Stosh

Be prepared....

I had a boy (Eagle) who turned 18 at the end of his junior year. He took SM fundamentals at summer camp after that school year, and did Woodbadge during his senior year. He is the scout who I mentioned in the previous post. He was not my son. His dad was the former SM of the troop. I drove from Wisconsin to Oklahoma for his wedding and one of the wedding gifts he received from me was my Woodbadge beads. I told him that there are over 25 years of experience on those beads that he is responsible for adding to it. I wear his beads. I keep in touch through Facebook on a regular basis. If he had been my son, I would not have complained. It is boys like him that make my job as a SM worthwhile.

When a boy completes all the requirements for rank advancement, I notify the CC that he needs a BOR. The CC gathers up 2 other parents from those dropping the boys off and the BOR is held during the troop meeting time. Most of our parents are registered and trained so as to do a BOR as needed. It's no big deal and no one has ever complained.

.... and this is why my grandchildren are being home schooled.

I had one Eagle transition into ASM after aging out. Did well, but struggled with his best friend who was 2 years younger. Found it difficult to not hang out together as much anymore, but they came to terms with it and the two of them worked well together after that. The younger Eagle was a TG for the troop and the older Eagle was the ASM and between them they did quite a bit to promote the boy-led, patrol-method process in the troop. If given a specific role, the ASM's in my troop stay on task and regardless of age, do well with the program..

Welcome to the forum and I'm happy to hear you have your boys in Scouts. It's a great learning opportunity for them.

I have never had a zero tolerance policy in any of the activities I have been involved with. I keep it simple, explain what needs to be done and then keep them busy doing the right things. I try not to leave openings for them to go looking for trouble. It seems to work, but on occasion someone slips up here or there. I don't shut the door, I work with the boy to get him back on track. One of the first things I teach in Scouts is that this is their opportunity to do their best and grow up and when they slip, they learn from it and continue on. History is always in the past and there's nothing that can be done to "fix it", opportunities to grow are in the future. The opportunities to grow are endless. I never shut the door on the future for them.

Age and grade levels are rather arbitrary to say the least. My daughter and I have birthdays 3 days apart. I turned 18 at the beginning of my freshman year of college and she turned 18 at the beginning of her senior year of high school. The awards of Cub Scouting are not progressively building ranks as they are in Boy Scouts. Keep the boy in the group he was with as a Tiger Cub, regardless of what grade he is in school. When it comes time to go into Boy Scouts it's based on age and the end of the school year. Even if he has "failed" one two or three years, when he turns 10 (with AOL) or 11 he's ready for Boy Scouts regardless of his grade in school.

I don't have a problem with MB's being a fundamental part of Scouting as @@krypton_son mentions, but they do have a tendency to be abused in their purpose. A summer camp of MB's instead of fishing, swimming, hiking, and hanging out with friends is not worth the $$ put into the program. MB universities has one purpose and that's to garner bling. They often cut corners and are abused by more than just the scouts. Eagle mill troops often use MB's in lieu of programming, socializing and having fun. I have even attended camporees that focus on the acquisition of attaining a MB. While attaining a large number of MB's for an individual, how much Patrol Method scouting is ignored. One hears it all the time. I got Eagle... My Eagle... It's no longer a scout rank, but a personal goal for oneself that is popularity bling in certain situations, i.e. military, college entrance and professional careers. With Palms is nothing more than bling beyond rank. I for one would prefer more POR/leadership development, Patrol Method, and scouting programming than sitting around the table taking 3 Citizenship classroom experiences. However, as @@Eagle94-A1 maybe it does do some good to cover basic civics that the public schools are not teaching. Same with shooting sports and other socially questionable activities. Cooking might be fine as well in that it introduces the boys to something more than their standard diet of fast food and pizza.

Any future speculation is always hypothetical. Simply turning Boy Scouts of America into Family Scouts of America and not seeing any major changes in membership simply means that there's a new program out there and it's not Boy Scouts of America anymore. If mom and/or dad want in on the program, sign up as scouters. If younger sister wants a program, the GSUSA is there for them as well. Parents can sign on as leaders in that program as well, but at the present time I don't see any inkling that GSUSA is going to accept younger brother in their program.

My Venturing crew was a Civil War reenacting group. Depending on the need for the activity, sometimes they wore the Federal blue and sometimes they wore the Confederate grey. --- except for the national First Bull Run event where they wore Federal grey...... Most reenacting groups knew they were a BSA Venturing Crew, but it didn't show except in their better than average portrayal of the historic soldier. I did not wear my green shirt to Roundtable when I was in attendance, I wore Federal blue...complete in every detail.

This problem is not unique to your nephew, there are a ton of scouts out there with the same attitude.

Just a mathematical question: If the membership is, say 100,000 members of boys and two years later the membership is 100,000 having gone co-ed, how much of that is number really the LOSS of boys and gain of girls? Sure, the organization has suffered no lost of membership... or has it?

Accountability and responsibility is not just for when the Scouts do bad things, it should apply to everything they do, both good and bad.

With a zero tolerance infraction, an apology no matter how sincere is a waste of breath for it surely falls on deaf ears. Consequences are avoided because there is always a work around. By law a child has to go to school. The public school system has to provide an education. And as far as BSA goes they don't have zero tolerance policies and there's another troop down the road. Until someone breaks the cycle and decides to actually help the boy, life will continue on with no lesson learned.

An unaccepted apology is a waste of breath, regardless of sincerity.

If a boy has been removed from the troop, all teaching moments are off the table. Nothing to fix. Apologies are only the first step in a repairable situation, otherwise, it's better to invest one's time and energy in developing a better relationship somewhere else.

There's no correct way to fold a flag, just a traditional way.

The only uniform for Venturing is the recommended green shirt and gray pants. There is nothing required of a uniform at all at the Venturing level, just the option of having a green shirt. I was a Venturing Advisor for 12+ years and we never had a crew uniform.

With zero-tolerance policies in place, no one ever has to figure out how to fix anything. No need to own up to anything, no need to apologize, no need to try and fix it. Just move on to the next situation in life and do something different next time. Somehow I find it difficult to understand how our kids today are going to grow up with nothing but burnt bridges in their wake.

Seriously? Those who can't be deterred are to be "removed"? That is how we are all supposed to be getting along? That's gotta make "help other people at all times" kinda difficult. Sounds like helping our own impossible, let alone "others". Sorry, but zero tolerance anything runs contrary to my moral upbringing.

I worked professionally a long time ago within a council. Working with kids was never a part of the job.

True justice requires a sliding scale on every misconduct, otherwise there is no justice. Expelling a high school Eagle scout for having a small pocket knife in his survival kit he forgot to take out of the trunk of his car from the outing the previous weekend is not justice, but it is a classic example of the tyranny of zero-tolerance policies. Expelling a kindergartner because his mother put in a butter knife to cut up birthday treats for his classmates is yet another good example of the tyranny of zero-tolerance policies that lack any resemblance to justice. Same for the kids on the playground that make hand gestures that look like pointing a finger with the thumb up in the air? Or the student that nibbles on his Pop-Tart until it looks like some imaginary weapon to some teacher? Zero-tolerance policies is the politically correct way of expressing the notion of organized injustice, a.k.a. intolerance.. True justice requires the thoughtful application of a sliding scale where the punishment matches the infraction. Last time I checked, that supposedly applied to the law of the land in America.

Once someone makes it a taboo, it makes for that much "fun" for adolescents........ Well, anyone for that matter as Prohibition proved out in America back in the 20's and 30's and recreational drugs do today. Oh, by the way, I put alcohol and nicotine in the definition of recreational drugs. Only the BSA "outlaw" them as some sort of noble stance. There are some boys in most troops that are exposed to these legal drugs on a daily basis. Everything that BSA does to lead by example with zero-tolerance in this area is quickly nullified by the actions of the world around them,. It's not just BSA, schools and other organizations do the same thing. Kind of a well known dirty little secret that everyone knows about.