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@@fred johnson, so if calamity hits your neighborhood while all of your adults are off at University of Scouting somewhere, will your youth know where to go to be of service to emergency responders? Camp drills are important. The question is, do they translate into what folks need out of us the other 50 weeks of the year? We need to encourage boys to "mix it up." This might eventually mean teaming up with scouts from other troops in the district. Or other service-oriented local groups. Thinking outside the box is what really adds value to preparedness requirements.

I haven't had much luck with that at the venturing level. The youth who you would like to influence will just drop out of the program. The most success I've had is to make very clear that a youth will only be welcome to the "next teir" adventure if he/she demonstrates discipline at their current level. For example, my fire-bugs know exactly why I'm not planning a hike out west with them. They know exactly what I expect to see (or more precisely, not see) from them before we move forward.

This is what comes of sending kids off to World Jamborees ... and that Cit in the World elective to talk to a scout from another country about his/her program. I'm pretty sure this is to expressly stifle the parochial American "wear it right or not at all" attitude, which has its place for some things, but not others. I hope a decent paragraph about neckers without field uniforms makes its way into the handbooks.

Sounds like a lot of work for the kids. I approve!

Our camp had an actual search-and-rescue last year. Troops had to move in an orderly fashion to their respective safe staging stations, and one camp had to initiate a mile-wide line search. So, yes there's a little overlap. But, when I think of "troop mobilization"; however, I think: how do you get your troop together and ready to serve in any reasonable capacity? Often times this involves discussion with a professional, such as yourself, who recalls the last couple events and has an idea of where volunteers are needed the most. You probably don't want 3 dozen boys cluttering your hallways! You probably do want 3 dozen boys gathered in a safe staging area in an orderly fashion, with one representative to contact you to let them know they're available for assignment. The assignment could be go to the local Salvation Army and serve lunch. Or, go to a food-bank and load supplies. Or set up cots at a staging area for displaced residents. Then tidy up afterword. Providing a nearby area for campfire (and possibly an overnight) after the drill is done would be nice. There the boys could evaluate how well they did. For such an excersize, you don't need a lot of your personell participating in the drill. (Although I'm sure the boys would appreciate whatever "bells and whistles" you could add!) So, if your boys were to do both requirements on a weekend, I'd have the troop mobilization part be one step. The search and rescue part be a different step -- probably after they evaluate their mobilization excersize. This gives them a chance to improve on what might not have worked well during that initial mobilization.

@@MrBob. Every kind of weather poses its unique set of hazards! Although, we easterners would be liking to hazard a few sunny days.

Oh yeah, rule #1: never ask someone for a rule they'll give you one. You're an aviation crew. Grounded? Hazardous weather training is a good idea. Assign it and discuss it. But, I'm pretty sure it will hardly touch what needs to be discussed if you are talking about planning a flight. Not every youth (maybe not every adult) will do the online course. So with your key youth, think about the practice exercises you all need to go through. But if they are in he room when you all evaluate a weather report, it's a step in the right direction. Do not wait for those mystical older venturers to appear. Your leaders are among the ones who appear at meetings now. Heck, that boundary pusher young lady might be a natural born leader. Just needs to set her compass straight. If you haven't elected officers, do it now. Pull your officers together. Consider creating a health and safety officer position. Help that youth bring in someone who might address aviation related injuries and emergencies. We all have the parent who drive us to face-palm! Don't let them hurt your head. Get your youth to use their heads to compensate for your adult's shortcomings.

Not hard to do at all ... pressure BSA so long as it lets its imprimatur be held by COs with restrictive requirements for its volunteer leadership. Activists could certainly continue to do just that via public or private means to the end that all COs would be permissive. The only question is do they have the will to do so?

Not a week later, but what about within 24 hours? I'm saying that a MC has the right to publicly regret his actions. The other adults don't have to agree. They can live life believing that the GTA has muzzled them. Or they can think, actually think, about what's best for this boy. And yes, the scout could appeal or what-not. And a unit commishioner might put you all in your places. But doing nothing may very well leave the boy unchallenged and further from becoming a star scout than he realizes.

This is not a required activity for 1st Class. Just a question from the board about how the scout thought he was living up to scout spirit. If the board missed a detail, yet felt it was important. IMHO, they missed out on a conversation they really wanted to have. It's not too late to rectify that situation. The boy could say, "Yeah, I actually had to do it because ___. But, once I got started, I did the best job I could because I wanted the scout to be proud of his work." And that could be enough to throw the board members in a grey area regarding yes/no. But, it could be enough for them to encourage the kid to really lead (regardless of his PoR) while working on Star.

Welcome to the forums. As an ASM, I would not want to tarnish any opinion of the board. So, talk to them after discussing this with your committee chairman (CC). I disagree with @@scoutldr and @@prof. If you have misgivings, call your CC and request that your signature be withdrawn. Then, request that they follow the guide to advancement -- basically that involves the board sending a note to the scout (copy the parents) as to why you are withholding rank advancement, and what he should do to remedy the situation. After that, call the SM and explain your decision. I would not be very harsh about this. The boy doesn't understand the difference between helping out of his own free will vs. being compelled. The board needs to teach him. Explain to him that you missed that detail the first time, and would have not considered that truly helpful. But, maybe there are other ways that didn't involve other people making him that demonstrated his helpfulness. You would like him to think of an example where he helped without being required to do so. There is absolutly no reason to award the patch to someone who you do not think is a First Class scout.

New discovery about the forums: in other topics I have a "Thanks" button. Anyway, you all can just re-imagine that +1 as needed. Definitely not inviting anyone to leave. (Won't do that until I see the same kinds of smiles on kids who participate in other scouting orgs.) But we have to acknowledge that some folks have been hanging on because National had this one consession to the "restrictive" camp. They now may find reason to be called elswhere. That's the thing about the "restrictives", They have a pretty solid formula for reproducing themselves wherever they land.

No need to sweep it under the rug 'Skip. Atheists have made it clear that they are knocking on the same door. In fact the ban runs paralell to the ACLU successfuly appealing that public facilities cannot sponsor BSA units. Lacking advise from non-religious CO's, the board entrenched with their religious base. (That's not entirely accurate. At the time, many public institutions here had morality clauses with which the membership policy meshed well.) As others have mentioned, the board can operate by caveat. However, each of its moves since 1972 has not resulted in membership gains.

No worries. Still falls under youth protection. It was right to notify the camp director.

Not quite following your logic here ... the ban was originally a central decision that overrode decisions of chartering organizations. An insistence, if you will, that BSA choose sides in a nation that is divorcing itself into "restrictive" and "permissive" camps. Each one fervently desiring to constrain the other's movements. That fervor has not diminished. A lot of us are cynical about the vision of scouting promulgated by National. We don't trust that they will find an equitable uniform national policy that will instill confidence in our nation's parents. Folks like @@Oldscout448 and @@AZMike were looking for BSA to endorse their "restrictive" camp. Well, that's no longer part of the package. I hope they find a way to get youth hiking and camping independently, but for parents to entrust them with their children, they may need a moniker other than BSA.

I have one coadvisor who was really concerned about maintaining her continuous membership transitioning from youth to adult. Still haven't seen her put service stars on her uniform.

Trail Life, huzzah!

A bug juice by any other name ...

To be fair, scouters who've taken the Train the Trainer course seem to come back with better presentation skills. Before this course was widely available, some of those presentations were real sleepers. It's on my bucket list, but meanwhile I'm having too much fun in the field. Unfortunately that means re-updating BSA guard and Wilderness first aid every other year. Other scouters have a lot to do in their respective fields. I'm pretty sure updating this one every three years is not on most of their agendas.

Oh, I have that. And maybe a year from now I'll transfer the pics from It!

A group picture of their kids. In a card with the boys, signatures. Trust me, when those boys graduate from high school, it'll the most sought after gift from whatever drawer it got tossed in,

For things like this and other reasons, scouters requested Heritage Reservation to cease scheduling family night. Week 1 SMs seemed to be very pleased with the decision. This is very simple, mom needs to write a note to the boy and his family for overreacting to his misbehavior. Lacking any remorse, she should be banned from troop activities. If she's truly contrite, she will want to find a way to communicate to the boys that she was wrong. It's the SM who needs to decide what to say to the aggrieved scout. That's all for a situation where mom had a bad day, and just maybe has come to her senses. If there's some kind of feud or whatever that's been boiling outside of scouts ... Well, prayer is probably your only hope.

Stupid happens fast. Your youth leaders need to get on top of the situation, and here's why ... On the last day of a week-long super-activity you won't have that edge, your spouse may not be there, and you youth may be within earshot of your rant. Discipline in a crew is the responsibility of the officers. That doesn't mean that the officers dole out a complicated list of punishments, but they are to take pride in their crew coming back without injury. That means you pull together the officers for after action review. Go over what went well, what didn't go so well, what would they do differently. This first couple of times, you may have to give them categories that they can "thumbs up or "thumbs down" ... one of those categories will be health and safety. Bottom line: the crew moves forward when they show discipline. So, regarding your rebel, you need to thank her for knuckling under and doing her part. That the crew's "next big thing" is contingent on her doing her part. Regarding that parent, tell him to do everything in his power to ensure that his child gains physical strength and discipline. 2nd degree burns are a failure not to be repeated. You have a very unique crew. I personally, am envious. Don't let the negative nannies bring you down.

'Skip, I'd promise to one-up you next week. But ... My phone ain't that smart. To date Dolly Sods's interior hasn't offered any bars. Red Creek's high, not sure if any crossing will be kind to electronic devices. But winds permitting, I'll be able to ask you to imagine a similar sight view, interrupted by the trunks of a red-oak cathedral.

So, what I said earlier ... advice to the family if they need it. For the boy, tell him you can coach in a number of ways, ask him what specific help he would like from you. I personally would offer to coach the SM and him into a better SM-SPL working relationship. This would boil down to asking "What one thing in your job would you like to do better next month?" You might want to advance-warn the SM so that he might be prepared with his own goal (e.g., better prepared SM minutes). Get him to manage the troop a few more months, and that should help him put the other pieces together. But if you have strengths as an educator or something else, you might be able to offer to coach one of those outside-of-scouts problems. Regardless, pick one thing. Chip away at it.