moosetracker

Last night was our annual woodbadge dinner. I have gone for maybe 7 or 8 years now.. Nice normal type of dinner, good food, friends, fellowship.. But, normally just some normal speeches, and dinner is with everyone getting up one table at a time, to go up to the table and get their food. This year it was all changed around and different.. More fun campfire type stuff, (and alot of those on our Woodbadge staff are truely entertaining characters.) And the change to serving style was a huge improvement. They did a really fun game and it ended in someone at our table winning 2 gifts, the gift of a mug and the gift of service (they became our table server).. So the server for each table was the only one who would go to the kitchen for the food and bring it back to the table, to be served family style.. It really sped things up (but I think may have caused some waste of food).. The only problem came with the whole chocolate cream pie that came with no serving utensil.. Two at the table had fun butchering it with the plastic silverware. Well regardless of looks it tasted good! Do your Councils have an annual dinner? We hold ours in March since our Woodbadge is in October, and that is the 18 month mark for a course.. Some people get their beads earlier at a place of their choice for the ceremony (like a pack meeting, COH or something), but most get beaded at the Dinner. My son got his beads that night.. He also won the cup and was our table server.. His fianc won a belt buckle (which he knows he will get, since he likes belt buckles and she doesnt).. We also got him a green vest with the woodbadge symbol and the patch of his patrol (his fathers & my gift to him for completing wood badge..) Anyway the kid really cleaned up last night..

qwazse - Sorry I just gotta poke fun at this.. Then encourage each Anglo mom to invite each Polish mom over for dinner, or to go dress shopping, or a simple play date. You may offer to take their husbands (or other male family, they're single moms) fishing. I got this 1960's "Leave it to Beaver" image of the Moms & Dads.. How about you all going out to pizza, bowling or maybe you all can go fishing.. Unless it is that the culture has the wives still acting like "June Clever"... I just had to put a modern day spin on things.

Calico - I saw the "beyond friendship" comment too.. Thought bad of it, then revised my thoughts.. If they are two single parents, then it may be just an innocent comment about observing a possible spark. Then again, it may not be so innocent.. As to the issue, I am with others.. Either the chattering is disruptive, in which case a casual comment by the den leader would have been the proper approach.. Then raising it to an issue to be dealt with outside of the Den, and bringing in the different language as a point of problem, blew a simple fix into a big problem.. If they are chattering while 5 others seprate other conversations are also taking place, then let them be.

Good question SMT224 - I guess I would say since your troop did all you could, and informed Council, and Council did not choose to expel him totally, the bad decision is out of your hands, and you should not personalize it or make it your responsibility. I guess I in the past did something similar, that I am not proud of now. Troop we were in was really run poorly by the SM. He would put boys and scout leaders all in one large tent, use scout funds to purchase what he wanted (things for the troop, but while we raised funds for seprate tents, he would spend it for fancy stoves and what-not, so we could never get the money for the tents.) Scouting events included his family & friends not tied to scouting, and he put the boys in cars that were of friends that had no association with the troop.. The troop was going no where also. The boys had title positions, but the SM did it all including the cooking on campouts. Our son took a Den Chief position so his was the only position doing anything. One meeting of about 5 boys the SM, concentrated on a MB for two, while the other 3 had to sit and listen.. two put their head on the table & fell asleep, it was so boring. Troop consisted of SM, and me as CC, Husband and friend as commitee. CO & COR were hands-off.. After spending 6 months of being the screaming B*t*h and being up half the night pacing over things being done.. We finally pulled my son out, our friends followed, leaving the troop with only the SM and no other Adult Leadership, and I believe 2 - 3 boys (as all other boys had slowly left).. (The only person I could have fired him and replaced him with was my husband, which would have looked like favoritism) I called the COR and had breakfast with him explaining the situation. I talked to the DE and explained the situation.. Later I heard they were still continuing to try to make the troop work.. Don't know how I found out who was thinking to be CC, I am not sure if she contacted me to ask for my opinion, or if I contacted her and gave it freely.. But, I warned her not to take the poistion and why.. Later I heard the troop collapsed. To this day I regret my saying anything.. I should have left it in the hands of the DE and the COR. And if they were not going to pull the plug after all I said, I should not have continued to stick my nose in and insure the troop folded.. I really think that in that situation, I, reacted from raw emotion, and the sense that my viewpoint was the only valid viewpoint.. Yet in retrospect, I was probably not seeing the whole picture.. You put out the proper warnings, you did what you could to make sure the boy paid for whatever crime he committed.. But, somewhere along the chain of command, someone else saw some other viewpoint and for right or wrong made a decision you would not have made. Your hands are clean.. You should have a clean conscious.. If you do as I did your conscious may not feel as clean, given a year or two for your emotions to settle.. Sort of like if you want a person who did you or your family wrong put in prision, and the jury returns a not-guilty verdict, or a very short sentence.. You argued your case, you have to accept what the jury decides. It is wrong to take out a gun after the verdict and extract your own punishment.

Fooey! TwoCub! I have our district Roster in excel. I "should" be getting a new one soon. Which will only have those registered.. Now you have me rethinking what I am saving of the info on the old scouts that don't re-register.. I was just saving membership ID, name, last rank earned and Birthdate.. I was only going to hold it for about a year after they aged out of whatever program they dropped out of.. Now I am thinking to save the Cub Scouts information for about 3 years after aging out, and saving their contact information..

Ahh.. shame on me for skimming.. I read started with 1 added 2, then 2 dropped out.. Missed you were still at 3.. So I had you at the count of 1 scout.. The crossover normally happens in March.. Why are they waiting until June? It makes it hard for those new boys to feel comfortable going to summer camp with a unit they have not yet settled into. If it is only for a few months, not so bad.. If you had 3 due to the recent crossover and were planning to limp for another year.. Not so good.. But, you should start motivating your pack to do crossover on time. You also shouldn't simply depend on the Pack to be your "feeder"..

I frown on someone asking you to cook the books.. They definately do not want to loose a statistical number.. Council sometimes cooks their own books, but they are now asking the unit volunteers to do it for them. Wrong.. Sorry, but "Yes" the rules do state you need 5 scouts, 3 people on committee (CC and two others) a Committee Organization and a Committee ORganization Representative and a Scoutmaster in order to recharter. They may let you float a year, if they think the numbers will change but shouldn't for several years. Looks like your grace period has ended.. One scout does not make even a single healthy patrol. The scout is better off in a program that has him working with other scouts.. Even two, three of four is not a healthy size for a patrol. 2. Every unit must have listed: ⃞ A unit leader (Cubmaster, Scoutmaster, Varsity Coach, Venturing Advisor, Skipper or Exploring Advisor). ⃞ A committee chairman ⃞ A minimum of two committee members ⃞ A chartered organization representative (may multiple register as Institutional Head, Committee Chairman or committee member). ⃞ An Executive Officer / Institutional Head (may multiple register as charter organization representative, committee chairman or committee member; if new, write date of birth on face of recharter printout near the name). ⃞ At least one registered den leader for Cub Scout packs. We strongly recommend at least one registered den leader if Cubs (Wolf & Bear dens) are registered, one registered Tiger den leader if Tiger Cubs are registered, and one registered Webelos leader if Webelos are registered. (To assure proper supervision, the Scout Executive or designee must approve recharters with less than one den leader per approximately 10 youth or without at least one den leader for each part of the Cub Scouting program - Tigers, Cubs, and Webelos - in use by the pack.) ⃞ A minimum of 5 youth members must pay their registration fees through this unit - primary membership. (The Scout Executive or designee must approve unit with 2-4 paid youth, but with 5 or more youth total counting those paid in another unit.) Now, it sounds like you are only relying on a very small feeder pack to populate your troop. That is not very good. If you want your troop to grow, you need to offer a good program, and try to attract other boys inside and outside the pack. I do not know why they let you start with only one scout.. You should wait for the pack to have 5 webloes crossover and start up, and then go out in the community and promote.. Or go out in the community and promote, get at least 5 interested scouts, then start a troop.. AND CONTINUE TO PROMOTE... the floating should be when your 5 scouts dips to 4, but you know of 2 crossovers soon, or are planning a recruitment night soon. With a troop your size if I was in the pack I would go to the troop down the street, to allow my son to have a healthy scouting program.

I imagine you have taken the normal recomended training and found it lacking in the specific worries you have.. If not at least take that. I would suggest you seek talking one on one with someone who has already gone through the rank and is confident in the skills. Does your pack have someone? If not, I would suggest talking with your district training chair and see if maybe they can set you up with someone they know who maybe you could meet and sit down with on a one on one discussion at a roundtable or someplace else.. Also attending roundtables monthly will help give you ideas and people who you can get contacts that you ask advice from. Our forum is also always open, with many people willing to give advice. But, I think in order to get that necessary shot of confidence that you can do this, that one-on-one with someone who is already confident about the position is what would be the best.. The rest will keep your motivation up, and re-align you if you start loosing your vision.

Well there is self-centered, and there is evil.. I started the thread about the recent scouts that turned into cold blooded killers. I broke away from this thread because, although this boy and the two in the news definately did not take to heart the scout oath and law they were being taught, so there is a comparison in that. There are many many scouts like this boy who are mindlessly going through the motions for years in their scout program, to end up with a piece of paper that someone has conned them into thinking that the paper itself was the prize.. For all these scouts that are too numerous to count, I would not even suggest that all of them, could grow up to be to the level of evil as these other two in the news.. For the sake of the world let's hope not at least. I will even concede that this scout may grow up to be something someday.. In the backstabbing world of Corporate America he may find a nitch and fit right in. The problem is his place will be with all the other snakes and serpents of the world, so he had better watch his own back. I agree with pchadbo, thanks for not planning to become an adult role model for the next generation of scouts. Your attitude is not wanted.

grmaerika - I have no doubt.. Scouting did not lead to their downfall.. Now the troops program may not have been the best, so did not teach them what it should have.. Or it could have been a great program, that these two boys went through blindly, going through the motions without choosing to learn what was being taught.. But, I do not believe there is some troop that is promoting this type of behavior.. If the troop has a good program, then I feel bad for this black spot in their history.. Also the parents maybe to blame, or may not.. I do think that if all he had to point at was one time having to vacuum in his life, and not weekly chores he was forced to do week after week, like feeding the cats, or setting the table.. Well then these parents were lax in teaching them about responsibility.. I feel for the mother being put on the stand and the son trying to place the blame on her.. I just invision myself in her position. My son could point to horrible things, like making him cook a meal once a week, or having him help paint the house one summer, or my horrible punishment of making him write a report per week for a full month because he lied to me and said he had written a report he needed for school, only to fail because he never wrote it or handed it in. And now we are horrible enough to expect him to pay for his own gas and insurance for his car.. I am sure if I asked my son he would have a longer list then I about how horrible a mother I am.. You are probably more accurate that it is the "virtual" reality. As well as the shock content in many movies, and music.. Kind of makes you scared of the coming generation, huh..

It might just be of local interest.. I was wondering if any of you guys were following the news about the two scouts that had murdered a mother and left a child for dead in Mont Vernon NH? Christopher Gribble and Steven Spader (there were 4 involved, but the 2 that did the killing were the two scouts).. The kid currently on trial is the Eagle Scout.. The other already had their trial, and was found guilty, he never made Eagle, but was Life I think.. Two shining examples of why the rank of Eagle does not mean a thing unless you have learned the true value of being a scout while you are going through the motions. The first kid on trial tried to say he wasn't a part of it, although they had tons of evidence that pointed to him.. The second kid is currently trying to worm his way out of a life sentence by pleading insanity.. From all I read, he is cold blooded but not insane. He tried holding up some conseling when he was 17 as proof he was insane, but both conselors stated he was depressed and anti social, but neither diagnosed him as insane.. Then I have no clue if this was to point out he was insane, or if he really felt this was abuse.. But he pointed to his mother as abusive because she made him vacuum once when he was 6 years old.. If he did no other household chores except for this one time vacuuming, I would point to that as a reason he was so self-centered (not insane).. And how did he get through Family life if that was his one time tramatic household chore?? He also pointed to a few spankings and was once hit with a wooden spoon.. Ha.. my mom's favorite was a wooden spoon also.. And I get hit more then once, still I didn't grow up to murder anyone.. And although we kids would hide the wooden spoons in the house if we did something wrong, I can't say I felt it was abuse.. I bet the belt hurt more.. Even though now adays society frowns on physical punishment, there are alot of us kids who grew up in an era that it was exceptable, so if that was so abusive as to cause us to go insane and murder people, why were murders less frequent in that time period?? Not saying it is great to get spanked, but, it is a tramatic abuse either. So both kids not only did this horrible thing, when they were both caught.. They both tried different approaches to try to worm their way out.. There were four in all, the other two (not scouts).. are being tried with smaller sentences, because a) they didn't do the killings, although they were part of the break-in and stood outside while it took place.. b) When caught they accepted their responsibility in the act, and turned states evidence on the other two. Talk about two kids who learned nothing during their scouting years. Just went through the motions.. http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/2011/03/gribble_testifi_1.html http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Gribble%3a+%27I+was+very+controlled%27+during+murder%3b+Spader+%27looked+like+he+was+in+a+rage%27&articleId=c1380665-32d9-4936-a37f-706e42893f7a

I was thinking the same thing jet.. People float from one job to another being fired or walking out, and it is always the job that was crap, they can find no fault with themselves.. So moving, I will accept, the first 2 troops being crap & your 4th troop also being crap.. I know I am getting a one-sided version from a very one-sided person, who feels the world revolves around them. Regardless, you will get out of Scouts what you put into it. If it is nothing, then that is what you will get out of it.. And no college or company will put much worth in it either unless you are a glowing example, which you will not be. You do little things daily that get you notice, people say "Wow" then someone will comment, "yeah he's a Eagle scout".. You do nothing worthwhile, people ignore you and you muddle through life.. Or you do something totally wrong, boneheaded or illegal and people point and say "That's suppose to be an Eagle Scout" and people see no value in it what-so-ever, for you or anyone else.. People in the buisness world are not so black and white as you are at your age. You can have a Degree in teaching and have no personality for it.. You can have a Degree in computer science and not be able to analyze a computer problem.. You can have a medical degree, and not be detail oriented enough to not give the wrong medicine, or have an awful bed-side manner.. You can have the rank of Eagle, and not have a clue as to what it is to live your life by the standards.. There is many many things that you can emulate and cheat and fake your way through the paper is meaningless.. That is why everyone looks for buisness experience.. Eagle Scout just on the resume will have no more value than others putting down 4H club, Football, Track team, Hospital volunteer.. Etc.. When the person is just looking at a piece of paper. It is no more then a single point for you in extra-curricular.. If you have some parent pushing you to stay and finish due to a college app, or resume.. You can tell them, it really isn't all that.. By the way, you might want to spend some time learning to spell a little better without a spell checker.. That might help you more on your College App or resume, then a line about an Eagle rank with no substance behind it. I am by far not a perfect speller, but...

That was fantastic! Thanks for sharing!

You forgot clemlaw.. The reason the eagle rank carrying any weight in the world is due to people like this boy who cheat there way through.. Of the small percent of groups who still think well of an Eagle Scout, if they hire someone who was an Eagle Scout, and they turn out to be totally self-centered, untrustworthy and a cheat they fire him, and will not let the Eagle rank sway them for the next canadate.. fermi - unfortunatly many of your type have gone before you, and have already ruined it for you.. If you aren't in scouting for yourself, in order to improve your charactor then you are wasting your time.. Todays scouting experience is not what you can write on a resume. It is the positive attitude, good work ethic, care for others etc that will shine through.. That is what you need to learn and take away with you in scouting. That is what will be seen and valued by people. That is what will get you ahead in life while you raise a family, have a career, and be a member of the community.. That little piece of paper you are cheating your way through, will simply be a meaningless piece of paper if you have learned nothing in order to get it.. It will offer you no extra benefit.. Four troops huh?? I take it you are not fitting in? Same will be your lot in life as you jump from one job to another to another.. Your resume will be full of holes and tarnished, and that Eagle rank will look meaningless in the face of the fact you are unable to hold a decent job..

Basement - I also think you are right with holding your ground. And yes, your SM backed you up and agreed with you. Just seems through what I read, you did not discuss it with the SM first, you were presented with the kid to sign off something, made an executive decision, and then "hoped" the SM would back you up. Lucky for you he did.. All I am saying is it is best that yout, the SM, and the other ASM's discuss the situation and are all in agreement on how to tackle this problem to either fix this scout and his dad's attitude, or cut the cancer out of the troop before it spreads. I don't know if any of us are saying you should do nothing.. Even Calico. He just thinks the troop as a whole should not have let it go this far.. As for your attitude toward the boy, if he is doing all he is doing in your troop, is there any Adult leader in your troop who does not feel the kid is punk? Some may not have the backbone to stand up to the kid and his parent yet, but, who thinks his actions are just fine, normal boy actions?

Well I can go into specifics of what was wrong in our Baloo course, but it had nothing to do with the overall course.. So I will just try to stay with the overall course. All in All I think Baloo is well setup except I think too much time is spent on campfire program, and maybe not enough on cooking.. But it just may be the emphisis of the person doing the course.. But campfire program we spent more then an hour going into everything you can bring into a campfire, skits, songs, run-ons, jokes, cheers..blah blah.. It was well done, but could not help thinking this is stuff that a Pack does at any basic Pack meeting.. Just pull out the awards and put more in and you have your campfire program, any pack can pull this together with little trouble. Yet with cooking, we put together our lunch chicken wraps, someone cooked them, we ate them. Later we went out and cooked desert and while this was going on just causually talked.. Ok, what about estimating food for x amount of people, food storage, what food prep you can do ahead of time, how to break up food purchasing, how to streamline cooking for a crowd and getting food to people hot.. etc etc.. This may be just different personalities and what I think needs emphisis to what our course director thought needed emphisis.. IOLS / OWLS or Welot- I think I already commented on in the thread you split off from.. I can't wait for them to put the two together. I really don't think it is fair to send the webeloes leaders to the same course two day course twice and call it something different due to maybe a difference in program of about 1 1/2 hours.. Alot of district/councils are already combining them for good reason.. But, yes it is a fly over for those totally green, they will walk out of the course having been thrown so much information that little will be remembered, and it is a waste of time for those who know their scout skills.. The test-out is a good feature but few councils want to use it for varying reason. What I am proposing to our council I guess is not by the book, but since it is for those who would be allowed to test out.. I guess I would call it a different version of a test-out, rather then a different version of the IOLS course.

Wonderful! a scout that gets it !! He may grow up to be a SM one day himself and help a whole 'nother generation fail.. (hmmm.. that doesn't sound quite right)..

Well is the majority of your adult leaders wanting this scout to "get with the program or get out".. Or is the majority the type who want to "make no waves, so refuse to see what is going on in front of their noses".. If the majority are fed up with the boys' actions, there hope that you leadership can turn itself around and retake control of the program.. I guess you will all have to get on the same page of how you want to treat this, and move as a unified front.. Or continue to igore the problem. Calico - If Basement is the only one thinking this boy is a punk, then he may be the wrong one to address the problem, but if most the leaders think he is a punk, I wouldn't give the decision making of how to deal with the kid to the one or two adult leaders who will let the boy run them over.. It though can not work if one ASM (Basement) is the only one saying "No" while all the others let him do what he wants.. Or they are all trying different things at different times.

dewASM - Your IOLS is only offered by the Council and only once a year??.. Most places each district does IOLS and normally twice a year. If you don't like my time table, you look out of district. Our district is long and narrow, so unfortunately I can book somewhat midway, and still the northern & southern people will have to travel an hour or more.. That is the one thing I dislike about my district, most others are smaller and more square. Oak Tree - Your comments helped me.. I am trying to do something more advanced, and quicker for the seasoned Scouters.. I probably wont get the council to vote on it until May though. It was scheduled for a vote in Jan. Council Planning meeting which was called on account of snow, and the March Planning meeting just got changed to a meeting to work on University of scouting stuff for that coming meeting.. (I kind-of figured that would happen, but got confirming email today.).. I agree with you that the IOLS is too fast paced for the totally green.. But don't know how to change that, I don't think many would prefer to go to a two or three weekend long course.. But, it is a waste of time for the expirenced scouter, and best to have them come together do a quick review, and then pool their combined knowledge to teach each other advanced methods and ideas of how to make the teaching of and continual review of scout skills interesting and challenging for their units. And cut the course down to less then a day.. From the few who have heard the idea so far, I have got positive feedback.. It is just getting the meeting to discuss and vote on it.. *Sigh*

How about announcing the Leave time for about an hour before you really want to leave. Have the other boys do what is expected, not what the other boys need to do, then have extra fun with the boys who are done.. Some type of game, last trip to the pond.. Visiting with the troops nearby (if at a camporee).. Leave the other boys to dawdle, but do not lift a finger to do their work load for them. Not a perfect solution, I can see the holes in it, without others pointing them out. It may get them to speed up, because no one is doing it for them, or it may end up the troop will have a new routine of breaking camp an hour earlier then necessary and then have an hour of fun for those who get their work done quickly.

I agree with both comment by twocubdad and Seattle.. You may give a little slack to the newbie scout for one or two trips, but if things don't improve naturally, then you have risked being on a slippery slope.. (I think though the motel stay, would have been the last straw for many troops.. That is not what I call a mild need for a security blanket, until they feel secure..) The advancement is something you think of putting a stop to, because it is obvious this is what they are after with the least amount of effort. So since that is their single minded goal, you want to put the breaks on their single minded goal.. But, TwocubDad is right, the reason you are putting on the breaks is because you don't want your troop to have that single minded.. Merit badge mentality.. You might get their attention by putting the breaks on their goal.. But, you will get their attention more, if the breaks are put on their goal, because you sit them down and tell them it is because this isn't the way your troop does things, and you do not condone or encourage that type of behavior. If they wish to get the badge without the work, and without becomeing a full team member of the troop and of his patrol, then he simply will not advance here.. Then when they start book thumping and demanding you let them work the loopholes.. Then you can use the Scout Spirit as a reason why all the loopholes they find, will never get them past the rank he is in until he truely learns what scout spirit is all about.. You kind of have to get their attention by damaging their goal.. But, you should not keep it totally in the advancement.. Let them know there are 8 methods of scouting and in order to get signed off on scout spirit, he has to become aquainted with the other 7 methods.. Then list what is expected of him as well as the other boys in the troop (whom I am assuming are living up to the expectations, most times).. If they do not accept that, then there are other troops in the area, and they may be a better fit for one of them. Pull them out of their narrow perspective, to get a full understanding of what your troop is all about, and why he is not living up to your troops perspective of what scouting is all about.(This message has been edited by moosetracker)

Well Basement you at least showed spine by standing up to him on Scout Spirit.. You probably should just make sure that the main adult leaders (SM, CC, COR) will make a strong wall and they will not find a weak link to get through. Your right if you have a parent looking for the weakness in the requirements, and looking for loopholes they will find it. They are all over the place. So Scout Spirit is what you need to use to back up the difference between being a true scout, and trying to cheat the system. Also by holding him to the time he really spends (like you did).. Not counting overnights where he spent them at a motel. Only counting the time he actually worked at a service project (just make sure you do so fairly, and all scouts are only counting the time they actually work the service project.) We had one boy who would sleep with a parent, but was otherwise a healthy scout. When his brother came in he was the same way. We left the troop for another while they were still young, so I hope they grew out of it.. But, I did give them some benefit of a doubt. There was something in the history of the Pack that a den Leader was violating youth protection and was arrested for it around the time these boys were in the pack. So they may have had some background reasons for it. But, with or without a requirement to check-off, your adult leaders should get together and come up with a game plan of what you expect and require from "all" scouts during a campout.. And although this may be the only scout breaking the rules, make sure you fairly expect it followed by all scouts. A Chore Roster is one suggestion to start implementing.. Have it organized by the Patrol Leader, and the duties equally divided between all the scouts going on the event.. This scout shouldn't be excluded from duties because he is only staying for an hour, or he isn't eating with the scouts. And Dad should not be allowed to do the chores for son. Of course, if he doesn't want cooking duties you can assign him to constant latrine duty.. I know with our patrols, that was the least favorite duty to be assigned to.

All depends on if Eagle dad made Eagle in a good troop, or an Eagle Mill. Sounds like since he thinks this is acceptable behavior, it was an Eagle mill.

I would definately clue in the CC.. The CC can decide if the committee needs to be included or not.. But angry parents, fall into the CC's domain, so a heads up so they can go in well informed would be nice. Is the SM in agreement with you?

Oh come now, Calvin could become a boy scout.. Kudu says the natural born leader is the one in the back causing trouble.. That would describe Calvin. He is always building and tinkering.. In most comic strips he's playing out doors, rarely in front of the TV.. And he is one of those boys who would definately go a whole week without bathing.. I think Calvin would make a great scout! I can see Hobbes peaking out of a backpack already.