruction when it comes to this requirement. My kudos to the SM who takes the boys out and makes them find the stuff. By the way, have you ever seen poison ivy grow 30' into the air? This stuff is wicked and will mess you up for 2 weeks if not hospitalization. Then there's the boys that burn poison ivy and others breathe the smoke. Like the swimming test, this requirement should be taught and re-taught every year. Stosh

We have been operational for 9 years. Because we are a specialty crew (Civil War Reenacting) our numbers are small, our structure is not BSA, but we adhere strictly to the guidelines of the hobby. They run the crew as an adult organization in the hobby. We draw people at the present time from 3 councils and 2 states. One of the reasons for our success is our level of reenacting. We function at a level which is beyond the average CW reenacting group. This year we decided to specialize in CW color guard and skirmish by the bugle along with our regular drill in 2 manual of arms and bayonet drill for fun. With adults we can put on the field a normal sized CW company of fully functional soldiers with NCO officer command structure. Stosh

for the past 10 years I have been an advisor for a US History venture crew. Currently we reenact Civil War, but do have boys that reenact WW I and WW II as well. Stosh

There are plenty of sites out there who have experience with handing the logistics of large camp crowds. EAA in Oshkosh have been doing this for years. The equipment and know-how is in the area. Surely this is but one site with similar capabilities out there. Sturgis has been handing the cycle crowd, and there are many others as well. Pick a site, research local resources and go for it. Stosh

morale is at an all-time low in many of the troops/crews I have come in contact with. We spend so much time on activities we spend very little time on group dynamics and satisfaction levels. Does the program create excited and interested boys or do excited and interested boys generate program? Stosh

As a SM/ASM, I have always worn the full uniform for all occasions. I have a few scout t-shirts but only wear them at home. I do take off the uniform to take the annual swim test, but I have gone swimming in my full uniform on canoe trips when I've been knocked out of the canoe or needed to jump in to rescue scouts. I own four shirts, two pants, two shorts. One set is worn and a few descrete mendings the other is reserved for formal occasions. I normally wear my WB scarf/beads instead of the troop neckerchief, always over the collar. Web belt for less formal/camping and the leather belt for formal occasions. I wear the expedition hat for less formal/camping and campaign hat otherwise. The only time I wore a scout t-shirt is at Philmont when the crew requested we all look the same. As a venturing advisor I wear full venturing uniform for formal occasions and complete Civil War uniform (either side) for activities. As an officer, it includes side-arm and sword, as NCO or private, it includes rifle-musket and bayonet. The uniform is heavy wool and with enough water it's not too bad. I put the uniform on at home and take it off when I get back. The only unauthorized part of my uniform is my WB patrol patch I wear on my right sleeve and an historic collar pin for SM or ASM. That usually gets covered over with the neckerchief. Occasionally I wear an historic 20 year lapel pin on the flap of my left pocket. Stosh

I remember getting neckerchieves for different occasions as a youth many years ago. I'm sure a patch is easier to deal with. We did a high adventure a number of years back and because it was two troops doing it together we had a patch, neckerchief, cap and pocket t-shirt all silk screened with the same logo for the occasion. I still have mine. You are correct on the oath. Many people don't even realize what an oath is anymore. It's refreshing to know there are those out there that still keep the tradition alive.

The really sad part of this whole discussion is the fact that Atheism is in fact a religion, i.e. belief system of faith, belief that there is no-god. This religion masquerades as a non-religion. The only non-religion is Agnosticism where the person doesn't know if there is a god or not, i.e. he can't "believe" anything about a god. Once people wake up to this fact, maybe we can work to keep Atheism out of our schools as well.

A non-profit organization is one that adheres to the state laws that determine such organizations. If the organization is authorized to do business in a state, they make application as a particular kind of entity, i.e. C-corporation, S-Corporation, Partnership, Limited Liability Partnership, etc. which are all for-profit structures. Otherwise one can form a non-profit organization i.e. charity, religious organiztion, not-for-profit corporation (hospital, nursing home, schools, etc.) If one is unsure as to the organizational stucture of any entity, simply go on the Secretary of State web page for any state, go to the searchable database, put in the name of the entity and it will tell you whether or not the organization is authorized to do business in the state, whether it is current with it's obligations, and what type of organization it is. Be careful because certain assumptions cannot be made. A hospital, for example, can be a non-profit or a for-profit, same for a private school or nursing facility. Check their state charter, that is the only definitive answer. Also, not all organizations are chartered. A group of concerned citizens, club or organization may not hold any state charter whatsoever. A club does not need to register with the state as a non-profit organization if it does not wish to "do business in the state." Those organizations do not qualify for tax-exempt purposes. In other words if you make a contribution to the group, you cannot take a tax-deduction on your income taxes. Most non-profit organizations do hold a sales/use tax exemption certificate which they will gladly show you giving proof of their non-profit status. Most scout troops fall into this category. As a general rule of thumb. If it's not a BSA organization or affiliated with the BSA and holds one of these tax exemptions, they are probably a non-profit organization and would work well as an Eagle project sponsor. Public schools, municipalities and other governmental entities are the only organizations that would qualify for an Eagle project that wouldn't be a non-profit organization. There are other entities that may qualify for Eagle projects that I haven't listed that would maybe qualify such as work on an Indian Reservation, etc. These special situations would vary greatly, i.e. doing work for an on-reservation Indian casino would not look as impressive on the Eagle project review as maybe doing some improvements on a reservation school building/playground, etc.