perdidochas

No worries, I won't counsel Sustainability. I like Environmental science too much.

Has anybody else read over the "Sustainibility" MB requirements? IMHO, it's a joke of a new MB. It takes a few of Environmental Science's topics and expands them to a mini Merit Badge. I'm and Environmental Science MB counselor, and I, for one, will never counsel this joke of a MB. It will be an easy MB to do at a MB clinic, though, which ES never was.

The OA is the camping honor society of BSA. Their goal is supposed to be cheerful service. I'm not a member of OA (don't want to be, but that's a different story), but both of my sons are. They love it. They do work at camp to fix it up some. My sons are involved in a ceremony team where they dress up like Native Americans and dance, and say solemn things. My sons are part of an OA election team (our SM volunteered to help our, so that means the 4 troop OA members were voluntold to help out). They are in full uniform when they do this, although ironically the election team that showed for our election did not.

In our district, the SPLs of the different troops plan the activities of the Camporees. I believe that adults just plan the logistics.

I do have a question about it. How do we score it? Is the merit badge challenge a one to one thing for the scouts--i.e. that every single scout earned an outdoor merit badge, or is it that if you have 29 scouts that 29 outdoor merit badges have been earned (but that maybe Scout A earned 3, and two other scouts earned none). Also, we have new scouts--came in in October. Do they count into that?

I'm working on getting individual scouts the outdoor awards. My next goal is to do the unit level.

I do agree, in terms of the Age Appropriate guidelines. We live in a coastal area. Most kids around here are pretty comfortable around the water and boats. It was absurd that I couldn't bring out my kayaks (large stable sit on top kayaks) for a Webelos event. My boys have been playing on them alone since they were 6. I also think it's ridiculous that paintball/laser tag is banned.

I'm with you Tampa. A little of both. I've got an external frame pack (it's hot enough, I can't imagine how much heat I'd build up in an internal frame back). I hammock (DIY tablecloth hammock). I used to have an old Coleman 442 dual fuel for backpacking, but after the leak of white gas, I decided to go 21st century with a canister stove. In terms of our troop campouts, we have a combination of gear. We have a set of uniform 4 person dome tents (generally sleep two or three in them), a couple of two man semi-backpacking tents, and boys are free to bring their own tents. They range from a one man backpacking tent to four man domes to hammocks with tarps (well, only one so far of the boys (my oldest) and myself). Our former scoutmaster either camped out under the stars in a blue tarp burrito, or in his large 4 person dome tent. We have another ASM who likes to sleep on picnic tables if available, again in a blue tarp burrito sort of thing.

MattR, Did he really want the rank? If so, I think he would have been more aware of his timelines and his drop-dead date. That said, while Eagle is a nice bonus, I would view as Scout Spirit as the more important thing for his future.

Good point.

Eagle92, I meant that it's hardest with SWMBO to send the oldest to summer camp. When I camp with the troop, I certainly don't shadow my sons. I rarely speak to them on the campout, we usually talk on the car ride along with any other passengers.

It's harder to send the oldest son to summer camp than a younger son. He's the experiment, and has to experience it. I camp with the troop on a regular basis. Until my sons were in leadership (i.e ASPL and SPL), I rarely spoke with them outside of the trip to and from the campout. (Troop tradition is that the SPL and ASPL have their choice of which patrol to eat with, that includes the adult patrol). I purposefully didn't go to Summer camp with my boys each of their first years at summer camp. Didn't go until the oldest's fourth, and the youngest's third, and then only for a few days. This next summer, we are going to Camp Daniel Boone, which is at least an 8 hr drive. I will go for the week--I haven't camped in the mountains in years.

My son used a campout he had planned as part of Personal Management.

I would prefer Scout #4. Earns Eagle at 14 and contributes to the troop until he ages out.

No elective points, but they could keep earning activity pins until they had all 20.

I'm located within walking distance of the home base of the Blue Angels. They saved $28 million out of a normal annual budget of $40 million by not flying for most of the season. Not sure about the Boy Scouts and sponsoring an airshow. Sounds strange to me like it does to Papadaddy.

As a 2 1/2 yr former Webelos leader, I would have had the boys who want to stay on work with the younger Webelos den under those circumstances. My general observation is that those that didn't crossover weren't that gung ho anyway.

Quayze, are you serious? The member id I have is 9 digits just like ssn, and it's possible that someone else has the same number? No wonder we have such a problem with record keeping. Sounds like National set themselves up for this whenever they made the original scheme. I guess I need to forgive my local folks in my mind. I've been blaming them for being too ignorant to link records, guess that is not the case, it's National that made a seriously messed up system.

Our troop tries to do 10-12 weekend (Friday to Sunday) campouts a year + a week at summer camp. We usually get pretty close. We only did 9 this year, but we had a lot of Eagle Projects in September, we didn't do one in June--our week in summer camp, and April was also a bad month. It gets complicated with Eagle projects and OA campouts.

We have a new Scout to our Troop from another Council. Our Council registrar says that the membership cannot be moved from one council to another, but that they have to recreate a membership number, etc. in our Council. This seems strange to me, it would seem that the number would be a constant from one council to the next. Is this the way the system works, or does our registrar just not know how to transfer scouts?

The uniform is the uniform. IMHO, it is as dressy as anything else. I'm not a fashion plate, so at those occasions, I wear my shorts or zip-offs.

Where are they doing that? They aren't locally, unless it's with their folks.

Not just video games, but also Facebook, etc. Part of it is the school-aged population is decreasing.

berliner, He also didn't live in a time where land managers could potentially ban outdoor activities if they degrade too much of the environment. BP loved nature. I have no doubt he would approve of Leave No Trace. "As a Scout, you are guardian of the woods." Baden-Powell-Campfire Yarn #16