MattR

I remember running around for smoke shifters and sky hooks. I tried to restart it and got a "that's hazing" lecture. Everyone is my troop would like to keep it going, though. We sat down at one point and talked about the rules of when to let the scouts in on the deal.

Do this at Berkeley and the camp fires would blend in with the burning cars. (Sorry, tasteless, but...) I could see it being a fun change, once every few years. Cardboard canoes are also a lot of fun.

Yes. Maybe a 3 month long course would do it. And the flip side is if the course doesn't send something home with the scouts then the adults don't know how to emphasize what was taught. So I like the idea of a course just for teaching the adults patrol method. There's another issue here. Today's scouts have much less experience at dealing with each other than scouts did 40 years ago. They don't have any experience at dealing with people problems because they aren't allowed to deal with people problems. The default behavior is to just ignore any difficulty and hope it goes away on its own. The biggest challenge I had was getting scouts to just try. If they'll try - anything - then the rest is easy. It's easier to work with a dictator than a scout that's afraid to rock the boat. It takes a lot of time and impatient parents that don't understand this will be a problem.

Maybe if your trees look like grass, and you rub it like an elk. I've never heard an entomologist say that ticks jump out of trees. Ticks do not jump or fly. Most of their pray is about 18" off the ground so they stay around there. Ticks are in grass and once they get on you they walk upwards till they find a good place to bite. Lots of ticks like scalps.

That sounds like a hoot. Please let us know if it's a good read when you're done.

"You can't always get what you want But if you try sometimes you just might find You get what you need." Keith Richards & Mick Jagger I agree that ironically kids are less social with all the social software tools out there. While they might like teamwork less than before, companies are desperate for people that can work in groups. Even software, the quintessential nerd activity, requires a lot of teamwork these days. I guess all this applies to families as well. So the need is there. But your point is well taken, scouts have fewer chances to learn how to interact with other people than before and consequently struggle with it. I see a lot of scouts struggle with leadership because they don't have a clue how to deal with disagreements. So they don't and problems fester. People problems seem to be the biggest challenge they have and so there's a lot of walking them through the process. What is really rewarding is when they do start figuring it out. Also, introverts can do quite well in teams. They just need a job that can be done by one person. That's another challenge I see. Patrols are like soccer teams. When they're young it's swarm ball. Everyone is trying to do the same thing. As they get better they realize different players have different jobs. So I'd say yes, it's a bigger issue, but it's even more important than before to make patrols work.

I'd really like to see the type of challenge you describe for klondike and camporees as well. Get everyone excited about it. The district has tried a few times and the response is not so great. Some scouts are all in for competition but some just don't like it. Part of that is that some kids are good at some things and not good at others. I'd like to see ideas for patrol competitions that require all sorts of abilities. Does anyone know of resources for that?

I remember when band was about music. This brings up an important point. Most extracurricular activities are based on a competitive model. Scouting is not competitive. It's challenging and it's about community. It takes time to develop. There are no seasons. There is no major event that everything is culminating towards - after which point everything starts over. Scouts doesn't start over. We don't want patrols reformed every year. It takes time to create that identity or that bond that brings scouts together, where they want to be together. It's not like a sport where x number of players are needed, each is given a job by the coach and he does it. Scouts can't get jammed into this model. Using the sports terminology, If the coach is picking players then there's a huge problem. We want the scouts to come up with their own schedule, have a never ending season, develop their own game plan, design their own plays, solve their own problems, and define what the rules of their game is. And every player needs to do this. This takes time and finesse. I certainly agree with this but there are external pressures making this harder .... There is a certain minimum participation level required for a patrol to be cohesive. If that level is not met then friendships fall apart, there's even less reason to participate, and it becomes a vicious cycle. Mandatory participation from a wide range of extracurricular activities is making this much harder on patrols. This is why I set participation requirements that were against the GTA. I want scouts to do other things outside of scouting so I made them fairly lax. But at the same time I want scouts to decide that if they want to be involved then they need to commit some time to this. I don't care what a scout's goals are. Motivation may come from rank, high adventure, working with youth, service. It doesn't matter. But the program doesn't really work if there's not a minimum participation.

That could be true. I was just thinking of the scouts that can get Eagle by 18, they could be good leaders. And not adult leaders. Look at the UK model and it seems that they go to 21 and it's those older scouts that do a lot with the younger scouts. Yes, college and life does make scouts move but that could be a nice way to mix up some experience. The adults would have to get used to it but that's okay.

This is just my opinion, but Venturing seems to be suffering from the same problems that Boy Scouts has, only it's worse. Namely, scout leadership is even more important in venturing, because there's no advancement carrot such as Eagle, and yet the venturing scouts I've seen have no more leadership skills than the boy scouts. It takes a certain amount of self motivation to make things happen. Without it scouts just sit and wait for someone else to do do it. The parents aren't around in venturing to run things. That's why I think fixing venturing will fix boy scouts. This has little to do with coed.

Jobs can be an issue but rarely. The fumes thing is a farce. The points above about how other activities have strict attendance is very true in my area. It's why we've made attendance requirements for ranks above and beyond. But more likely it's the impact of puberty, and I don't mean girls. There seems to be a gap between childhood and adulthood, roughly 14- to 16++, where boys' brains are just mush. My theory is they're starting to see the size of the world and trying to figure out how they fit in. Consequently they struggle making decisions and commitments. If I can get them to stay until they are close to 17 then suddenly everything gels and they are incredibly fun, capable, and they really get it. They can more easily self motivate. Then they graduate and move away and I start over. That's why I like the idea of raising the age to 21 for boy scouts.

Just for arguments sake, let's assume TAHAWK's better product is created. Strong focus on the boy led, patrol method, outdoor skills, where adults are just trying to work themselves out of a job by developing great youth. In this scenario what would the impact be of adding girls to the boy program? The boys own this. Some would like having girls around and some wouldn't. And just the same, some girls would like having boys around and some wouldn't. Sounds like a good problem not to be wasted on adults. Most of my concerns with girls in the program are mitigated by having a strong youth led program. Unfortunately, the evidence suggests this would be micromanaged from above.

Can't say, but here's the scoutstuff.org phone number: 1-800-323-0736

@@John the Xcar, your complaint that there's too much focus on advancement, that advancement has become the aim of scouting, annoys a lot of people not in LDS units as well. Very well said. I don't know if this is possible but if the LDS church drops boy scouts is there anything preventing you from starting a regular troop?

Good points, Skip. But I'd gauge where the scouts are before talking about it. A lot of kids are not affected by the 24hr news cycle because they're more interested in playing video games. At the same time, if a kid is in shock about it then telling them to ignore it is not going to help. You have to accept where they're at. So maybe "go enjoy a rare day of sunshine, but if you're really upset by this then let's talk." Every problem is an opportunity so who knows, maybe a discussion about the scout law might also help. When 9/11 happened I was a den leader and what we mostly did was just watch the kids for unusual behavior. I think all the parents in my den just turned off the TV when their kids were around so the kids didn't see much. Kids talking doesn't have nearly the impact of seeing it on TV so we never even brought it up at den meetings.

Yes. The MB counselor decides when it's done. And that means nobody else needs to see a worksheet, or that one is required. Just a hunch, but does this troop not use blue cards and uses a worksheet instead? The blue cards are the correct way to do it but ... if there's room for a counselor's signature on the worksheet then maybe your troop twists the rules just a bit for their own convenience. Sounds silly to me but there are much worse things.

I wonder what "politically conservative" means. Is it pressure to conform? If that's the case then Japan and Sweden are much more conservative than the US. Is it religious participation? If so, look at Africa or India or most of South America, they are much more devout. Or maybe conservative is that people stay in their social band. When was it that the UK finally got rid of the hereditary members in the House of Lords? How about acceptance of immigrants? I saw some political ads in Berlin last year that were rather blunt in their condemnation of Turks. This is what, 2 or 3 generations after they were first invited to Germany? In the news today I read that 2 men were caned in Indonesia for having gay sex. What about a country like Russia, where state propaganda has made a free press a joke? Is Russia considered conservative? And yet, all these countries have coed scouts. Maybe it's something else. The US certainly has its issues but I've seen enough of the world to know that most people, all over the world, want the same things. They might be used to different cultures so their approach to getting those things might differ, but they all want the same things.

Here's a shorter, slightly different version: decide what the maximum amount of describe, discuss, and explain should be for any rank or MB, and then stick to it. Hint #1, it should be a lot less than what it is now. Hint #2: kids like to do. It seems that each of T21 class have had an added page of requirements, not to mention Scout rank, without any increase in hands on skills. MBs are worse. It's a giant buzz kill. And, to get back to the OP, it makes summer camp boring.

It looks to me like there are two issues. One is some of the scouts are very competitive while others are not. The other is that some scouts, in this case the competitive ones, are very aggressive and assertive. First, the competitive and non competitive scouts. I would not try to make the competitive scouts less so, or the non competitive scouts more so. That's who they are. Some people would rather challenge themselves than compete with other people. There are different ways that people motivate themselves. By the time they're 16 you'll likely be happy with any way at all to motivate them Anyway, I'd treat them individually and see what works. If they want to split then let them. The challenge is to keep ahead of them and provide enough opportunities to each style. The second issue is something I'd put my foot down on. I don't care how a scout motivates himself, he can not do so at the expense of disrespecting the Scout Oath and Law. There's an idea in scouting called reflection that might help here. After every event each group of scouts, in this case a den, talks about what went right, what went wrong, and what they'd like to change in the future. While the scouts want to talk about things it's really good to get them to talk about the Scout Law, or how the scouts interacted with each other. The challenge for the den leader is to keep the discussion from getting personal. Telling a scout he's a loser because he doesn't want to compete is not acceptable because you can't tell some kid he's a loser, it has nothing to do with competition. Some scouts want to compete and some don't and that's fine. If you want to compete then politely ask around to find someone you want to compete with. As for aggressive behavior towards adults, that's also not acceptable. Make clear boundaries and consequences. And treat all the scouts the same.

How about having each executive spend time with a randomly selected unit? I'm not sure it would help for the same reason you mention that going to summer camp wouldn't work. I'm not sure how many of these executives understand how the program works. I looked at the BSA "Game Plan for 2016." http://slideplayer.com/slide/10781510/The emphasis is: Membership, people that work at national, IT infrastructure, finances, and high adventure bases. There is nothing about helping units, or improving the program. The closest they have is membership numbers and high adventure bases. They don't see a problem.

If you're stuck in the woods on a snowmobile: Pull the spark plug, still connected to cable, and crank the engine. You'll get a spark. Even if the tank ran dry there's enough gas left that you can pull some out and start a fire. I've known a few people to use this. I make my scouts start all their fires with a hot spark, just to appreciate a match. It also forces them to set the wood up right. The best I've had luck with is drier lint and vaseline, but the vaseline needs to soak into the lint.

I've seen that before. More often I've seen the leader that gets frustrated and bitter and angry. I just knew I had to leave before that started happening. I've had some great experiences and that's what I want to remember. I have a hunch these problems come from different personalities. I may not be the leader anymore but I'd like to keep helping. I can't do that if I'm angry or burned out.

I'm about to step down and I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to be the new SM's biggest fan. Anyone that comes to me will get "do I look like the SM?" If anyone comes to complain I will tell them in no uncertain terms that they didn't volunteer so they should help out or shut up. The reason being is that when I started the previous SM did leave and a few people that saw it as a chance to get their way. It became a pain for a year until I finally convinced them that I was, indeed, the SM. I would like to help the new guy so he doesn't have to go through this. If I have to I will be the bad guy so he can get his feet under him, but I don't think it will take much more than pulling some adults aside and talking to them. People still respect me so if I tell them the new guy really knows what he's doing they will help out.

I tried very hard not to treat my son any differently than any other scout. I told him not to get eagle for me, but for him. I did not sign off on anything for him. The adults that did were those that did not have scouts in the troop anymore. I told them not to give him a break. At the same time I didn't want to hold him up to a higher standard. During his last 6 months he did start to pull away from scouts and I respected that. And yet, I had the best memories with him. We had a lot of fun. He went on more campouts than just about everyone else mainly because I was driving anyway. The adventure side of scouting was, and still is, his favorite. I can't keep up with him and it makes me so happy. When he was 18 he told me that when he was 16 I was not so smart but now (when he was 18) I had gotten a lot smarter. When he was 20 he told me he knew what scouting was really about. In a few weeks he'll be 26, and I'll finally be stepping down. It's been a good adventure, but having my son there was the best part. I tell parents that scouting is an opportunity to have fun with their sons, like no other activity. On a 40 hour campout I might have only seen my son for an hour or two, but it was magic. @@Chadamus, enjoy this opportunity.

You're right in that they shouldn't camp where they're not prepared. But it's not just gear. More likely it's knowledge. If your troop can find someone that can show the scouts all the tricks of staying warm and dry in cold weather (I've done 19 below) then that's one more challenge the scouts can learn from. The gear we use is not a lot different from what we call typical in the Spring and Fall. There's just more of it.