Stosh

Back in the day...... Pre-school was not offered, we just played outside with our friends. Kindergarten was not offered, we just played outside with our friends. I was in school for 20 years and got a Master's degree. The added years before grade school are just for those parents who want free daycare while they both work. The lack of those first to years did not hold any of us back from doing well in life. What I did learn those early years was, it was a lot more fun playing outside with our friends than it was sitting in school.

What the average person spends on Jamboree, a boy could spend a month in the Boundary Waters. A Scout is Thrifty.

Unless they know the reason for the yell, what's the point? In all my years of Scouting no one has been able to have a patrol yell for any other reason than for meeting a useless requirement.

I often wonder how much learning really goes on with fundraising. The boys never really know the money that's passed around in the project. The only money they see is what they have to turn in at the end of the door-to-door sales. Even then the boys aren't trusted enough to get it straight. Parents are motivated to fund-raise because then they don't have to pay for their own kid's scout activities.. After going out selling, the money comes back, the adults skim off the top on the profits, hand out a few beads and trinkets to the younger boy because they are into the instant gratification kind of thingy, But for the older boys for the older boys the ISA's can be used to "build up an account" of moneys the adults tell them they earned, sans the 1099. I really don't think many of these "lessons" I really want to teach. Now if they are going to have fun serving up a pancake supper the parents plan out (they do it anyway, the boys can't prep food by state law) I can see them having a lot of fun with that. Of course they could also go down to the Salvation Army and serve, too, but they won't get a cash hit on their ISA's, they'd have to have that fun without getting a personal kickback. Anyway it's hard to justify a service project credit when the boys get paid for their work. If the boys want to learn the process, they can plan what they want to do, do it and then keep everything for their patrol. Of course they will have to budget it all out and make plans, and do all sorts of things the adults do, but if they are doing it only for their patrol, it can be done on a lot smaller scale where the lessons can be learned and they actually learn the lessons as boy led. Every patrol has to develop a budge and make plans. A lot of times that kinda gets in the way of the boys having fun, so it doesn't get done. Even a small fund-raiser for a patrol would require some effort on the part of the boys. If they did do it, the motivation would have to come from themselves and they would have to take responsibility in the process.

I would be a bit hesitant to count conservation training as a service project only because that time is devoted to oneself, not others. One could stretch it a bit further by saying training of others is service, but if one is looking for actual service with no questions asked, maybe the trained boy could take his class out for field work and do that as a service project. He as instructor would "take the lead" on that and score up some leadership skills in the process. I guess I see service done "in the field" so to speak, not the classroom, either as student or teacher Just my take on it, I'm sure others have theirs as well.

It's a small troop in eastern Ohio who currently holds the top spot for selling cookies. The troop in second place has about 10% of that troops gross sales.

There's bugs in the world, one doesn't want to be out there with Lymes, encephalitis, Rocky Mountain fever, Yellow Fever, malaria, West Nile, etc. etc. and add to that all the poisonous plants and venemous snakes and spiders, and, and and, and then there's the bears. No wonder it's hard to get the boys out of the basement.

First of all welcome to the forum, glad you're with us. http://frontiergirlsclubs.com/faqs/ This is a link directly to the Frontier Girl's website with Frequently asked Questions and Answers. #5 indicates there is no liability insurance provided and leaders are encouraged to rely on their homeowner's insurance or find chartering organizations that have insurance policies in place. I would check that out carefully. There is no provision for youth accident insurance and again if they are hurt during an event, and the girl has no insurance, that's unfortunate. The organization itself doesn't back up it's leadership, problems are to be dealt with as an individual leader or if the chartering organization has insurance, what they back up is up to their policy. #14 indicates no background checks or YPT provided. This whole process is pushed to the troop owners and if it happens to be a handful of parents, it's up to them to make the checks and provide the training. If the troop owners don't do it, then any problems in this area are the responsibility of the individual and their insurance. This organization basically sells a program curriculum that people who pay for it and membership have access to.

Does that mean we're going to get 12 year old Eagles and major burn out on the Scout level?

A little humor goes a long way to address some very serious issues. While not many GS's out there are going to be going around selling cookies with a 50 caliber sniper rifle, there are many precautions that need to be constantly reemphasized when participating even in what is considered a "safe" situation, like outside a public store in broad daylight. In this day and age it is different than in years past. The big issue for women was park your car in a well lit area. Now it's don't sell cookies in front of a public store in broad daylight. In between, one might want to be that much more vigilant and go as more than mom and daughter when selling door-to-door. One can't be too cautious today. We try to instill some common sense rules into how we address things like this, but even now common sense is no longer all that common.

I go every month because Commissioners' meeting precedes it. I do have to admit ours is run fairly well.

Is Luddite a derogatory term or is it okay to use?

Wanna buy some cookies?

BP said that Scouting was a game with a purpose. Now we can debate all day 'til the cows come home as to what that purpose might be. I like the doing things for themselves (being independent) and for those around them (leadership). So how does it happen? I'll go back to the MB's just as a way of focusing. MB's of interest are entertaining and fun to explore as maybe a career in the "real world" or entertainment purposes. However, i don't see it just as a game, but a game with a purpose. Imagine if you will a natural disaster is eminent. What MB's apply - Emergency Prep? Probably. Is taking that MB an adventure in and of itself? Probably not. So the disaster hits, hurricane for example. The "real world" the current BSA has prepared you for to be able to take care of yourself and others is gone. But now we have Search and Rescue, First Aid, Cooking, Camping, and even Wilderness Survival on one's plate. Schools are designed to prepare kids for the world that is. Scouting used to be preparing kids for the world that might suddenly appear out of nowhere and being able to handle it for themselves and others. Look at the requirements for First Class, first aid, cooking, building shelters, camping, surviving in a world the modern person is not necessarily prepared to deal with. Is a scout prepared to take care of other people at all times if the world or situation they find themselves is something they have never experienced before? How are the Citizenship MB's going to come into play? How about Chess or Textiles? or Fly Fishing or Golf? Maybe it's a good thing to Be Prepared the next time the President of the United States invites you into his four-some. The FC requirements are the core basics of the purpose of Scouting. Unfortunately they have been tweeked to the modern era of today's world. Heaven help the Scout that finds himself in a strange new world overnight. And by the way, it doesn't mean a disaster is necessary, maybe taking care of oneself and helping other people at all times will place them in a foreign land working for the Peace Corps. Are we doing even a modicum of effort helping our boys to Be Prepared. @@DuctTape is right by saying the outdoors is closer to the world of what might be, it exposes the boys to a "strange" environment they normally don't experience, and it is a ton of fun. But the game has a purpose. Can one survive in that world?

Lack of gun control? The perp had control of the gun, the girls only had laws to protect them. Which was more effective? Now I'm not advocating the Girl Scout start packing, but right in front of a public store? What do these girls do in the neighborhoods when they go door-to-door? Are they going to need a police escort? Or at least one armed and trained parent? As my thread title indicates - Has it really come to this?

@@EmberMike To answer your question, @Stosh, I think the BSA was right to try adapting to the world. I think they're still trying to adapt, it just gets diluted going from National's lofty ideas, and travels down to the local units where we often have very limited resources and capabilities to implement the vision of scouting that National seems to have. Here's where my hitch seems to creep in. What happens when the "world of today" goes away? Hurricane, tornado, house fire or any one of a number of natural and man-made disasters (riots, crime, etc.) arise. Are our boys Prepared for that? There's a lot we know about "out there" but there's a big Unknown, too. Are we prepared? A while back we had the pseudo scare of the world as we know it being disrupted, Y2K - Everyone was in a panic, what will we do when airplanes fall out of the sky and we have no electricity or food? Have we prepared any of our Eagle Scouts to handle that? Just a few months ago I was faced with a week of no electricity, natural devastation that limited our movement to mere miles, MRE's for food (survival food), no access to medical care and I was responsible for the welfare of 150 people. Every Scout trick in the book came into play. It was called Hurricane Matthew and I was a shelter manager for the Red Cross. Nothing to do with Scouts, but my scouting background was there for me to use, which I did many, many times. Feeding, sheltering, medical, all part of the T-FC training along with further training later in life. Was what I experiencing an "adventure"? Was it outside my comfort zone? Were people looking to me for leadership, security, survival? Was I prepared? Seriously that was a big "unknown" for me living in the Midwest to find out about what a hurricane can do. Fortunately for 150 people, I was prepared.

We as a nation have a serious problem if it has come to this. http://www.foxnews.com/food-drink/2017/02/17/cops-pool-cash-to-buy-cookies-from-girl-scout-robbed-at-gunpoint.html

Okay @@Back Pack I'll bite. Outdoors to my mom was any place outside the house. It might be playing on the swings at the park or going hunting in the woods. What we determine as "outdoors" might be sitting on the front porch watching the traffic go by. Some people really enjoy that, they get fresh air until the bugs get so bad they retreat to the safety of screened windows and doors. Is the focus outdoors or is there more to it than just that? Oh, by the way, Raising Rabbits for the old MB was not considered an outdoor activity the same way we do today.

@@TAHAWK mentioned an issue that might be beneficial to pursue further, the notion that the focus of BSA has changed from a rural program to an urban program to keep in step with the changing world. Has this been a constructive thing to be doing and is it possibly the reason for it's decline in membership. Yes, the original MB's were focused on Rabbit Raising, Farming, and such and are now Computers and Rocketry. BP when he started Scouting, the world was about 90% rural, yet the focus and membership grew out of the urban areas. Boys wanted the adventure of the outdoors, not just down the block. During what I call the Golden Age of Scouting, the world had changed tremendously and urban expansion and suburbia was all around. The small towns were not as small as they once were. But everyone was still in Scouting! So the voices grew, we need to update Scouting to be more urban, more relevant to the youth of today. So BSA adapted their strategies to those voices and membership declined. They made it even more urban and technologically savvy and the membership declined. Now they are grasping at straws. One has to be constantly reminded that BP might have used military terminology when he set up Scouting, but he never called it a Boys Army, he called it Boy's Scouting. The part of the military that is not operational with the rest of the army, but is an independent small group of soldiers that leave the safety of the army and go out and reconnoiter the unknown. That's it's forte. That's possibly why BP used the term Scouts. ...and that's the real adventure missing today. Has modern BSA made a mistake in trying to adapt to the world? Should it have stayed the course? After all, being prepared is the knowledge and skill necessary to deal with the unknown. Are our boys not moving from the infancy of the a known world into the unknown of the adult world? What say ye? Yay or Nay.

@@TAHAWK you're analogy of urban/rural is spot on. As our society moved from an agriculturally based rural society to a urbanized, mechanized/information based society, the world around us changed. That's a fact, the numbers are accurate. Yet I am reminded that while I was born right in the middle of this transition, (coming out of the machine age of WW II), BSA was still enjoying it's Golden Age. Various clubs, schools and churches had exchange programs were urban kids would spend time in the rural areas and vice versa. "OMG that's what a tree looks like? I have only read about them in books." or "OMG, that building is 10 times taller than the silo back at the farm." The best one I experienced in life was the boy I took on an church convention to a big city. He was from the rural area of North Dakota. When we got on the elevator to go up to our rooms, he just stood there. I had my hands full and told him to just push the button. "Gee, there were numbers from 1 to 15, which one?" We're going to the 12th floor, push button marked 12. He smiled and said the elevators back home only have an "On" and an "Off" button. So the BSA changes it's focus to "reach the urban kids" which they already were doing because that's were their membership was, small town urban and suburbia. The kids wanted the adventure of getting away from that and out into the rural areas where there were woods, and swamps, and mountains, and..... After all the rural areas is where BSA's Lone Scout program operated, which is virtually non-existent today. In all of it's logical meddling they created a urban program for urban kids and the numbers started to fall. The OMG factor was gone as was the adventure, the movement out into the unknown, the beauty of the natural world was seen only in books. Have even the books gone away, too? and the only real adventure is virtual reality? If so, BSA will never regain it's past luster. Virtual reality may be great entertainment, but so is reading a book, the real adventure comes in being there and seeing for oneself and having their OMG moment.

Om another thread here on the forum, It was pointed out to me some concern about my use of the word stupid. The definition of that word refers to the type of person who operates out of a lack of intelligence, (meaning knowledge or information) and/or common sense. In this case a less mature person can be or cause a problem because they lack sufficient information or knowledge about something yet have no problem with common sense. On the other hand a person might have a tremendous amount of knowledge but with an immature level of common sense and still make poor choices.. Either case have the tendency to produce stupid results and thus a problem. Therefore you are correct in that naivete and/or lack of understanding is not a situation one wishes to put young people into without proper knowledge (which many already have) but without a sufficient level of common sense to be able to make choices about it in a more mature manner. When it comes to the cyber world, one needs both to protect themselves and those around them. It's a new frontier which has appeared only in recent years and our young people have yet to develop an appropriate level of common sense to go along with the ever growing knowledge that has presented itself. When I work with the cyber world, or the world of strangers, or dealing with situations in the "real world" in which others live, developing mature character in our young men it requires me to be attentive to both the knowledge and the common sense to use that information wisely. People are trusting me to provide them with the proper knowledge so they can further develop or at least guide them through the years of early maturity to be able to make good choices. When I tell a 5 year old the stove is hot, they may understand that, but like any other inquisitive child, learning to deal with the world around them, may not have built sufficient trust in the person telling them a stove is hot and will then further explore for themselves and test out that by touching the stove anyway. It's all a natural part of a person's development. Now if the child tests the stove when it's not on they conclude the person was not trustworthy and will correctly conclude the stove is not hot. However if the stove is hot they get a boost of common sense. and will conclude that even when cold they may not wish to choose to touch it. Either way they have not acquired the knowledge as to when the stove is off or on and further instruction in information is still needed. It's a process, not a snapshot in time.

The problem is you don't see the humor in it.

The lashings shall cease when the morale improves.

I think i t would depend on the individual @@EmberMike. Over the years I have "mentored" a number of boys with their Scouting experience. On two occasions I was honored by receiving a boy's pin. I totally did not expect it for his father was an Eagle with palms himself and it was traditionally given to a father or grandfather in most cases. I would be the last person to deny anyone such an honor. If I was assigned to be a "mentor" and the boy chose someone else, there is no way I would feel slighted. I would be glad there was someone in the boy's life that was more deserving than me. I had one boy that did not give me his mentor pin, but I had been his Webelos I and II, DL and his ASM for 7 years of Boy Scouts. Afterwards he said to me that there had been no one other than his father that had spent as much time helping him grow up than me. I didn't need the pin, the comment was enough. Not all bling goes on the shirt. I think there's a difference between being an Eagle mentor and a Scout mentor. One takes a bit more time.

I like it, didn't think it depressing at all.