MattR

Pros: The calendar sounds like fun. Very active. Must be a lot better than what you had. Having a lot of adults volunteering can be a good thing. Having older scouts teach the skills is good. The comment about the SM restricting the adults. Cons: SM picking patrols (I used to do that, now the scouts handle it). Not allowing 300' because of safety concerns (i.e., do the adults trust the scouts? Train, trust, lead?) Suspecting the generals surround the monthly plc and coach (are the scouts deciding anything at the PLC?) The meeting of bringing in 3 patrol boxes for 40 scouts sounds boring (no hands on). No wonder only 40 out of 90 showed up. So what are the other meetings like? Maybes: With 90 scouts there is sure to be a few that are exceptional in front of a crowd. I'd watch the patrol leaders. What are the patrol activities and what do they do at the one meeting a month that's a patrol meeting? If it's only advancement: con, if it's a mix chosen by the PL: pro. If the uniforms are the biggest issue and the PLs don't lead, that's a con to me. With 90 scouts how many go on high adventure trips? Many trips have limits of a dozen people, they would need 3 per year. Do they have high adventure trips every year? How do the patrols function on the campouts? How was your son treated when he visited? Ignored:con, welcomed: pro. The real question - are the patrol leaders leading or are they glorified secretaries? If they are leading, it sounds like a great troop. If not, it's still doing a lot.

We seem to be talking about two different issues; what the kids want, and what the parents want. As for the kids, they haven't changed over the years. They still want fun, challenge, and respect from adults. They still like telling stories of dealing with tough situations. For the boys we need to improve the program. Boy-led, 300' and the outdoors is all part of it. What the parents want is different. Maybe they are afraid of the outdoors, or more likely, just don't understand it. At the same time, I'm not sure parents views have changed that much on what they want for their kids. Responsible, confident, compassionate, courageous. They want their boys to grow into good men. I certainly have plenty of moms come up to me asking that I help raise their sons to be good men. Maybe the challenge is that the BSA isn't doing a good job of connecting the methods of scouting to growing into a man. If the view is we go into the woods and start fires with flint and steel, but nobody sees that as being prepared, or that the scouts are learning to solve their own problems, then scouting is seen as quaint. We don't need to sell the adventure as jumping on the back of a wild boar with a knife in our teeth, but certainly conquering challenges is a good, fun way to learn what's important.

Paul, looks like a council summer camp thing. I like it, though. EagleDad, I don't doubt you one bit that there are a lot of adults that are clueless and just want to do right by their kids. That was me, although I had a lot of camping experience. But why is it top shelf with 50% versus bottom shelf with 100%? Why not 50% on the top shelf and 50% on the bottom? The problem is there are not enough adults with good training. The problem is not that there are adults that don't want to be successful. I agree there are a lot of adults that have limited time, but when there's somebody that really wants to do well, let's have something to give them so they can succeed. For those that have never camped, this is an excellent opportunity to have them learn along with their SPL. My suggestion would be to leave everything as is (for the bottom shelf) but add a course that spends a weekend on how to implement boy led and really dive into the nuts and bolts of how to make the methods of scouting work, and how these parts work together. Explain why 300' is important. Send the SM home with a binder full of ideas that actually work, as opposed to vague platitudes. We're guys, we need blunt! Someone needs to say that 300' doesn't work if you have 75 lb patrol boxes. 300' doesn't work unless the adults give the scouts real responsibility for the well being of their patrol. Explain how to deal with helicopter parents. Explain how to set boundaries and then stay outside of them. Explain how to get the best kids in a patrol to be the leader. I would absolutely sign up to take such a class and I know a lot of adults, mostly new, that would really appreciate some help.

I agree with the idea that character and adventure go hand in hand. Adventure in the outdoors leads to problems which leads to learning how to deal with those problems. Match that with good character and you have a man. Either one by itself leads to either a church youth group or an REI minor league. The character part of scouting is strong. The part that's lacking is where the scout makes decisions and takes responsibility for himself and others. It's getting harder to do that with helicopter parents, rules from above that limit a lot of fun, and kids that honestly expect to be told exactly what to do. I have a mom that sent his son's patrol email "because he's not very organized" (what a fight that was). We can't climb on rocks above waist high. Really? These kids ski and bike off of rocks higher than waist high. Anyway, Kudu has a point that, while harshly made, I'm finding more and more important. We're moving away from the adventure and that's what a lot of kids want and that's where they learn. There's a way to get back to it and do it safely but there's nothing I see from National that's helping that. Not JTE, not ILST, not Woodbadge. Maybe back in the day of Hillcourt all the adults naturally knew how to do this but they don't now.

It doesn't have to be 100%. I require, for a scout to be in a patrol, he go to roughly half the events. It works well and the scouts have plenty of time for other activities. I no longer need to mix patrols unless it's extreme and only one scout from a patrol shows up (it happened once this past year) and the scouts no longer even mention combining patrols. We have 6-8 in each patrol.

One patrol this past weekend only had 2 scouts show up out of 6 and they had a blast. They recruited a few other scouts from other patrols to run the relay and they got first place at the camporee. Sure they picked all the fast kids but they had a problem and they solved it. I tried making larger patrols once before and it didn't really help, especially if everyone showed up at a campout. It's hard to cook for 10 - 13 people on one of those little stoves.

I'd still let the scouts camp, and one of them just might be a new patrol leader.

I don't have aged based patrols. I require either the PL or APL at every patrol activity (camping is one of them). For non leadership positions I require scouts to go on half the campouts and half the service projects if they want to be in a patrol. Exceptions are only made for acts of God. Homework is not an act of God. Band practice is not. Divorced parents are. Scouts have time to be in sports and other activities, they just need to think ahead a bit. We've had these expectations for about a year now and attendance is up and attrition is no different. More kids are having fun. Teamwork is much better. The problem scouts left or are no longer a problem. I will only allow combined patrols if there is only one in a patrol going.

Careful what you ask for JoeBob You'd also get three mother-in-laws, or nine.

The Scout Law hasn't changed since 1911. The Scout Oath and Law could be considered the constitution of the BSA. Of the world's countries that have constitutions only Australia (1900), Denmark (1849), Luxembourg (1868), Norway (1814), and the United States (1787) have constitutions that are older (the U.K. and Canada don't have constitutions). I'd say leave the Scout Law alone, it's passed the test of time.

I would tend to believe NJCubScouter. The new code seems to be using AJAX, is asynchronous, and my guess is there are timing issues. My guess is these would show up more often with multiple people writing comments at the same time, so something about TL, which is interesting to us, would have a greater chance of having problems. That said, I wish TL luck. Although they don't like my tribe, they'll help some kids and that's a good thing. They will also hopefully pull some of the heat off the BSA and that will help everyone. I don't get the LDS thing at all. Then again, it ain't my tribe. I generally like the LDS, they like me, but not having a glass of wine on Friday night, well, we can agree to disagree I saw their description of the program and it looks like the equivalent to boy scouts is broken into a younger and older group. Maybe this comes from american heritage girls. Either way, it doesn't do much for boy led.

OK, guys, it's time to stop beating the poor kid. Paracord, you obviously have a lot of enthusiasm. That's a great asset to any troop. That said, your idea of awards for being able to do things that are already covered by ranks sounds a bit redundant, and I think that's what people are complaining about. However, your trying to improve enthusiasm to do a good job is admirable. Is there another way to reward that? How about having a knot tying competition and giving out something for the top three? I had a knot tying competition and to even the field I had the older scouts do some of the knots blind folded. You really have to know the knots to do that. So, don't give an award for being average, make an award for going above and beyond. Personally, I don't like adding awards to a uniform that can already look like bling central, so I'd modify the neckerchief, or add something to it. Also, I'd suggest not worrying about the length of hair. I'm old enough to have seen that when I was your age and it never had a positive outcome. Besides, I had hair that was as wide as my shoulders. It sure pissed my dad off. Good luck.

Sounds like the problem is with the CC. Punishing a scout to send a message to the parents is rather draconian.

Scout Spirit is an attitude and the SMART (acronym, not shouting) requirements for Eagle won't create it. What does create it is the scoutmaster, and it's very subjective. That said, this is the crux of scouting, this is what parents want for their kids. Better training for scoutmasters is the only thing I can think of that would help.

If you like knots, para chord can be used for real cheap woggles. You need something less than 4'. http://www.troop54.com/knots/TurksHeadKnot/TurksHeadKnot.htm. The only challenge is figuring out the right diameter to start with so it ends up right. Sometimes you have to try a few times. If you like knots it's not a problem, if you don't, well, stick with pvc. Something else that is very nice is, while making the turks head, between coming out and going back into the knot, is drop down a loop and tie an overhand knot in the loop. It looks just like the Good Turn Daily knot hanging off the bottom of the scroll in the scout badge.

Okay M&M, it's time for one of you to take the high road and step back from the keyboard. This conversation is not changing anyone's mind and brings nothing new to the table. Both of you have a strong desire to convince the other of something very important to you and, to be honest, neither of you will. What's left is the appearance that neither of you is willing to not have the last word. How do you teach your scouts to deal with another kid that won't stop arguing? Some times it's better to just walk away and know in your heart that you are right. Anyway, please stop, before I start praying for Packsaddle to start singing

Strictly professional I've been asking around for the volunteer type and this seems to have struck a chord.

Colorado. Of course I need help, at least that's what my wife always tells me. Since private messages don't work yet, send email to jsi6hgcw3oj6ceg@jetable.org. Then we can use regular email. That address is only good until 9:40PM Tuesday.

I currently have an exchange student from Germany staying with us. Yes, we do have guardianship. I'd ask the boy if he's interested in advancement. Most likely he has no idea what it's about and really is just interested in how Americans have fun and what camping is. He's here to learn our culture, not get Eagle. After one campout he may be done with it or he may really enjoy it. Give him a handbook, sign stuff off so he can be part of a patrol, and don't worry about it. He'll be gone before summer camp and will never get close to Eagle. Explain to him what the PoA means to us and ask him what he wants to do about it (stand respectfully or participate) This is an opportunity for your troop. Ask if he'll give a presentation to the troop about his country. He does have a presentation prepared. I'd wait a month or two until he's a bit more comfortable with English. If he is from mainland China, he may be very subtle about talking about his government. Don't push him. But I've never heard of mainland Chinese exchange students.

I'd say there can be passion without religion, look at PETA, or the vitamin junkies at Whole Foods.. Passion can be a good thing, art, running, gardening, one's spouse, boy scouts.... Passion isn't the problem, the problem is when passion spills over into telling others how to live when they don't agree.

The sad part was I didn't even realize this until my son was close to Eagle. At the time I thought I had a long way to go. Totally clueless as a youth. Now, I fully support Eagle coaches

The only MB I had left to do for Eagle was Cit in the World, and I was living overseas at the time....

I should learn to keep my mouth shut. I went to the meeting about rebuilding the camp and I gave them a synopsis of everything we talked about here, and they loved it. The good news is they want to start off small and slowly change it over a few years. The bad news is I have to figure it all out. Stay tuned.

One scout from my troop went and he enjoyed it. Only negative was the miles to get to some events. He couldn't do some of the events because of the time required to get there. Maybe 20,000 cheap bikes spread all over the place next time? What was great was he had no problem with the heat. At summer camp he ended up at the medic with pretty severe dehydration. It wasn't that he wasn't drinking enough water but wasn't getting enough salt. I had electrolyte tablets but he didn't like the taste as his stomach was already upset. He did ok with gatorade. When he was getting ready for jambo his mom offered him gatorade packets but he said he only wanted the electrolyte tablets "because Mr R said they were better." It warms my heart to know that once in awhile a kid listens to me.

How about a game called "human pin ball." I'm not sure what the rules are but it sounds about right. We did human foosball and it was great. I tried a version of quidditch with 3 balls with webelos. That was a bad idea. Two boys looking at two different balls running into each other.