MNBob

As I said when we joined in 2005, the handbook still had Scouts earning their Tiger badge before the Bobcat badge. And our Pack treated Blue & Gold as the Tigers graduating into the Pack. A site like http://www.troop97.net/bsahist2.htm#cubs doesn't mention the full integration and it was last updated in 2009. The online advancement system our Council provides only allows you to record Bobcat, Wolf, Bear, Webelos and Arrow of Light for rank advancements. The roster still separates "Tiger Cubs" from "Cub Scouts". I'm just pointing out that many places have not caught up to the "official" program and it's 2010.

As a second year Webelos den leader this past Scouting year I had the same concerns as CPAMom at the start. As it turned out we did not add any new scouts but this was my plan if some had indeed joined in September: 1. Explain to the Scout and parent that my goal for them was to earn their Webelos badge. If the Scout was especially motivated he could also plan to try to earn his Arrow of Light as well. 2. During some den meetings I would have included some activities that applied to the Citizen and Fitness badges even though the rest of the Scouts were finished with those badges. 3. The "third" badge would have been one that no Scout had yet earned that we'd work on as a den. 4. The new Scout would obviously be included and signed off on all arrow of light requirements that we worked on even if he wasn't planning to earn it.

Put me in the cold-hearted bastage den leader category. To those who way Cub Scouts is not about advancement then why is the Cub Scouts 2010 program changing entirely to den meeting plans that lead towards advancement? I can only go by my own experience but the dens that have advancing boys stick together while those that do not spend much time working on requirements have had the most turn over in our Pack. I'll go out of my way to communicate with parents about what their Scout needs to complete in order to advance. I'll send reminders ad nauseum until I feel like I'm actually being a pest. As a Webelos leader I've had my Scouts share completed requirements in front of the whole den so that others could learn from what they did and possibly think "Oh, that's what I need to do". When a Scout has trouble articulating what he actually did (sometimes leading me to wonder if he truly did all of the work) I provided helpful prompts sometimes to the point of answering my questions for them. I then signed off. At the same time if a Scout didn't do anything to complete a requirement I wasn't going to give them credit just to avoid hurt feelings at awards time. I made that very clear to Scouts and parents. For those of you who seem to think that participating is all it takes does every single Webelos scout earn Arrow of Light and Super achiever simply for being a member of the den until cross over?

I realize they are integrated. But I find that lots of information online has not caught up with the changes. I suppose most of what I'm talking about is not BSA official (ceremony ideas and such). And most likely my Council hasn't yet allocated money to fix the internet advancement system.

My oldest son is a second year Webelos Scout nearing cross over. When he joined as a Tiger in 2005 Tigers were still "the year before Cub Scouts". He earned his Tiger badge before his Bobcat badge. The following year the handbook changed and Tigers earned their Bobcat first and Tigers became the first year of Cub Scouting. I only found that out because I remember being surprised when the new Tigers earned their Bobcat before our Wolf den. Yet even with this change almost everything I've seen still treats Tigers as outside of Cub Scouts. Our online Council advancement system still only records ranks starting with Bobcat and followed by Wolf, Bear, Webelos, Arrow of Light. Considering the Northern Star council is currently piloting a new Lions (kindergarten) program I'd hope the rest of Cub Scouts would catch up with the fact that the Tiger rank has replaced Wolf as the first official year. Hopefully the new Cub Scouts 2010 (http://www.scouting.org/CubScouts2010.aspx) program will be the start of this.(This message has been edited by MNBob)

I don't know for sure, but I am willing to bet that part of the issue here is that we are in blue & gold season. For reasons I don't understand, many (most?) pack leaders are under the impression that rank awards should be presented at blue and gold, come hell or high water.I agree completely. When we first joined our Pack 5 years ago this was the big push (all ranks by B&G). Not only does it make it difficult for some dens to finish in time but also it tends to change Blue & Gold from a party to a long advancement ceremony. We have since changed things and hold a "graduation" pack meeting in May. Scouts may have earned rank badges earlier but we hand out new neckerchiefs and the next rank handbooks to all of the current Tigers, Wolves and Bears. Re: earning Tiger badges. One large part of Tiger requirements is the family portion. While I agree completely that attending and participating even if the Scout does not really seem able to complete the requirement is good enough to sign off for in person requirements, I fail to see how that would apply to the other non den requirements. At the same time every den leader runs into the parent who suddenly turns in a fully completed book or list of requirements knowing full well that some of those at home, family requirements probably were not done. But that counts too. It's not the kids fault mom/dad wasn't willing to assist them with their requirements. And it's definitely not worth the fight for a den leader to suggest the parent might be lying. Now if the Scout continues on to Webelos things may get a little more difficult once the den leader is the person who signs off on all requirements but that doesn't apply to Tigers (or Wolves or Bears).(This message has been edited by MNBob)

The registration problem had nothing to do with browser or machine. The site must have been having email problems for a couple of months. Since email wasn't being sent new users could not register.

I've quickly picked up on most of the acronyms but I have to ask, what does IH stand for?

The point I was trying to make (poorly) with my example situation is that if you have den leaders who don't care what is going on with the Pack or how their decisions impact the rest of the Pack it's hard to ask them to do things at Pack meetings. And if you keep asking and they keep ignoring there isn't much else you can do. Individual examples might have easy (on the surface) solutions but deeper issues are more difficult. Perhaps that makes me a bad leader/Committee Chair but I don't see anyone else wanting to volunteer for the position. Tonight the Cubmaster will come to the committee meeting and the two other committee leaders will come late. And you are correct that they didn't both have to go to the den meeting (one specifically said he was going for 2-deep leadership) but that was the choice they made. I know the den in question will not have either of their leaders at the committee meeting. I'll just continue to try to "do my best". (This message has been edited by MNBob)

Well, if its a consolation, picking the new Cubmaster or Scoutmaster etc is not the function of the Committee. Selection of adult leaders is the COR's job Where do you find that responsibility listed? http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/CubScouts/AboutCubScouts/ThePack/chorr.aspx Pack Committee http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/CubScouts/AboutCubScouts/ThePack/pcomm.aspx Regardless of the size of the pack committee, these responsibilities must be performed: - Make recommendations to the chartered organization for final approval of pack leadership. - Recruit the Cubmaster and one or more assistant Cubmasters, with the chartered organization's approval. To me that points to the CO as ultimately being responsible for selecting leaders with help from the COR and the Pack Committee.

Dens only make it happen if the den leaders are interested. If Den Leaders do not come to leader meetings and do not respond to requests for their dens to "do something" that something doesn't get done. How do you deal with that? Do you embarrass the den at the Pack meeting by saying "Ok it's now time for Den 5 to perform their skit. Oh I guess they didn't prepare a skit. Next." In the end that doesn't solve the problem of lack of leader participation. Prime example of a situation that I'm not sure how to handle. Tonight is our monthly parents/committee meeting. These meetings have been on the Pack calendar since September. One of the dens scheduled a den meeting tonight (and never put it on the calendar). So now I have 5 parents (den leader and assistant den leader, Cubmaster and 2 committee leaders) who have overlapping meetings. The Den Leader is out of town so he wouldn't be coming to the committee meeting anyway. But the Cubmaster and 2 committee leaders are stuck. No one even told me there was a scheduling issue until Tuesday night. It's these types of situations that completely frustrate me and then I start to wonder if I'm overreacting.

As your response inferred we do have some issues but I'd rather not discuss them here. We're working on them and hopefully things will get resolved. However your comment Then assign the no-show dens the tasks of bringing snacks, set-up, and clean-up, for the next Pack meeting. did pique my interest. I'm curious if other units have tried this kind of punitive response? I admit that I've considered this type of reaction but I always decided against it as I figure it won't really solve anything and instead will make the situation worse. IMO accountability is the toughest thing to have in a volunteer organization. You can't fire anyone. And if you ask someone to step down what do you do when you don't have a replacement available? In Cub Scouts it's often not too difficult to see when a den is failing as the result of poor den leadership. But if no other parents want to take over the job what do you do?

I'm excited about this new program. While searching for scouting related forums it was this thread that caught my attention and made we want to join here which I was finally able to do after the server email problems were fixed. However I was a little discouraged when I contacted our DE and she wasn't aware of it. She forwarded my email to some other people at the Council but I still haven't received any responses. Kind of suprised me that a brand new program is rolling out "nationally" and I haven't received a reply from anyone at my Council who has any details. The DE did point out that it sounded like Fast Tracks. That made me look up Fast Tracks which I also wasn't aware of. I was shocked to find the program online via the Council with planned meetings available. I wish I had known about this as it really would have helped some our den leaders. My den is crossing over in March and we've essentially used this type of program on our own without knowing that it had an official name (Fast Tracks and now Cub Scouts 2010). From a high of 16 Scouts we will cross over 11 (a 12th would have also but he moved last month). Between first year Webelos and this year we lost 4 Scouts (one Pack transfer, one dropped due to too many activities, and two dropped which didn't surprise me as the boys didn't seem to have the interest). Until this past year we had only gained Scouts other than some drops between Tigers and Wolves. I think two monthly den meetings that focus on achievements does work as long as you can still mix in some fun as well. I do know that program helps never worked for us as weekly meetings were just not practical. Heck, we've had some dens drop to only meeting once per month. Unfortunately those have been the dens who are struggling and don't feel connected to the Program. I really want to make 2 meetings a minimum for the Pack next year. I hope our Cubmaster agrees.

On the other side of the coin, you as a unit leader should try to engage your CO whenever possible if you wish to improve relations. An old thread with some tips can be found at http://www.scouter.com/forums/viewThread.asp?threadID=257086 Thanks for the tips. I recently have made an effort by inviting our COR to our first 2010/2011 planning meeting as well as our Blue & Gold which is March 7. Haven't heard a response yet but the invite was recent so we'll see.

I noted your emphasis on "all" and I agree that everyone working together is the ideal situation. But reality is not always ideal and in our case not all of the leaders are interested in Pack planning. We're not even able to get all leaders to attend committee meetings. I've made many attempts to be inclusive but at this point I realize the best course of action is to focus on the leaders who wish to participate and then we'll tell the other leaders what we've decided.

Our Pack had the unpleasant experience of going through 4 Cubmasters in two years. The third Cubmaster was in the role for just over a year but he did not believe in doing any planning or meeting prep and relied on others to take care of that if they felt it necessary. No one looked forward to Pack meetings and the lack of effort showed in what was delivered. During that period I was the Webelos I Den Leader and Pack Secretary. The Committee Chair and I tried our best to make things work with the Cubmaster but it was a struggle. In the latest year (09-10) I took over as Committee Chair (and still am the Web II Den Leader). In August we had a volunteer for Assistant Cubmaster. We talked that person into becoming the Cubmaster in November after telling the previous Cubmaster that we could not continue to function if he was unwilling to do any planning. Fortunately our new Cubmaster is committed and she is doing a great job. So now we are in the process of tentatively planning for next year while doing our best to get the current year completed (we've had other issues that took a back seat to finding a committed Cubmaster). Having been in the position where I was sometimes feeling like I had to be the acting Cubmaster I'm now trying to figure out the best way to divide responsibilities between Cubmaster and Committee Chair. I know the former is in charge of the "program" and working with the Scouts in the overall Pack. I'm trained and I've read the responsibilities multiple times. But on paper there seems to be a lot of overlap. I want to come up with a practical break down of responsibilities and I'm curious what others have found to work well. Going into next year we will have a Treasurer, a Membership Chair and hopefully an Outings/Camping Chair to help the Cubmaster. I see my primary areas to concentrate on as committee meetings, leader recruiting, re-charter, dealing with leadership issues (if any, hopefully none next year, please, thanks! ) and training (I doubt we'll have a Pack Trainer). The Cubmaster will concentrate on Pack meetings and outings. We will be getting together soon to discuss all of this prior to a March "mandatory" committee meeting with existing leaders and new leaders who will be replacing the leaders who are crossing over. Fortunately the most important lesson I've learned since I've been involved is that communication is the key. If leaders are not communicating with each other or if leaders are not communicating with parents bad things tend to happen.

I'm not positive that this thread belongs under the Council Relations topic but no other topic jumped out at me either. First an introduction. Our Pack (http://www.pack589.org) has been in existence since 1972. We had been chartered by a home owners association but ever since my son joined as a Tiger (and in the recent past just before that from what I learned) we never truly had an Org Rep and we did not have any relationship with the Charter Org except on paper. Last March we changed charter orgs to the local Lions Club. We now have a Charter Org Rep but we still don't have a strong relationship. We have been "independent" for so long that we're used to funding ourselves and finding our own meeting location. When we were looking for a new partner we had hoped to find an organization that would be able to provide us with meeting space but that did not work out. But at least we finally have a charter org that can give us some storage space. Introduction over, my question is whether or not our experience is typical or atypical? Are charter orgs usually involved with their units. Is the chartered organization rep engaged with the unit? Do reps usually come to committee meetings or other unit events?

I often use the term "my" in this context. If someone thought poorly of me for using that term I could care less. Frankly, I'd consider the person questioning my use of the term "my" as the person who has the problem.

I worded that poorly. I should have asked the following questions: Before a Scout earns his Totin chip can he use a pocket knife with the troop he joins? Will the troop require that he has a whittling chip or does that only apply to Cub Scouts?

When a Webelos Scout crosses over to Boy Scouts does the Scout need to have a whittling chip to use a pocket knife in the troop? Does he have to wait for the Totin chip?

AIM: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AOL_Instant_Messenger ICQ: http://www.icq.com/ (kind of the first big messenger service) Website would be a place to put the URL of your own personal web site.

I just tried it. I think it's just an odd interface. Clicking the "Continue" button saves the information. Your public profile gets updated. For you I see: Location: Pennsylvania Council Name: Keystone Area District Name: Current Scouting Positions: ASM Past Positions you've held: Tiger and Webelo leader Interests: Founded a troop. I like an organized & fair troop. If a boy has initative he should be rewarded for it.

Ditto. Glad the email is working again.

Thank you BrenAllen. I was finally able to join today.