MattR

I never signed off on anything for my son. I did go on a lot of campouts with him. We have lots of stories to share. He even tells me things he was certain he would have gotten in trouble for. Lots of memories. I showed him a lot of skills. I still do. We still have fun working on these things. There's a difference between signing something off and teaching the skills. These parents quit because they couldn't sign off on something? I think there's more going on and this is just something that they used as an excuse.

I'm never too interested in encouraging advancement at anything but one on one with a scout that is not advancing. At COHs my interest is in encouraging participation and helping out. For the first we show pictures and tell stories. For the second we make a big deal of publicly thanking scouts and adults for their help.

The OT is about change. What I find is there is a huge amount of momentum that needs to change, both scout and adult. Scouts don't seem to learn from what adults say nearly as much as they learn from watching the older scouts. So, with older scouts that don't lead there's a bad cycle to break. I think I've finally broken that cycle in my troop. I let the patrols break up any way they wanted and it came out to be scouts 14 and older or 13 and younger. I knew that would happen and I used it as a great way to get the older scouts away from the younger. The younger scouts are now figuring it out on their own. After 18 months they don't want to follow the older scout model. i.e., the patrols are now 15 and younger or 16 and older. The younger patrols are slowly taking ownership. In the meantime the older scouts went through their own change. At first is was rough as no amount of me talking could get them to do much of anything. I think what really lit a fire was when some of them said they'd like to spread out among the younger patrols and "show them how it's done." I very politely said they probably didn't need any help and besides, they had more going on anyway. Some of them took that to heart, really stepped up, and illustrate everything scouts can be. These scouts are the ones that have always been willing to help out. There are also those that have never helped much and still don't want to. They are struggling. They don't want to plan anything so they don't have much to do and a couple have left the troop. There are adults very unhappy with that. Then there are those older scouts on the fence. They'd like to help but they don't have a lot of confidence. The ones that are participating are watching and slowly getting pulled into trying to help out. It seems to be working. The point is the maturity level feeds on itself. It starts with a few scouts that just want to do it and the rest of the scouts see it and then are willing to try it. Just as important the adults are figuring out their roles as well.

We only use lanterns on one campout a year, klondike. On most campouts, about the time it gets dark the scouts are in bed or at a campfire so the patrols never need them. The adults use one for playing farkle, but headlights work well. Part of the reason we got away from them is they are fragile. The led ones sound nice, but at this point I don't want more gear in the trailer so I will quietly forget your good idea.

Good point, I guess what I was really thinking of, but didn't say, is that they don't have the experience to know they need to ask themselves more questions to get the details figured out. And yes, lazy is a big part of it. But the fear of failure and the fear of upsetting their peers is huge in their heads. It's better to sit quiet, knowing trouble is coming, than to rock the boat. What you call management I call bureaucracy. If the plan needs to be approved by the SM and copied to the website then that's bureaucracy. However, if the plan is just a way for the PL to get his head around what's coming, or be prepared, then I find it useful. I use it all the time to ask scouts about what they want to do. Plan for a campout, ECOH, meetings, Eagle project. What's your plan? It's a way for them to explain what they want to do and for me to ask them questions, and that's a way to teach them what the scout motto is about. And yet, life is what happens while you're busy making plans. I regularly ask the scouts how something went and when things go astray of the plan I then ask if it was good or bad. In almost every case, if they had a well thought out plan then any change was a good thing. They could adapt. If there was no plan then any change is typically not good, but sometimes saves their bacon.

I see this type of problem all the time. It's the problem. It's not a constant struggle so much as a constant learning process for the scouts. It has less to do with filling out paperwork and more about being prepared. Scouts seem to be notorious for not wanting to think a problem through. At the same time, leadership requires understanding what's coming. A great example is making a menu. They want hot dogs for lunch so that's what they write down. How many? Buns? Mustard? A side? Also, their writing skills are horrible. Writing is about organizing and thinking things through, so, no surprise they struggle with it. Since you have a great SPL (he cares about this problem!) this is what I'd suggest to him. There are a few issues. First, scouts are inherently lazy when they don't see a reason. Second, they likely don't have the skills to work through the problem they have. Third, feedback is important for a leader to get motivated. Success will solve the first issue, so don't worry about it. As for skills, I'd start two weeks out before their meeting and talk to the PL (talk, not text or email, face to face). All you need to do is ask the right kinds of questions. You just want them to think the problem through. Questions with a single word answer are bad, make them talk. What is the plan? Where does this change from normal? Encourage change. It's good and fun. But it needs to be thought through. Once there's a basic plan you can start asking more questions. While you're getting answers start filling in the paperwork for him. Eventually you can get him to do that but for now, give him a hand. He will appreciate your help. It's likely that 2 weeks before he won't have all the answers. Give him some homework. Repeat this a week before. Hopefully you'll have a plan. One thing about plans, though. It's okay if they aren't followed exactly. Things change and that can be good or bad. The important point of a plan is to get the leader prepared. If he knows what he wants and it's likely to work then people will follow him. That is the goal, not the plan. The third issue is feedback and review. A quick review will bring up the things that didn't go right. Something I've just started is once a quarter we do a big thorns and roses session for each patrol. It takes some skill to do this so most PLs don't have the skill to do this on their own. It's all about asking leading questions. Don't ask how's it going, ask what's going right and what's going wrong. Make a big deal about what's going right and any progress. For things going wrong, don't lay blame, ask the patrol what they can do to make it better. This has to be a very positive thing. There aren't failures so much as opportunity. You have to believe in them. If you believe in them then they will believe in themselves. That is motivation. That's the oil that gets the whole thing moving. The bottom line is using the Oath and Law to help them realize the promise of scouting. Good luck. I'm sure Mr [krampus] will help you out if you ask him.

This discussion is why I'm getting tired of scouts. All the arguments on this forum come from the same group of questions. What is character? Leadership? What is good? How do you motivate a teenager? These are questions that are thousands of years old. So why is it that people think they have the answer? It's all painfully subjective. This is the wellspring of drama. There's no point in calling anyone a control freak. There are different solutions for different troops. For me, the best results I've see is from setting participation expectations and giving the scouts plenty of freedom and support to make it fun. Stick and carrot. If it doesn't work for you I won't be upset if you do something else. Its like the whole religion thing, share your ideas but don't judge others. I don't get paid enough for that.

My rule to be considered for a POR, or be considered for a rank advancement past second class, is that the scout has to have been on 5 scout related campouts in the past 12 months. We put on 10 campouts a year at least, plus OA, training, extra backpacking trips, there are all sorts of possibilities. It's a bit more complicated for getting credit for a POR and Stosh's "take care of your people" is part of that. That said, there is the "acts of God" clause. Acts of God can lower this number on a case by case situation. Homework is not an act of God. Not being able to camp above 9000 feet for medical reasons is. Playing three sports a year is not. Having parents that use a kid as part of a power struggle is. Money is a different subject. Essentially, if a scout can make a decision that would enable him to go then he has no excuse. I will also cut some slack for the SPL that got burned out and just needs a break from scouts, or some scout that did a fantastic job with the new scouts and needs to write college apps. Ten years ago we didn't have to worry about any of this but since then there are lots of extra curricular activities that are requiring kids to participate 100% or else. So, I say 50% or else. The good news is that at the last campout one of the older scouts thanked me for making him go on campouts. Of course, there's also the 16 year old that has to go on two more campouts before I'll sign off on Eagle. He took it to council. We'll see. Just be aware, this can create lots of drama. And it comes from a few parents (most are really good about it). Some people will say the campouts are boring and that's the problem I should fix, not forcing scouts to camp. My response is if the scouts think the campouts are boring then they have a problem they need to solve. My job is teaching them how to solve their problems using the Oath and Law, not creating their calendar. Once they know they have to participate they get a lot more interested in making sure the calendar is what they want to do.

Here's some empathy for you. I'm fortunate in that when I said no mixing of patrols the adults had to back off because I am the SM. Turns out the scouts like smaller patrols. Two is a bit small but three works fine and four is great, at least that's what my scouts tell me. The adults used to say "well, if only half the scouts show up then we should double the size of the patrols so there's always a full patrol on campouts." Nowhere in that comment does anyone show that they understand the dynamics in a patrol that is on its own. i.e., they aren't interested in developing youth leadership. As for what to do, I can't pretend I know what you're going through. I'm guessing you're really frustrated after having worked up the energy and excitement to take over and turn the troop around only to have it explode. You could walk and nobody would blame you. Yet you obviously care about scouts. I mean, wouldn't the new SM like your help teaching leadership skills? While some scouts do enjoy being catered too, there are some older scouts that want some purpose. If a few scouts say they'd like to lead and, via training, you can give them a taste, then maybe they can talk to the SM. Just a thought. A bit subversive, but really about keeping what's important in focus.

You just have to keep reminding the adults until it sticks. Most eventually get it. This isn't a fact that you can tell them once and they get it. It's an idea with lots of ramifications. Once they start understanding how all these ramifications fit together then they're quite helpful. It took a couple of years since I was starting from scratch but now I have adults that get it. If you can find them a job to do that's great but this is really all about training the adults.

On Saturday night I was sitting at a campfire and I was honestly bored. Then I noticed the scouts were having a lot of fun yucking it up over something the older scouts were doing. That's when I realized I had had very little to do all day because the scouts were running everything. Not perfect by any means but they were running it. Sunday morning I gathered up the scouts running things and told them how great it was to see their progress. It's been a long haul with not much to show before now. It's been 12 to 18 months. They certainly have a ways to go but I'm seeing progress. The older scouts are looking out for the troop. The Pls are looking out for their patrols. The PLs still struggle with planning but they finally seem to realize that they are responsible for their patrol. They at least want to lead. That's huge. I'm also learning. My guess is if I knew what I was doing their learning curve wouldn't be so slow. Or maybe it's that when I started this the scouts that would listen were 12 years old and now they're 14 and patrol leaders. The old days of picking patrol leaders based on who needed a POR are beyond everyone's memory, even most of the adults. Then there's also the scout-like way to deliver tough love. I had a scout thank me today for being such a hard ass.

pong?

We do line up at flags by patrol. That's trivial. Only one skit per patrol? I guess that's okay. But space and resources are an issue. Doing things by troop takes less space and gear than doing it by patrol. So I spend the first day or two asking for more resources and defending my scouts from staff. It's a lot of my time because the staff doesn't understand patrol method. But it's more than just being in camp. It's also about fun. I asked if a patrol can go down to the dock to go canoeing together, or to the rifle range to go shooting together, or could they at least give me some maps of local trails so scouts could go hiking together. Or maybe there's a geo cache they can do. Nope. It's not that camps are troop vs patrol method, it's that they're all about MBs. I once suggested to my local camp committee that MBs only go until 2:30 and have a time slot for patrols to do things together until dinner. For the really popular things they'd have to sign up but it would be a chance for scouts to have fun as a patrol, or do a service project, or whatever they wanted. They looked at me like I had a 3rd eye. So, yes, we make it work as best we can, but if the patrol method is such a big deal, shouldn't camps be supporting this? The usual answer is that I can run my own summer camp for my troop. I suppose I can, but again, shouldn't my council be supporting my troop using the methods of scouting?

@@ianwilkins, when baking cakes with a DO there needs to be a lot more top heat than bottom heat. That way you don't need the spacer gizmo. A rafting friend of mine taught me to rim the top with briquettes (place them side by side all around the rim) and put a couple more in the middle. Then only put about 6 on the bottom. Very little computation required! This helps heat the walls. Whenever I did the +-3 up/down I always got a thin layer of burnt cake on the bottom, enough to insulate the rest of the cake I suppose. I'll do the 3 up/down if there's enough liquid in the pot but it needs to be done with a large grain of salt. If it's cool or windy then the oven will be getting cooled and more coals are needed. Also, if the ground is damp put down a layer of aluminum foil to keep from putting out the coals. I learned that the hard way as well. @@Stosh, the rim on the lid of the DO to hold in the coals was Napoleon's idea, or at least that's what I heard.

Try onions with some butter or oil. As long as there's enough liquid I don't burn stuff. We're going camping this coming weekend. Maybe I'll try the kibbeh. Sounds like a great lunch plan.

Our camporees' cracker barrels are advertised for SM and SPL. For about the past year I've asked the SPL and PLs to go. I've never had a problem with it. I just stand back and graze for food and the scouts volunteer for things. Our camporees have been mostly patrol events for a long time, so that's good. As for cracker barrel most troops bring just the SPL and a few bring PLs. What I notice, walking by camp sites, is that my troop is just about the only one where the patrols are distinct sites and the cooking is at the patrol sites. A lot of troops either have all the patrols cook in the same spot or there's just one setup for cooking. i.e., the adults are probably running it. Summer camp is a nightmare for patrol method in my neck of the woods. When I ask what activities there are for patrols to have fun I get a blank stare from camp directors, council execs, pretty much everyone. I've gotten complements from staff that see oure patrol sites. I think I've found what I want to do when I step down as SM. I've been leery of doing anything with the district or council because there's so much momentum that needs to be changed. I go on and on about training but I can't change what there already is. However, there is nothing called "Patrol Method Training", so I can offer that and write it any way I want. My DE wants me to do it.

Please don't suggest you can teach rafting in an hour, or anything on moving water. The idea of canoeing our local white water is crazy. People that end up on the wrong part of the river die every year, and they're in rafts. Getting scouts to want to do adventure is a chicken and egg thing and adults are part of the mix. A couple of years ago the campout ideas the scouts were coming up with were bad. Nobody wanted a competition or a challenge. I'd suggest it. I'd talk to the PLC and remind them of how much fun they had doing something like a tug of war competition at a camporee, but when the rubber hit the road they didn't want to compete. So I finally said every campout must have a challenge of some sort, their choice, but I'm setting boundaries. Turns out they really enjoy it and now they wouldn't think of not doing it. There's also no doubt they need help turning their ideas into something that works. Lately, anything with a disaster theme works. You were in a plane. It got shot down by Russian separatists. Here's a map. You are at A, your gear is at B, and an injured scout from your patrol is at C. Good luck. I put that one out and the scouts are going crazy with it. Motivating scouts is a subject all its own that is never covered anywhere in the training and I find it the crux of many problems. Once a scout can self motivate, when he can see where he wants to go, the adults should watch and enjoy it. But getting him to that point is most of what I should be doing. You obviously don't want to do it for the scout because he'll never learn. At the same time just asking him what he wants to do really depends on the maturity of the scout.

I agree with Stosh on this one. A scout learns what trustworthy really means when an adult can really trust him to do something that both of them knows is important. And that requires some risk. In fact a lot of scouting requires some risk. Kids fall down and stand up. This is a big part of learning trust and confidence. Confidence comes from knowing you can stand back up and try again. Some parents can accept that risk and some can't. Let's not worry about those that don't like it. The aims of scouting are character, citizenship, and fitness, and that's how boy scouts is sold. Maybe that needs to be updated to talk to parents in a language they understand. I think they'd rather hear that scouts will teach their son to be responsible and do the right thing without being asked. And one of the methods is letting their son fail in a controlled situation. Maybe if that was all updated then everyone would get focused on what scouting is really about.

I'm not surprised at the BSA's focus. Numbers are falling, the BSA has to figure out how to pay for their mortgage, right now, so they did ask the parents, and there are lots of parents that are worried about their kids' careers. So the BSA responds with more Explorers and junior explorers, aka STEM scouts. But what could they really do to help each of our units? Many people here have said that scouting is local, so maybe that's the discussion to have. I suppose some better advertising could help me out. Not too crazy on it but it would help. My council does not have enough trainers when it comes to shooting sports and climbing, as in, we have adults willing to take the training but we can't get them trained. We have climbing gear we can't use right now. That huge new HA camp on the East coast does nothing for my troop as it's too far away and too expensive. I'd much rather see some of that money spent on fixing my local camp's infrastructure. I'm not talking about fancy gear, just a water system that meets state standards. Maybe if we took that $24/scout that goes to national each year and gave it to the local council then we'd be in much better shape. Also, don't just dump stem scouts on my DE without first coming up with a plan to pay for it. He will quit if you don't. Remember, it is about the adventure. It is not about Eagle. Kids do not need Eagle if they are having an adventure. They certainly don't need to get Eagle by the time they're 14. Make sure that summer camps are about summer adventure and not just merit badges. Kids still like adventure and fun. They always have and they always will. If anything has changed it's that kids have less opportunity to have an adventure. If we're starting to not let them choose the game they can play at recess then 1) what we offer is even more important than before, and 2) these kids are starting at a lower level of maturity than what we're used to. We might have to adapt the program to get them started but it is still about the adventure. And just to make this clear, there is no better place in the world to have a real adventure than the outdoors. It's called wild for a reason, and that's what boys respond to. Look at the assumptions we've had for too long and check them. We assume that there are plenty of adults with outdoor experience. I find plenty of adults that like being in the outdoors, but maybe not the wild side of the outdoors. Maybe there needs to be a training program for them that's fun that they can do alongside their sons. We assume that there are plenty of cub scouts coming up into boy scouts. I've noticed that a lot more kids in elementary school play sports than in middle school. Maybe we should be trying to get into the middle schools to make presentations rather than the elementary schools. If so, that presentation should focus on the adventure. Either way, does cub scouts really need to be so long? My pet peeve is training. If the adults don't know what a good program looks like then they'll never create one. I'm sorry but 6 hours of slides will not describe what this is about. My proof is simple. The district training people tried to start a troop last year and it failed miserably. Revamp training. The 6 hours could be cut down to 4 and called an introduction, but for those that want to do it right, Train them, trust them, and let them be.

Exploring Explosion, stem scouts, family scouts. What happened to fun with a purpose? Probably went the way of recess .... I guess I shouldn't be too surprised given that the efficiency of raising kids is the most important thing parents do. It's all about winning. Win all you can. Your son can win more if he has less free time and focuses more on his career, starting at age 7. How many other threads can I tie into this one? BTW, it's not a rifle approach, it's a shotgun approach. This whole document is a grab bag of ideas. Hardly a single bullet. I do like the idea of reaching out to minority communities. These communities tend to be more interested in community and less on winning all you can. But someone said they don't know the outdoors and for some it's hard to volunteer, so that is a problem.

Taps on an instrument is a simple melody but very powerful. I think it only has 21 notes. Don't touch the keys on a trumpet and it's a bugle. Have the bugler back away from the audience, where it can be heard but not too sharply. Another thing to do is walk among the grave stones. Read a few names. Do the math and figure out how old they were when they died. Some of the older scouts may be surprised. I did that when I was 17 at the US cemetery in Normandy and I realized a lot of those guys were only a few years older than I was. That's what brought it all home to me.

Welcome to the forums @@cubscoutdan. First, it sounds like you're doing a great job (15 to 20 new scouts is fantastic), so be happy about that and pat yourself on the back. Seriously, it's these successes that need to be savored to keep your sanity. Second, anything you do is good, and you can't solve all the world's problems. Remember that. Just a guess but it looks like you have a few options. 1) fix the mess you're in, 2) pack up and move across town, 3) work with the mess you're in, or 4) create a new pack. Number 1) fixing the leadership in this pack, sounds like a maalox moment, or more likely a year or 5 until your kids bridge to boy scouts. Number 2), as you say, hurts the boys that likely can benefit from scouts. Is it possible to shuttle the boys that have the hardest time getting to scouts? The den meetings don't have to be across town and if it's only once a month the boys need to be with the pack? I'm just putting up questions. Maybe there's a way to get these boys across town. 3) There is no leadership or teamwork in the existing pack, so you can pretty much do as you please. You did and you got 20 new scouts. If the Scout Oath and Law guide you, there's nothing wrong with doing as you please. Fix the tiger dens. Give them a real calendar. As SlowDerbyRacer says, work from the den up. The scouts will have fun and that's all that matters. It all depends on getting some adults that share your vision. Get some parents to go to roundtable and take the training and you're most of the way there. Number 4) is only if the others don't work.

Very sorry to hear this. It's always hard to put it in words, especially on a forum. Of course, your mom did a good job of putting down words on this forum and I always appreciated that. But tell us, is there a story behind the name Moose Tracker? Or Moose the Italian blacksmith? Stories are always a good way to remember someone. I'd make that a part of a memorial.

Capital Gymnastics' point system was one dollar earned equals one point earned equals one dollar donated. That's pretty clear that each parent gets a reduction exactly proportional to the amount of money they spent at the grocery store. What I'm talking about is based on participation. Just to pick numbers, say every $10 raised is 1 point, as is going on 1 campout, and a service project is worth 2 points. One scout raises $100 and goes on 2 campouts, and a second scout raises no money and goes on 6 campouts and a service project. Do the math and the first scout gets $60 and the second gets $40. If the first scout had not gone camping then the two would split the money evenly. Throw in 50 more scouts and a lot more events and nobody knows how much money they'll get. The benefit is based on participation, not just fund raising. This would also handle the problem of non participants getting no money. The fact that the money has to be spent evenly is a real problem with a boy scout troop because everyone is doing different things. We can't say we are just going to have a fundraiser for Philmont, especially with the Kroger cards. In all honesty, nobody will ever look at our books. We asked our CO if they wanted to look at them and when we told them the numbers they said no, it's not worth their time. So the IRS will also never see them. The real questions are what kind of lessons can we teach the scouts and how do we best support the troop? For scouts that go door to door selling popcorn or camp cards, I honestly would be fine giving them all of the money. That's a good lesson for the scouts and most parents explicitly tell their kids, you want to go on a high adventure, pick one you can pay for because you will. For grocery cards and events where the adults are doing a non trivial amount of work, I'd rather distribute it based on participation. We have scouts that can't afford to shop where the grocery cards are so they aren't getting that money. When we hear about kids that can't afford camp we pay for it, whether it's the general fund or just passing a hat, but some parents won't ask.

I read that gymnastics document and it's kind of like reading tea leaves. Trying to compare it to a troop is a bit of a challenge. On the one hand, it did say that because all the members of the fund raising organization got a benefit there was a violation. So does that mean, since all the scouts are a member of the fund raising organization, that we can't pay for anything for a scout that a parent could pay for? But there was also the comment along the lines of "unlike a church youth group, where the primary purpose of the organization is not to raise money, it's okay to have bake sales and the like." Read what you want. One thing that brought up a huge flag for me was the comment about the grocery store coupons. Kroger stores have these, we use them, and make a lot of money on them. That's going to be a topic. Where a scout actually does the work for the fund raiser I have no problem giving them most of the money but the boys are clueless about grocery store coupons. I'd rather see that money go into a big pot. Here's an idea for how to divvy money up. Scouts get points for participating in any activity (outings, fundraisers, service projects). At the end of each quarter all the raised money is divided by the number of points handed out and payed out by the number of points each scout has. It's not a one for one payment and it benefits those that participate the most.