asm 411

nrp1488 is absolutely correct. I have no problem with a parent pulling their Scout from any event we have if they are concerned for the Scouts well being. I have never tried to convince a parent to let a Scout go when they don't want them to. Using the parent card is perfectly okay with me. I will talk with parent so I can understand their concern, mostly to make sure I am not missing something but that is as far as it goes.

I have had a parent ask me this question and my answer is that we are prepared and we train the Scouts to camp in coldest weather we experience in our area. The parent's response was that but there must be a temperature that is too cold to bring boys camping. I explained that there is no temperature defined by National or Council that I know of. I have read most of the documentation that is available and double checked the Guide to Safe Scouting. Being that there may be documentation out there that I am not aware of does anyone know of a documented temperature cut off? Tonight's low is destined for -10 degrees at our district Klondike. When I mentioned that I camped at -10 when I was a Scout it did not seem to carry much weight. When I mentioned that this event was being put on by the district at our council camp and if there was a problem with temperature they would send us home it also carried no weight. So if there is anyone out there that can find me a reference to a cold weather cut off temperature I would appreciate it.

As troops do occasionally we have a need to something with our patrols. We currently have 4 patrols. With 3, 7, 6 and 6 patrol members. The pack in town has no Webelos IIs this year and I have been trying to recruit 5th graders without any luck so far. This leaves us with 4 Scouts aging out well before the next group of Webelos Cross over. Giving us a total of 19 by next September. When I pointed this out to the PLC and asked what we should do this is what they came up with. First they wanted only two patrols because they have been on too many campouts with only two or three Scouts per patrol. Okay that gives us probably two patrols one with 8 and one with 9 probably if you remove an SPL and ASPL for the ranks. The next questions was how to place the Scouts in the patrols. This discussion went on for a very long time. They decided we should have an activity at a regular meeting, they pick checking tents (set them up, make sure they are clean and look for damage). Even though we do most everything by patrols now for this activity the Scouts could pick anyone they wanted to set up the tents in twos or threes. The PLC would observe who worked well together and then using attendance data from the campouts from the last year they would create the new patrols. Our meeting was canceled yesterday because of an ice storm yesterday so the tent check will be next week. I will let you know how it goes. I found it interesting. Do any of you use a similar method?

I have read a lot of the old Patrol Leader and Scoutmaster Handbooks as well as the current ones. When I discussed with our PLC what the requirements for the SPL positions should be they decided on the following: 1) Run the election like the current OA election process. First week each member of the troop votes for everybody they think will make a good SPL. The second week those selected give a short speech about their vision for the troop and what makes them qualified. 2) No prerequisites. The PLC felt using the method above it would weed out the under qualified. 3) SPL elections are twice a year. The current SPL can run again but gives them a defined time period in which to look toward for getting their vision accomplished. Plus with sports and band it made sense. Elections in mid February and last week of August. 4) Patrols can change patrol leaders as needed with the approval of the SPL. This was only done because there was a fear of having some patrol with a patrol leader of the week syndrome. I guess the most important thing is the PLC came up with the process with guidance from myself and the Scoutmaster in terms of what the options are. When in doubt, ask the Scout. You will be amazed at how often the solution will be simpler and fairer than anything you could think up on your own.

In our troop the basic rule is that the SM, ASM or any Scout who has earned the rank of First Class can sign off on the foundation rank requirements. Only SM and ASMs can sign off Star, Life requirements. Only the SM can sign of on Eagle requirements. Of course the BOR is always signed off by an attending committee member. That is what we do. Sometimes I wonder if things should be different. For instance shouldn't the Advancement chair sign off on the merit badge requirements. The SM and ASMs have to check with the advancement chair anyway. Perhaps any Scout that has learned a skill should be able to sign off on that skill for the foundations ranks. For instance we had a Webelos Scout cross over last February. Loves First Aid so much we call him Doc. Whenever there is an injury Doc is the Scout that does the patching up. Doc completed his First Class requirements last month. I would have been more comfortable with him teaching first aid than some of our older Scouts at summer camp. No that the older Scouts are terrible just that is something Doc really likes. So in that case why not let him sign off on the requirements?

I personal believe that Troop generated bylaws or policies are not necessary in Scouting. Conversations with boy leaders or Scouts will cover most situations. Conversations with parents and their children will cover the rest. The BSA provides plenty of documentation about how, what and where. Knowing where to find the information is the trick. Having hard copies the Boy Scout Handbook, Scoutmasters Handbook, Advancement Guide and GTSS at he ready covers most of it. Of course you will need to read these books and probably several times get a good understanding of where the information is located. Many times if you can not find what you are looking for ask here or other similar forums and someone can general quote a BSA publication chapter and verse. The biggest argument I hear for having policies or bylaws is for disciplinary action. I believe creating a policy opens up the door for finding loop holes and exceptions. It is far better to deal with situations, the few that happen, one at a time talking it over with those involved face to face.

I think this may help. www.sharonscouts.org/winterCampingHints.html Let me know if you discover anything along the way that I can add.

Why nag when nag when you can encourage? Why control when you could enable? The first thing to do is ask the question "Do you want to be an Eagle Scout?" If your son is already tired of you getting on his back about it have someone the Scout respects ask that question. Typically the answer is "Yes". From there ask them what they need to earn the rank. If they say "I don't know." Ask them how they can find out (hint he should talk to the troop advancement chair). Once he knows, help him make a plan. Then ask him what you can do to help like drive him places. In the long run a earning Eagle Scout can and should be a family bonding experience. Why make a source of family turmoil and frustration?

" I think it is absurd of anyone to expect you to alter your activities to fit *just* them." In the fall we have many Scouts involved in Football and Band. It used to be we would not camp on Friday's "because no one would come." This year we did camp on Friday night with the understanding that those who could not make it on Friday could show up early on Saturday morning. About half the campers came out on Friday night in Sept and Oct. In our case the committee organized the transportation. In the one or two situation there is no reason that the Scouts parents can not transport them home early.

Like others we start our meetings on time and we leave when we say we are going to leave. If a Scout is running late to meet us for a campout and he calls to let us know we will leave one car behind. We do not wait for Scouts who are not courteous enough to let us know he is running late. We do have Scouts that come late to meetings and even campouts. Scout are active and and busy outside of Scouting. We appreciate that but we do not sacrifice the good of the many for the few or the one. When I was a Webelos leader I started giving pony beads to Scouts that were on time and I had a pre-meeting activity. The Webelos loved the activities and the beads. I very rarely had a boy miss getting the on time bead. The Webelos would actually drag their parents down the hallway to be on time. Our troop has other bigger hurdles to overcome right now but one thing I have been thinking about is pre-meeting activities. One thought was making Merit Badge Councilors available for the 15 minutes before the meeting. Not so much a class setting but a time when they would be easy to work with. To me this would help in two ways. The first is that we could open the door for the always pesky Citizenship and Communications Merit Badges. The Second is that the Scouts would be early under their own steam. Since not everyone wants to work on merit badges I have been thinking about teaching advance Scout skills for a few minutes before each meeting might also be fun. Things like monkey fists, woggles, long splices, matchless fire starting, html, what makes a good knife... anything the Scouts are interested in. Perhaps taking the time to find out what the most popular video games are, combing the on line faqs for short cuts and dropping one or two along the way. Hope this helps.

The following are really rough numbers but I found them interesting. What I did to get them was take the number of Scouts that are currently involved in the program in the given year. Then calculating the number of available boys based on births for a particular year and infant and standard mortality rates found the number of available boys ages 11-17. Like I said really rough but I think it gives a picture of the decline: Year Percent of boys in Scouting out of available boys 1998 9.63% 1999 8.21% 2000 7.86% 2001 7.75% 2002 7.63% 2003 7.54% 2004 7.44% 2005 7.10% 2006 6.51% 2007 6.51% I interpolated 2002 using ljnrsu's data adding 2001 and 2003 together and dividing by 2. Not the best but it filled the gap. Also interesting is the percentage Eagle Scouts based on available boys instead of the number of Scouts. Year Percent of Eagles Scouts for all boys ages 11-17 1998 0.39% 1999 0.38% 2000 0.31% 2001 0.34% 2002 0.38% 2003 0.37% 2004 0.38% 2005 0.38% 2006 0.39% 2007 0.40% It could be argued that the numbers above are off a little off because in any group of boys from the ages of 11-17 there are already Eagles Scouts that can not earn the rank a second time. I think that number would not effect the out come much. Regardless I think it is interesting that even with participation dropping the number who earn Eagle is on the rise. Are those who stay in more likely to earn Eagle then those in the past? Does that mean the trail to Eagle process in helping or is the program softer? To make a true analysis more reliable data would be needed. Non-the-less interesting to think about.

"Yeah and how often does the kid wear the shoes and hoodie? How about the Scout uniform? " A1) As often as possible for 4 to 12 weeks depends on how long he thinks it is cool. A2) In our Troop the Scouts wear there uniforms every Tuesday night, one weekend a month and at least one week during the summer at dinner. The Boy Scout uniform does not go out of style and its life is measured in years not weeks.

Does anyone know where I can find the number of Boy Scouts (no Cubs, Venture, Learning for Life...) in particular for each year since 1910. I have been combing the web for them but have not had any luck.

I received several emails asking where I got the data. I found it while going through the Scout's L archive from September. The poster there said the data came from national. I am not signed up on Scouts L list server so I can not post a question there to find out how the original poster got the data. Here is the link to the original Scout's L posting. http://listserv.tcu.edu/cgi-bin/wa.exe?A2=ind0809&L=SCOUTS-L&D=1&F=P&P=154928 If someone else is a member of Scout's L and can find out, please do and let us know.

The uniform is expensive? Generally when I hear this I look at the Scout. He is typically wearing shoes and hooded sweat shirt cost more than the items the parent is complaining about. My only recourse used to explain that the uniform is part of the game of Scouting just like a the uniforms used for Football and Baseball. I had a hard time with this when the uniform, especially the pants, was not really functional for what we do. That is spend time in the outdoors. Now with new zip off pants with real pockets and wicking material shirts that can be worn in all camping situations it is a lot easier to convince parents that it is not really that expensive. I wear my field uniform to all scouting related activities meetings, round table, camping including summer camp... without any problems. So I explain to the parents that the shirts are typically good for several years before the scouts grow out of them. The pants are more problematic but we are already building up a troop closet in which the pants can be exchanged. Also now that they took the zippers out of the bottom of the pants legs they can be adjusted as the boy grows. We now have boys that wear their uniform pants for the entire weekend when we camp. The shirts not so much but some do. Myself and our Scoutmaster wear full uniform the whole weekend including neckerchiefs. Yes the initial investment may seem like a lot but compared to the cost of the "in style" clothes the boys wear which changes much more frequently our uniforms never go out of style and so are actually a bargain.

Hey thanks for all the great information. Most of my Scouting as a youth was done during this so called "disaster". I was lucky enough to have adult leadership that seem to stick it out applying a lot of the old stuff. Even though we were following the current requirements as written for rank advancement I spent a lot of time out on outings. My adult leaders never felt that the right answer for what to do if you get lost is to "ask someone for directions" if you know what I mean. Lincoln Eagle Class of 1980

I came across the Eagles per year data below and plotted the data on a graph. There is a huge jump in Eagle Scouts in 1973 then drops like a rock to levels from almost 15 years before. Does anyone here have any idea why that would be? The first column is the year, then eagles in that year with the last column eagles to date. 1912 23 23 1913 54 77 1914 165 242 1915 96 338 1916 103 441 1917 219 660 1918 222 882 1919 468 1,350 1920 629 1,979 1921 1,306 3,285 1922 2,001 5,286 1923 2,196 7,482 1924 3,264 10,746 1925 3,980 14,726 1926 4,516 19,242 1927 5,713 24,955 1928 6,706 31,661 1929 6,676 38,337 1930 7,980 46,317 1931 8,976 55,293 1932 9,225 64,518 1933 6,659 71,177 1934 7,548 78,725 1935 8,814 87,539 1936 7,488 95,027 1937 7,831 102,858 1938 8,784 111,642 1939 9,918 121,560 1940 10,498 132,058 1941 9,527 141,585 1942 8,440 150,025 1943 9,285 159,310 1944 10,387 169,697 1945 10,694 180,391 1946 10,850 191,241 1947 9,733 200,974 1948 8,016 208,990 1949 9,058 218,048 1950 9,813 227,861 1951 10,708 238,569 1952 15,668 254,237 1953 9,993 264,230 1954 12,239 276,469 1955 14,486 290,955 1956 15,484 306,439 1957 17,407 323,846 1958 17,548 341,394 1959 17,360 358,754 1960 21,175 379,929 1961 24,637 404,566 1962 26,181 430,747 1963 27,428 458,175 1964 29,247 487,422 1965 27,851 515,273 1966 26,999 542,272 1967 30,878 573,150 1968 28,311 601,461 1969 31,052 632,513 1970 29,103 661,616 1971 30,972 692,588 1972 29,089 721,677 1973 46,966 768,643 1974 36,739 805,382 1975 21,285 826,667 1976 27,687 854,354 1977 24,879 879,233 1978 22,149 901,382 1979 22,188 923,570 1980 22,543 946,113 1981 24,865 970,978 1982 25,573 996,551 1983 25,263 1,021,814 1984 27,326 1,049,140 1985 27,173 1,076,313 1986 26,846 1,103,159 1987 27,578 1,130,737 1988 27,163 1,157,900 1989 29,187 1,187,087 1990 29,763 1,216,850 1991 32,973 1,249,823 1992 34,063 1,283,886 1993 33,672 1,317,558 1994 37,438 1,354,996 1995 31,209 1,386,205 1996 37,715 1,423,920 1997 40,296 1,464,216 1998 41,167 1,505,383 1999 47,582 1,552,965 2000 40,029 1,592,994 2001 43,665 1,636,659 2002 49,328 1,685,987 2003 49,151 1,735,138 2004 50,377 1,785,515 2005 49,895 1,835,410 2006 51,728 1,887,138 2007 51,742 1,938,880 (This message has been edited by asm 411)(This message has been edited by asm 411)

Before I start I want to make clear that I am talking about BSA camps with fire rings. In our area for a while camps discouraged using ground wood for fires. It is best to leave it to nature they said. Now the camps are saying that the ground wood is more of a problem if there should be a forest fire because it helps fuel the fire. So we are now encourage to use the ground wood and not bring our own. Moving firewood in Ohio right now is a big no-no anyway because of the Emerald Ash bore anyway. So from my point of view the use of woods tools in our Troop is on the rise not the decline.

A bit off topic but the last post stirred up some memories. Not sure if this was a troop rule when I was a Scout, 30 years ago, or not. In our troop the councilor for Home Repairs merit badge was the Scout's Dad. This was one of my favorites because my Dad was not into Scouting at all. From his perspective driving us to and from any camp on the planet was good enough which I appreciated. This merit badge gave me the opportunity to spend the better part of a Saturday with my Dad doing Scouts.

I love cycling merit badge. It is so easy to verify requirements 8 and 9. -------- 8. Avoiding main highways, take two rides of 10 miles each, two rides of 15 miles each, and two rides of 25 miles each. You must make a report of the rides taken. List dates, routes traveled, and interesting things seen. ---------- So if the Scout can tell you the date, the route and interesting things then he has done the requirement. I had one Scout that did not like to write. Unlike hiking merit badge all the Scout has to do is report so he talked to me after each ride he did. In the case of this thread for the Scout to say he did the rides with his family is plain not enough. He has to provide the details. Now it may be possible for him to sit down with his family calendar and family members and recall the information. In which case I would be satisfied. But the rides have to distinct and if he can not put routes, dates and distances together I would have repeat the requirements. His family does a lot of cycling in the summer anyway so this should not be a big deal.

We are very fortunate here in NE Ohio. The previous poster spoke well of Seven Ranges which I have only heard good things. We have camped there on weekends. Really nice camp. Our council Camp is Camp Manatoc just a little North of Akron, OH in Peninsula. We have a great attendance numbers by all ages. For that matter we have older Scouts that are typically inactive, few meetings and maybe one campout a year, that come to summer camp. Like Seven Ranges there is also a 5 year program for the Scouts to participate in. Additionally we have Scouts that will go to Manatoc as provisional Scouts for a second week of summer camp. The Boys love it. So you may also want to check it out http://www.gtcbsa.org/manatoc/index.html which is also no too far away.

It is my understanding that it is up to the MBC if they want to accept work done previous to getting the merit badge application, blue card. The classic example is the 20 nights camping for camping merit badge. Typically a Scout does not ask for a blue card until after he has the 20 nights completed, at least in our troop. That being said it seems to me that the sign offs for the requirements on the card should be when the MBC acknowledges the requirement is complete not necessarily when the work was done. Hence the Scoutmaster's initial signature should be the oldest on the blue card. When the MBC signs off a requirement it should be the date when the signature is applied not when the work was done by the Scout. In the end the last time the card is signed, when the card is turned back into the Scoutmaster, is the one the matters most right?

Thanks ScoutNut. Great site, just what I was looking for. Now I can see if I can get the PLC to get back on that troop logo thing so we have something to put the segments around. What are your other sources? I just like knowing my options.

ScoutNut, where do you get the segments? Are they custom made? I really want to do this for our Troop and have not been able to find a source. Thanks.

Not to hijack this thread either but Webelos Activity pin requirements are supposed to be signed off by the Webelos Leader only. Parents can sign off on Cub and Bear requirements. I agree with Buffalo Skipper about Webelos II not meeting with Boy Scouts regularly. We do have the Webelos II do open and closing ceremonies with us. The rest of the meeting they are in another room except in rare cases which we coordinate before hand. Back to our regularly scheduled program. Buffalo Skipper describes the standard meeting plan. Use it as described in the Webelos Den Leader book. You can work on requirements and team building if that is what you would like to do. Simply build your activities and games with team building in mind. So instead of doing something like hide and seek you choose something like building a human pyramid. One word of advice if you have not learned this in the past. Always build your meetings with too much in mind. For that matter always have the next meeting ready to go. If you have too much in the plan you can either do some next time or send it home to be finished. If you don't have enough you end up scanning the book for something and winging the end of the meeting. Having too much is always easier to deal with. I had planned on spending 20 minutes in a discussion and demonstration of the water cycle. I start my discussion with boys and they looked at me and said "Not again." I found out they did the water cycle in school earlier in the week. I looked up and said "No problem." Went to my car and got the stuff I was going to use for the next week, Bernoulli's law and continued on. It could have been a very boring meeting had I not been prepared.