MattR

We've tried high adventure as bait and it didn't do what we'd hoped for. Another thing I have noticed is scouts that don't have a couple of good scouting friends by the time they're 14 won't last. And those friendships take time to develop. I don't think the scouts are so much against the OA as they just don't see making friendships. Walking into a new group of scouts when you have friends in your troop that you're used to is a hard sell. My guess is that when the OA was highly respected a scout would just suck it up and make it work. Then the friendships had time to develop. I have no idea how to raise the level of respect for scouts in the OA. My troop is brutally honest about who they elect. The scouts that are elected do have the best character. It is not a social thing at all. But once they're elected, something is missing.

Just a thought, but does part of the demise of the OA have to do with poor leadership skills of the scouts? I look at my local chapter's OA and the scouts that show up are good scouts, but they're all shy, timid, not ready to take charge. If they had confidence in how to get things done there are adults that would like to help them out. Instead they're kind of waiting for someone to tell them what to do. The result is any other scout that comes to check it out doesn't really see a reason to stick around. Would leadership development within OA help?

If your treasurer is any good it's possible to have multiple accounts under the same bank account. A troop should likely have multiple accounts anyway so adding another set for a different troop shouldn't be too hard. We have an account for HA, summer camp, gear, etc. It ties to our budget.

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."

Our story: We have some girls and parents that will bridge to scouts in a year. Some of the moms really do a lot of outdoor activities. We were worried about a split troop until we heard that last part. We have time but the current thinking is essentially EDGE for the parents and the scouts. A temp SM/ASM's with an expiration date while the moms get up to speed and take over. We'll teach them our program. Shared gear and committee. Separate PLC, separate calendar, with the hope that weekends mostly line up. If we go to the same area there's no reason the two troops have to do the same thing. If the girls want to canoe and the boys want to backpack, so be it. I'm hoping this encourages the boys to understand that their patrols can do different things on a campout.

Unless they owe you or you work at national I don't think this will change anything. This is about restructuring debt, which is code for owing less. I doubt national actually owes much they could sell, otherwise they would have already sold it. Restructuring the leadership at the top might be a good thing, though. But I don't know who would do that. We should volunteer!

Kind of a long shot, but if the boat is mostly used for personal use, then figure out the ratio and say it's fair for those that used it for their own use to pay that share of the $4000. How many scouts are in this troop and how much does the troop have in the bank? ($4k is huge for any troops I know of.) Also, what percentage of the families are upset about this?

I was worried about that, as was our troop when asked about starting a girls troop. In fact, there are a number of moms of web 1's that do a lot of outdoor stuff and are very interested. They're all younger moms, though. (When I meet parents in their 30's it really makes me feel old.) Anyway, I said I'd help start the troop assuming that there would be a mom taking over as SM after a year and wanted to do the outdoor program. We have a half year or so to figure things out. I think it will help the patrol method and I can't think of a better way to illustrate different patrols doing different things then having different SM and SPL as well as patrols with different calendars. They might drive to the campsite together (or to different campsites) but they'll be doing different activities.

If you're clever you can also creates something like http://boys.troop123.org and http://girls.troop123.org assuming you now have http://www.troop123.org.

Welcome to the forum, @epiieq1. You just made two great decisions. First, you're helping out your son's den. Second, you're asking for ideas. I haven't been a den leader for a very long time but I would say, go to round tables (monthly district meetings of scouters) and get training for being a den leader. I never did these things and that was a mistake. One more thing, stick around the forum!

Oh my! Welcome to the forum. The two best days of owning a boat: The first and the last. That's likely your best option. I don't think you have much claim to that money. It's a sunk cost that's best forgotten. One thing you might do is set up individual scout accounts, make sure there's a policy that says if you change troops you can take your money to the new troop, and then leave. Not sure what the odds of that working are, though.

In Judaism there are many terms for God (which is also not a proper name). Lord is just one of them. Father, King, Adonai, Elohim, Elohai, Adon Olam, Hashem, .....I don't know how many there are. Also, Adon is Hebrew for Lord, Adoni is my Lord, and Adonai is literally translated as my Lords. If you're getting confused as to why the plural of God is used then good for you. However, it's treated as God. There's a famous prayer/song that uses the words Avinu Malkeinu, which translates to Our Father, Our King. Two words, same God, but different views. Father is someone that looks out for their children while a King just makes decisions and, in this case, some people live and some don't. It's an intentional paradox. But to get back to your intent, the use of Lord does not bother me at all because I use it all the time. However, since you asked, let me try to politely explain what does bother me. It's the phrase "in your/his name" at the end of a scout prayer. I only hear something similar at Christian services and my understanding is it's similar to saying amen. So, when I hear it at scouts it sounds as if someone wants to end their prayer as they usually do but figure if they just drop the word Jesus then it will sound right to everyone else. To me, it doesn't.

Welcome to the forum. To answer your question, a position of responsibility for one rank has to start after the completion of the previous rank. So, if after 4 months as being Den Chief a scout becomes Star and keeps on as Den Chief for another 6 months, then yes, it does count. If, however, the First Class scout does a year as Den Chief, waits some more, and then becomes Star, he would need to do 6 more months in a POR.

The original question of this thread is whether there should be a forum on faith and chaplaincy, not what BP's intent was.

@Sablanck, but tomahawks can be used (with the correct certification.) It's still a sharp object that you can throw.

Humility always bites me in the butt when least expected. A long time ago I read a book about some famous Buddhist and he talked about beginner's mind, where one is both unsure and willing to jump in and try. This was in contrast to those that had been around for a long time and knew all the answers. It just seems to apply to this thread.

Is the quality of a camporee any different than the quality of a troop? Doesn't it depend on how it's run? I'm the district camping chair and the key seems to be to keep mixing it up. It also has to be relatively inexpensive and work with 200+ scouts. This is a lot harder than figuring it out once and then getting into a rut. All of the bad stories that have been mentioned seem to stem from people looking for a quick easy plan, and that means doing what has already been done before. Advancement is super easy to plan. But doesn't every single troop have the same problem? It takes imagination to come up with a new program and that's a fine balance between crazy and diving down into the details to guess how it will play out. There's a lot of massaging required to take an off the wall idea and make it work for hundreds of people. To be honest I don't see many people, scouts or adults, that are willing to take the time to come up with fun ideas. There are some and when I find someone that wants to run with an idea I give them whatever they want. But the vast majority of people want easy, simple, and what's been done before. Back in 2002 we had the OA running camporees and it was horrible. It was the worst type of advancement possible because the scouts were running it and that's all they knew. After that someone from my troop said he could make it more fun and he just took over. Things got much better. There is never advancement just for the sake of advancement. There are always events that involve outdoor skills. And yet, at one point a few years ago while I was SM I asked my troop and they said they weren't interested because "they just sat waiting around to do the next 10 minute event." A year ago I volunteered to run the camporees and I made a few changes. First of all I started asking scouts for ideas (this is where zombies came from). Next, I made sure we had enough throughput to handle all the patrols so there are no lines. It's simple math but it took some time to get it across to people. Next I added patrol vs patrol competition. I also push for events that last between a half hour and an hour. The schedule is also flexible. While all the scouts participate in the morning, in the afternoon some would rather hang out at their campsites and some want to do every last event. It's up to them. We also put the patrol competition as the last event, around 3pm. It tends to tie the day up nicely. The scouts also get super into the competitions. I don't think they'd like to do it all day but an hour seems to work well. Lots of intensity. Next fall we're going to have a cardboard canoe event. I'd like to figure out how to do a simulated disaster with a steam punk theme (UFO crash site, old West, semaphore for communication). Another idea is create a framework and ask for troops to take on creating an event based on certain criteria. I just want to force some scouts to see that imagination can be fun. It also takes imagination to solve problems, so it's a good skill to have. It's also really fun when it works and I see a bunch of scouts and adults having fun.

Ya know, it sounds like an event. I wanted to have a hot chocolate station. This would be a fun thing to add to it and we could video it and put the best clips on the council website.

I'd say let them camp wherever they want. Don't try and solve problems that don't exist or try and follow rules that aren't clear. The best approach to solving all sorts of camporee problems is to make the camporee fun. Scouts will put up with all sorts of things if they're having fun. Our next camporee's theme is Zombie Snowpocalypse. We will probably give extra points for anyone that can pronounce it, 10 times quickly, while eating a cracker, and maybe hanging upside down.

Could be that you don't have to fill out taxes but the rest of it's correct. Who is your CO? Assuming it's a church and that church has a kids group, would you expect them to have their own EIN number? That's the exact situation your troop is in. Unless you don't have a CO, use the CO's EIN number.

We have to raise $200/scout. Good news is popcorn goes against that and they won't ask us to make a donation.

You should be using your Chartered Organization's EIN number, as your troop is likely not it's own entity. It is also not part of the BSA. It is part of the CO and that's why you use their number. If you create your own EIN number then you'll have to fill out taxes every year as well. And get your own insurance....

My reality is that the scout in my troop that brought weed to summer camp eventually had his membership revoked. On the other hand, self centered and obnoxious scouts can eventually get their rank as well and the SM technically has little say in the matter. I understand that's the way it is but I'm not happy with it. We go on and on about the scout oath and law but they don't hold much weight when push comes to shove. I also understand it's sometimes a hard decision but that's what character is all about.

What's interesting is I asked what troops do that works and I didn't get a lot of response to that. I'm certainly not denigrating anyone. It just looks like everyone is in the same boat. Everyone uses an ad-hoc approach. We have a couple of meetings where we talk about how the troop runs and we have a section on this type of material but I'm not sure how effective it is. It's probably due to the person talking about it.

Then it's okay. I found a reference to a venturing fencing competition dated 2008. I also found a Master at Arms MB that used fencing for one of the requirements. That MB was one of the original 14. However, it was cancelled a year later.