moosetracker

Those are good questions shortridge, but if done then neither examples qualified under the patrol outing.. Both are groups of boys that are not only not a patrol, but not even of the same troop... Since this was always for a patrol, and not for troop activity, it most certainly was not something that boys who may never met until that night or that week and are thrown together hodgepodge can use to avoid adult supervision and be considered a scouting activity following G2SS. In our council, with OA inductions, I know that there are several adult leaders in the OA group.. I don't really know what or who is nearby or the supervision of the camping groups doing the wilderness survival MB at scout camp.. But I guess that yes an adult over 21 will need to be willing to take responsibility for the group, and be at a distance that the camp considers sufficient to be available if needed..

Oh, I understand CA & Lisabob.. My husband & I disagree on this issue, he thinks it should be wiped off the books (so will not be happy that it still is partially on there) He's all for Patrol outings, but not without the adult supervision.. I know our COR would not go for it either. I also don't see many troops with parents who would sign permission & wavers over this type of outing.. Still I like to see it on the books, and avaliable for those diehard very rare troops with an adventerous soul from parent, to Adult Leader, to scout.. For the more common troop with the Parents who want to bubble wrap the kids.. If at least they have Adult leaders & kids who would love to do this one day.. It is an ultimum goal that they get to strive for.. The scouts that are so skilled, and mature that they can someday, put the parents worries to rest...

Well, they didn't out right kill the Patrol events.. But they did give it a crew cut.. I guess I have mix feelings, I am happy to see they did not kill it all together as the rumors were hinting at.. So find large camping areas, so you can camp at 300 ft, where it use to be a Patrol outing I guess..

I also agree with Lisabob, if you have already posted the either/or, then leave it be, to keep a consistant front, rather then wishy-washy one.. But.. on the next event, turn up the flames more, and make it an do-or-die.. Especially if this event turns into a BBQ fishing derby due to no one stepping up..(This message has been edited by moosetracker)

Well make sure you remind them that one of your rare helpful parents, is now hiding at home, not answering phone, door, and will probably not be back to the Pack ever, due to the totally nasty treatment from this out-of-control parent.. And that you would rather find a way to bring her back, which definately would not happen if the unit allows this other parent to run amuck.. The council and CO should support your decision.. Especially if you can also state he was being destructive of the other scouts property.. And the next time he lashes out, it could be at a child. Especially since he is acting like the victim and not the instigator.. It is clear he has no concept that he did anything wrong. I like Eamonn's suggestions two, but I think you can use the two ideas in tandom with each other, rather then and either or.. Make sure the unit knows if they don't step up, the unit will not have much activities, at the same time proactively work with people in one-on-one communications to encourage them to step up, and have a Reflection Meeting after an event with those who did step up, making sure that they know that you are appreciative of their efforts, as well as discuss what worked and what could be improved upon..

You are doing it right, (almost).. You should have just let the event fail if there was no help.. Instead you have a BBQ, fishing thingy replacement.. So if no one helps at the camping event, who will help with the BBQ thingy??? YOU.. Mr. one-man show.. Also who is providing this self-centered Pack with the food for the BBQ thingy?? Better not be you!.. Better be Pack funded, or a pot-luck.. And if you bring your one dish, and no-one else brings anything, make sure your family eats first! Ok.. So you are a work in progress... Slowly you will be able to tell them "Either help out, or no event, nada, nothing".. So what happens when you hear all the gripping and complaining?.. Keep your cool, smile sweetly and say?.. "Yes your right it did not happen.. Do you reply that you understood your assigned duty..? Well no one else did either.. If you had, the event might have taken place.." or "Oh, not enough food? Wow, I brought something to the pot-luck, like I was suppose to.. What did you bring?.. Well, you better discuss that with the others who brought nothing also.." They will either start to leave when there is no free ride, or meal ticket.. Or they will slowly understand that you are not backing down.. That either they help, or they go without.. Right now stick to your guns.. But, you may need to get meaner, and let that ball totally drop, before your self-centered group get a wake up call..

Hicountry, Welcome to the boards.. Your very first post is a good one.. It encompasses what I was thinking, but I only had a half thought of "eventually the Troop will inherit the problems of the pack, if these parents and their self-centered ways are allowed to continue unchecked.." You have taken that half-formed thought and explained it beautifully! The Pack may fail without you Basement, but it might surprise you, and after alot of grumbling and fingerpointing, they may shake loose the real deadbeats and then the smaller core group, may get themselfs straightened out and figure out how to do for themselves.. Then when this core group crosses over it will have less self-centered, wiser parents, who can then work into good leaders in the troop..

I had to look at the link, because I was shocked Vermont (my little quite neighbor state) was ranked 2nd.. 38 women Navada, 8 women Vermont, 50 Alabama... In proportion to population 8 women got them ranked 2nd worst offender.. Also it is a study of one year (2008).. It would be more interesting to be a study over 5 or 10 years.. Any of those states could have been having a bad year.. Still interesting study none the less.. Basement - Everytime you talk about your Pack, it just seems like everyone but you is totally self-centered.. Understand it is from your side of the story, but unless you really didn't announce the expectations that other people bring items for thier own snacks or a bake sale type venue.. Then things like expecting you or the pack to foot the bill of their party snacks is an issue with this group, that is not the first time you have brought up examples of this self-centered belief of theirs.. They probably wont fire you because without you that unit will cave in on itself, but since I don't think a few years of you "helping out" is going to help this group take control of their own pack, and it will either cave in this year or 2 years from now, because the mentality of "You do it all", will not change.. I don't really know why you don't just let it happen now.. After all you personally are getting no joy out of this.. You are gritting your teeth and trying to will the years of forced service to go by quickly..

I could see the "no award" if he was on lifeguard duty at the time, and being paid for it.. Or even if he was off duty, but on a beach he worked at.. But, this kid was not a paid rescuer for this river area they were in.. So I say.. He earned the credit, fairly.. Good for him!.. But yes the other kid should get some credit too.. Even green, to go into a risky area takes alot of courage, and to follow orders enough to help and not hinder the operation..

If your Pack only camps about once a year, then you are right, you not being there should not be a deal breaker.. The concern for it made me think this is a Pack with an active camping program that they did not want to see weakened by a CM who was not into camping.. I don't know if I see all the doom & gloom that OwnTheNight sees.. But, if you are sensing something, I would trust my gut feeling (and you say you do).. So trust that.. But, consider what ever you put into it right now, is a starting point that will be an improvement over when you took over.. And if you can pull off a good job, then I doubt anyone in the Pack will be wanting to take over the position & take the reins away from you, since they don't want it now, and if they see you are doing a good job, why would they want to in May?.. Now that is not to say you don't have your few that will want to try to change their minds.. As for the committee who doesn't do their job, but want you to do all the work, the way they want you to do the work.. And just be your supervisor.. Slowly start moving the work that they should be doing onto their shoulders.. Again.. If the Den Leaders & ACM's do not want the position now, they wont change their mind because you are making the committee do the work the committee should be doing.. And the committee member who doesn't want to work, will not take the CM position so that they can now do all the work.. And as stated before, if you pull the work the CM should not be doing onto the committee (adding new committee members to help delegate).. those DL & ACM may then want to take the job eventually.. Remember you want to leave this Pack someday or move to CC with the CM duties being in balance, work being delegated evenly to others, and someone in the Pack willing to step in to fill the position because it is not an impossible job.. That type of change will assure the Pack will stay running for years to come.. Good Luck..

As the others have said, with the break up.. But unless you as organizer was strict on who slept where, the 3 rooms would have been arrangable (as others have stated).. Once there, they could have reorganized the plans, made it work and all had a fine time. Bottom line, I don't think it was your fault (unless as stated, you wouldn't let them rearrange..).. You gave them the accomedations, it was up to them to make it work.. And it was a workable arrangement. Also in my unit, part of being prepared is looking at the accomidations ahead of time and making plans.. There have been times, the cabin setup was only a division of two, we then would let the women adult leaders know for this trip, they could not come. They have understood the reasoning. So again up to the units, to foresee an plan.. A little harder with 3 packs.. But in being prepared, for those accomedations we would have either corresponded with the other units, or brought a setup for a room divider if need be.. Then again we are a troop with some experience behind us, some Pack Leaders can be totally green, and not able to think for themselves, or think outside the box. (Notice I said SOME, not ALL.. So you who are from packs that can preplan and come up with solutions on the fly.. Don't shoot me..)

Expecting the CM to try to go on Pack campouts as much as possible is not unreasonable, but shouldn't be a deal breaker if no one else is available for the position. If you had two canidates though and one planned to be on campouts and the other only on occasion, I do think the one more willing to camp would be the winner.. I would suggest if the Pack is nearby at least visiting during the day for a little while, even if you are not going to camp with them.. Expecting the CM on Webelos trips should not be expected, even if your son is one of the Webelos, that is when it is expected of the Webelos leader to take charge.. So your Webelos leader is correct feeling the CM is not required for his/her outings.. Good Luck..

agree with SP & Nike.. Sounds like the best thing to do for this pack is get a good CC that can concentrate on dividing up the workload amoung many adult leaders.. One person willing to take it all on again is not the answer, because when they leave the Pack will then still have problems.. If 5 adult leaders move on with their kids at a crossover it is survivalble if you have 20 adult leaders.. If 2 adult leaders move on with their kids, and you only had 2 to begin with, it is devistating.. All the paperwork that you are willing to take on, should be taken off the shoulders of the CM, and be part of the CC and their committee members responsibility. Then the CM, ACM and anyone else willing to lend a hand should oversee (and do when no one else is avaliable) the manual labor of setups & takedowns, as well as the in front goofiness and entertainment like showmanship.. RoundTables are not so important to a CC to go to.. It is pushed that the CM or SM should go, but when that was the idea in our units.. guess what, no one went often, because the CM/SM was already doing alot.. My last unit had a COR that simply pushed that the unit would have a representative.. So a parent volunteered to do that for their job for the troop, they came back and reported anything of news worthiness to the SM.. With this few RT's were missed..

Welcome to the forums.. Let me thank you for all you did for your Pack over the years.. Good luck to you in the troop, I am sure you will find new challenges await you there..

Sorry, My response was more on your statemnent So, I did more research and realized that I could be an effective XM or CC without going on every camping trip. Don't know what XM is, but I took what your wrote as "vision" as looking to fill the CC roll, not CubMaster.. But, seems like you are still thinking to campaign for CM still.. Anyway, thinking not to go on events if your son does not attend would be a detriment to a CM or even an ACM.. You have to consider that you are there for "ALL" boys, not just your own.. In the troop, we have several Asst SM, who think this way, and it ends up that they still rely on my husband who is not SM or ASM, but a committee member to be relied to go on every event with the SM or maybe if they can get 1 ASM and my husband.. But my son is 20 and doesn't go on any outings, but my husband was in it for all the boys.. The SM & ASM must be in it for all the boys.. The pack will depend on it. You might have other committements from time to time, but you should be available about 90% of the time, regardless of it your son is only thier 75 or 80% of the time..

Sometimes a unit will try to campaign for someone they choose for a position.. I know our troop would for SM, to the point of doing silly things like putting signs up outside the persons house sort of like a political campagne.. "so & so for Scoutmaster".. Most units take a willing warm body, but it is not suppose to be the best way to do things. CM & SM are more people you want the right person in the position. Right now we have someone as SM who wants to do the position, but is just not the right personality.. Can not delegate well, and since they don't care to camp, they sort of sabbatoge the planned events so they get canceled.. The troop also gets lots of complaints, maybe he did do it wrong, and maybe it is just perceived wrong due to people already having poor opinion of him.. So, this position may be more important to make sure you don't just put someone in a willing, but someone in that will follow their leadership.. The Committee Chair's position, is also a need to be willing to follow. But a quite more reserved, less engaging personality is fine for the job.. A big thing is to be able to delegate, and get others to be willing to take on the work load, while the CC just works to make sure the positions are filled and those in the position have the support they need to do the job correctly.. Some of your plans are big, and could be scary.. You may think they are attainable, but some of the plans would need to be carried out by the chosen CM, and they (especially if new) may be happy to keep the pack going while they get to know their job.. So you could scare people... How is the Committee membership right now, is it large with people who have time to take up extra causes, or are you in need of getting people to fill those positions.. If you have empty positions, the first task is to fill them, then over time you can slowly add on a suggestion or two.. But, if it is the CM court (things like Journey to Excellence, and recruitment) those things should be left to him.. They will not want a Committee Chair who looks like they might try to do oversee or force the CM to follow their plans rather then allow them to run their own program while they as CC and thier committee members are eager to support his plans for the future, be that his plans are low key enthusiatic as yours are.. That does not mean that from time to time the Committee Chair (or others on the committee) can not offer him some suggestions or insight into an award that he doesn't know about, or a recruitment idea that may bring in more cubs.. But then it is up to the CM to concider and decide to act on the suggestion or not.. It is great to dream, and dream big, and see wonderous things.. But, I think if you want a shot, it is better to go in with a few simple suggestions for improvement, and not scare everyone that your idea will be more then they have the time or energy to implement.. If you get the position, then start slow, make sure you don't cross the line of what is your territory and what is the CM's territory, and slowly over years you may get some of your dreams to slowly come true without laying it all out on the table.

The mess with the sign up of MBC has troops in my area using unregistered MBC's.. With the fact blue cards are no longer turned in, but the troop just electronically files the completion of, it is impossible to check into.. We had someone from one troop state they do it.. We have several troops who have earned several of the special centenial MB's, although absolutely no one in our district has become an MBC for any of them.. I guess they could have used an MBC from a different district, but I doubt that they did. Frankly there is no doubt about it, between the difficulty to register, the difficulty to stay registered (due to the software system district uses), the difficulty to get out an accurate MBC list, and the troops who just are skipping the whole process and doing their own thing.. It is a mess.. I know some of you say your district will check blue cards during the ECOH.. But frankly that would be a pain, not only the time of doing so, but the fact that the past recordings of MBC, have told people they were approved, and then they never got recorded accurately.. Why put the mess of this system onto an Scout who might then loose the Eagle rank while they may have not known the MBC was not legit, and even the MBC and troop might have thought they were legit.. But, I think more & more of the adults now know they are just bypassing the whole system. Still does the scout know that?

You guys talk about troop wide vs Council wide. We don't have council wide.. We only have troop wide vs district wide. My son was trying to do a quickie MB to complete a 3rd palm before turning 18.. Found no one in our district, tried to contact 3 different neighboring district advancement chairs to see if they had anyone who did traffic saftey, finger printing or Fire Saftey.. Not a one got back to him even within a one month time period, so time ran out.. (Son is not someone to email twice, or phone twice though) But, it is a nightmare to organize a district wide list, my husband is halfway through the process of cleaning up our districts list from a nightmare, but it is hard, and then cleaning up your records is one thing, the councils records is even harder. The person who does the data entry, swears he can add new people, and delete others, and the system seems to bring back old peop and delete the entries he made.. Don't know if this is true, the delete would have to be not a true delete, but an archive, or someone one restoring the database for deleted people to come back.. But, I have heard the same nightmare in other councils to give his statements some credit.. Besides he is meticulous about other things, I can't believe he can be accurate about everything but the MB recording..

Greetings Carlos, Welcome to the forums, come for visits and to read other threads and you will be the "all knowledgable one" in your pack in no time! I agree with what everyone else has said, just wanted to clarify one point I don't think was addressed. My gut tells me that if an activity was performed without the specific intent of doing an elective, it should not count, As long as the activity was done while he was officially a Tiger Scout, and all requirements of the activity are met.. Then "yes", it should count, even though while they were doing it, it was not for the "intent" of earning the activity.. I don't know all Tiger activities so my example may not be a true activity.. But lets say your tigers have one to go to a museum.. You plan a trip, and one of your tigers can not go due to other family comittments.. But, they had just went the month before to the science museum, not realizing it was one of the Tiger activities.. As long as he was a tiger before he went on the activity, then it should count rather then having his parents take him again on their own the following month, specifically for the purpose of the Tiger activity.. Now if there is something like While at the muesuem, talk to someone in the visitors booth, or count the display cases, or some such thing, and that was not done, then it would not count..

I have no idea.. I use them interchangably, but if you asked me if they should be youth led or youth run.. I would say "Led". Youth lead to me means everything RemmeberSchiff said about both Youth led & Youth run.. To lead you do the planning and decision making and as leader you make sure the plan is being executed (by the boys lower down the chain of command), and if a decision must be made to alter and go to plan B, you make it.. Youth Run (that has a different meaning to youth led) - would then need to stand for.. The adults are making the decisions and the boys are the figure head, or puppet of the Adult leaders in executing the adults plan.. Normally I don't distinguish, but that would be my interpretation if someone told me to nit-pick and distinguish the two..

Our Advancement Board does seem to take a little longer then the Training Board, but I only have to wait a little while for my husbands board to get out.. We are one of the last groups to leave, but not like I am standing in an empty hall for an hour waiting for him.. Sometimes they will do what you discribe sometime they are just finding something to argue about on some nit-picky topic..

Easy! Our district does not offer a district wide MB-anything.. Neither does our Council (except for summer camp).. Neither did our last district, though one of the troops we were in, in our old district did do their own MeritBadge thing.. 4 Saturdays in March, the kids choose I think 2 or 3 badges and worked on them a little bit each Saturday (With alot of homework.. At least I remember his astonomy one being alot of homework because the meeting time was not when the stars were out, of during a time for tracking the sun pattern over some period of time..).. He was only in that troop through one of these programs, but the groups were small, like 3 or 4 kids, so alot of individual attention.

That is sad, but I see your viewpoint. Now my son would have loved to have gone to your troop. He was recruited by a troop who had mixed levels of scout working with him during the visits.. When he joined, he was very, very disappointed when they put all the young scouts into one patrol.. He loved the interaction with the older scouts. The only thing I would have been concerned about would be if the many trips far away, also had an expensive price tag with them that the parents were expected to foot the bill for. Maybe not a full out campaign, but keep the door open. Every now and then there is a boy or family that is looking to break from the pack, and going someplace the rest are going to may be the answer for them.

The units should welcome scouts with disabilities.. But, there are some that don't for most, it is more of a fact that they are average parents who do not know how to work with the disability, and if the parent/guardian are not willing to be there to help guide these volunteers, it turns into a frustrating situation.. Now our troop, is one that welcomes disabilities, but until we had one volunteer who took special disability classes to know how to reach them, it was at times for us frustrating.. We have had people with sever asthma and epilepsy (to the point of life threatening in an attack), dystonia, a boy with 3/4 of a heart (heart could stop anytime, when it does no way to revive him), learning disabilities bordering on retardation.. We first try to work with the parents, they have been with the boy and know how to motivate them, and what they are capable of and what they are not.. In some cases (like the heart problem) the parents are asked to go on every event their child is involved with.. I think the worst was the boy with the learning disabilities who had a single parent mother, who had issues herself.. She would always put the boy down, and tell him he could not do anything, and that he was too dumb.. So the mother had to be removed from the situation to get him to do anything, still it was hard to figure out how to engage him.. This is when the one person took the training and within 3 months the difference she brought out in him was amazing, plus she was able to guide other volunteers the right and wrong way to get his fullest attention and interest.

I will accept the H/W for dragging them out of the backwoods, not as the participant is more likely to have health issues in the backwoods if overweight.. But, more as a problem to the other participants, or to a rescue team should he need to be dragged out of the woods.. Although an overweight 10 year old could be no heavier then a full grown man with no weight issues.. And the overweight football/wrestling team player may be the great one to have in the backwoods to haul out the normal weight full grown man, that trip and broke his leg.. I will also accept that the overweight kid that gets winded crossing the parking lot, is a more serious health risk.. But that is again putting it back to common sense evaluation, as to who is overweight and a health risk and who is overweight and not a health risk.. I am fine with the following email I got, regarding how I am to interpret everything.. That the 30 minutes from an egress road is all we need to read into these statements as a definite rule.. for all else the following from the Guide to Safe Scouting is what should be followed.. In situations not specifically covered in this guide, activity planners should evaluate the risk or potential risk of harm, and respond with action plans based on common sense, community standards, the Boy Scout motto, and safety policies and practices commonly prescribed for the activity by experienced providers and practitioners. Now all we need to do is get the health forms to state that and not say things like "Enforcing the height/weight guidelines is strongly encouraged for all other events." Blanket statements about health have been used before when sometimes they do not make sense.. Take the kid who was having multiple seizures per day.. Got medication and was having no seizures.. Then Dr. wanted to take him off meds to see if he still needed it.. Well by now, he was of driving age.. Taking him off meds may cause him to have a seizure. He could go back on meds if that happened, and all be ok. Except since he had had a seizure now by state law, he could not drive for a year. For this reason, Dr. was not given permission by the patient to run the test, and patient will be on medication for life.. All due to a blanket rule by the state, that give no common sense leeway.