meschen

Good to hear. Hope he's having a great summer.

Does anyone know why Clark Green's podcast and website have gone silent? Nothing posted for a couple of months.

I agree that they are more than capable, its just a matter of timing. We got the Webelos just before their first campout and we were focused on the "getting ready to camp" skills, new patrol formation (names, flags etc) and the routine campout planning activities. Our goal has always been to get Scout done by our May Court of Honor and by sending this requirement home to the parents it was easier to get that done.

Scouts bridged in late May. We've got 6 out of 7 their Scout rank. The last one has one knot tying requirement open. I "dumped" the Cyberchip on the parents along with the rest of the youth protection requirement we've always told the Scouts to do at home. Most of the new Scout have been on at least a couple of camp outs, plus 5 attended summer camp. With a bit of luck, we should get the majority their tenderfoot at our September court of honor. Looking at the new first class requirements, we're going to be lucky if we get any of the to first class in their first year.

All but one of them pulled their kids too.

We had a trip planned this last weekend and I had 7 parents signed up as drivers, In the last 48 hours before the trip, 3 of my drivers cancelled and a fourth simply didn't show up to the departure location. If one of the drivers who was signed up didn't have the opportunity to borrow a mini-van, we would have left Scouts behind in the parking lot.

If you're covering summer camp, I don't think $480 will go that far.

I’m curious what units spend per Scout each year and what they charge in dues. I’ve run a rough budget and figure we’re spending ~$275 per Scout. This covers most camping costs except summer camp. How does everyone’s unit compare? We haven’t collected dues in decades, but our primary funding source doesn’t scale with growth so our increase in the number of Scouts over the last couple of years has caused us to eat through our reserves. We’re going to be very close to $0 when fundraising begins at the end of June, with just enough funds remaining to cover our commitments for summer camp. I can't see us surviving on what we expect to raise this year, so we're going to need to go the annual dues route for the first time. What does your unit charge in dues?

If you want to know if they are approved for camp use, I'd e-mal the camp director. Send him the link. And save his e-mail response :-). Those look like they'd make a great pair of camp shoes for a Scout taking boating related merit badges at summer camp, assuming they dry quickly. But I never assume anything regarding camp policy. One thing I've learned is it is best to ask first on maters such as these.

We accept payments via our SOAR website in combination with PayPal. It's popular for the smaller stuff (say $30 to $50). We tack on a fee to cover the PayPal charge, so it isn't as popular with summer camp payments.

Two Scouts isn't a Patrol. It also makes for a lot more work at meal times since there aren't several Scouts to share the load. For our Troop, if a Patrol doesn't have four or five Scouts, they become "guests" of another Patrol for the weekend. One other thing, if you're getting only 5 Scouts to attend a camp-out from a Troop of 30 Scouts, you should probably looking at why your turn-out is so low.

Looks to me more like a website design error than inconstant uniform policy.

This looks like a website design error. The boarder around the patch at the top of the page indicates the patch is required, but if you hover your mouse over the patch it says "It is not required for uniform wear, but makes a handsome addition." Lower on the website, the patch is not included on the list of "essential" patches. (Edit - just noticed Stosh posted the exact same thing)

Agree 100%. If you haven't counseled them on their Scout Spirit before, now is not the time to start. Look at the first three words of your third sentence. "The good kids..." That is your answer. Look at the first sentence on http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/BoyScouts/OrderoftheArrow.aspx. Scout. Scout spirit should be primarily about how you live the Scout Oath and Law in your daily lives.

This is a rhetorical question: but one you should think about while rebuilding your pack. Why did the Pack fall apart? What needs to be fixed? I'm reading between the lines but since all you have is another Webelos Leader, it looks like everyone else aged out and you had a recruiting failure. Perhaps that is the first thing to look at repairing. IMHO, relatively speaking, recruiting Tigers and Wolves is the easiest thing for a Pack committee to do. Unfortunately, the most difficult task for the Committee is recruiting Den Leaders for those same Scouts. OTOH, if the Scouts and their leaders left before the end of their Webelos year, then you have a program issue and need to find a way to offer a full program. Either way, I'm not sure you're looking at one year to put a strong pack together. It takes a while to build the institutional knowledge and experience on a pack leadership committee until a pack can run on its own momentum.