rjoy

I agree. I would prefer the old method also, but alas I have inherited the "new" way and I am forced to have to work from within. My aim is to have the boys back into the real patrols by the time they pass Second Class (the end of their first summer).

Boys join Scouting for the out of door experience also in the hopes of becoming Eagle but not all join Scouting to become Eagle. The experience I want to endow my first years is fun and learning about Scouting Get thru Tenderfoot and then work on Second Class and finally First Class but I see that process taking 18 months that way I can incorporate more outdoors experiences.

If you wait until the third year before go backpacking my fear is you would lose alot of scouts. When my son was in Cubs he had already been on 3 backpack trips in the Sierras, the duration of these trips were 3 to 5 days and ranged from 3 to 7 miles in, and they ate it up. Granted at the age of Cub Scouts they did not carry much but they did great and these outing secured their interest in Scouting. The trips also bonded the parents more and made them more involved. The first year programs do not lend themselves the time to interject any such outings of that nature as they really do not schedule any time for those kinds of outings. I feel if the first year program was extended to 18 months it could give the options for these kinds of outings that would cement their interest in the Scouting program. I get comments from the boys all the time as to when they are going backpacking. I even hear from the Cubs coming into the Troop that they are looking forward to doing alot of camping and backpacking. The confidence generated by bacpacking is emeasurable to the Scouting experience and keeping the boys interested.

I disagree, as from watching the Guides teach it would seem everyone in the troop could use the relearning of the basics as most of them have forgotten most of what they learned in their first year and are unable to teach without relearning everything again. I know sad but true and thus the mentoring of the older scouts within the patrol venue help everyone.

All of what you have said works for me, but in our situation the First Years are totally isolated from the troop. The only exception was Summer Camp where they were all together and that is when I saw them come together and work as a whole group and it was great. The way we have it now is that the First Years are with the troop for the opening ceremony and announcements and then we leave only to return for the closing ceremony. Now let me add that we have a very large troop and that our First Years number 24 which is broken up into 3 patrols. Yes, we have guides and they sent about 3 guides per patrol. None of the guides knew how to teach boys and they came ill prepared so that the teaching was meaningless or most of the time wrong and with only about 20-30 minutes of teaching there is not enough time to teach properly. We have now instituted a guide train course which they must take PRIOR to the new scouts arriving and not as it was done 2 months after the new scouts arrived and a lot of time was wasted. Our boys made tenderfoot by the time they went to summer camp and at summer camp they did the Second Class course. The summer camp courses were also taught poorly an unfortunate delema at least for the new guys. so here we are frustrated. We have revamped the Guide Program. But with our size troop the only way for alot of the older scouts ( I use this term loosly because the "older scouts" are only 12 - 18 months older than the boys they are teaching ) to get their leadership credit is to be a guide. So our focus now is on teaching the guides how to become teachers and mentors and will also focus on making sure they know what they are teaching(which has been the main problem), a skill I think will make them become much better scouts and people. Our Troop has a reputation for being an Eagle factory, a rreputation which bothers me. I feel scouting should teach the boys how to become better people and have many outdoor skills learned and enjoyed so they can use the knowledge for a lifetime as I have. If they make Eagle in the process GREAT but it should not be the only main focus. Helping them become a better human being is of greater purpose. There are boys in our troop that are Star working on Life that I would never entrust another scout to be with. Because they have advanced rapidly in rank but have not advanced at all as a person. These attributes are only learned thru experience and age. Now after saying all that I made Eagle at 16 (Dad was Scoutmaster so I had to perform and wanted to) but there was no rush really put on me to become Eagle at 16 ( just to make Eagle as my father only made it to Star ), but there was also no First Year Program it was the old Baden Powell method and it worked. There is a reason only 3% of scouts that join Boy Scouts make Eagle, it was because they had the desire and the fortitude to stick with it to achieve their goal. When this process is handed to them on a silver platter it make achieving Eagle not such a large effort and in that vein not such a statement of character and effort. The boys now a days rush thru the first year to become First Class at 12 years old, giving them 4 more YEARS to earn 21 Merit Badges, actually less because aleast 3 to 4 were earned at their first summer camp. They have Merit Badge Camps where they can earn 3 to 4 badges at a time. All of this extra effort is great but it has deminished the role of the troop as an environment for group learning and the dynamics that involves, to just a schedular of events.

I guess it is the separation of the boys that bothers me the most. I understand the rational but to isolate them away from the main troop for the first year does them a disservice. I am trying to have them intergrated back into the troop after they finish 2nd Class. I feel that the boys have no model on how to be a boy scout or how leadership is done. There is also no mentoring by older scouts, (that I see at summer camp)other than the guides. Which our program is weak, but in the process of being revamped. Right now the troop meets EVERY week so in reality there are no patrol meetings and actually the only reason they are there are just so the boys line up somewhere. So the dynamics of the patrol is non existant. I feel the boys need to be back into the troop earlier so they can get to know the other boys. They could still be excused from the troop meeting to do special teaching to finish up First Class and still meet the first year goals. This would also allow the older scouts to help them advance and maybe rekindle the Patrols. Right now the main troop is comprised of boys just working on merit badges and goofing off and going on fun adventue outings that the first years do not get to go on because of separate scheduling. Any feed back would be appreciated and how other troops are modelinf their First year Programs.