ScoutNut

Good luck with getting Cub Scouts to do some kind of "pattern walking" or "organized marching"! They get tired out real quick with just walking & waving! Since Cub Scouts is all about family, we include the families in the march. So we also end up with the "lively mob" thing. We have the older boys or parents carry the banner & flags and we switch off periodicaly. Sometimes the families will bring decorated wagons so the boys & younger siblings can take turns riding.

Our District usually hands these figures out yearly. It helps us to see what % of eligible youth our unit is actually serving. I do not think anyone (except possibly the DE whose performance review is based in part on these numbers) really keeps track for any kind of "success rate". We use it mainly for informational purposes.

OK, maybe I'm a bit slow this afternoon, but I really don't see the problem. Are you having a problem performing your duties as a den leader, a Pack trainer, or both? You are working on your Cub Scouter Award, but you say you are being "left out of the loop" & "getting no help". What loop? What kind of help exactly should you be receiving? This award is based on tenure, training & performance. About the only thing you would need help with would be Pack projects. Then you would need the participation of the Pack Committee to help spread the word and organize things. Are you not being allowed to plan Pack service projects, Chair a Pack event, or work on the Pack FOS campaign? As stated on the Progress Record card, approval for each area is required by either the Pack Committee Chair, the Cubmaster or the Unit Commissioner. It also states "some other appropriate person" can approve the card, I would guess that could be your COR, the Council/District Training Chair could approve your training record & your DE could probably approve your tenure. If the problem is your CC and/or your CM refuse to approve your card, then there are some real problems there that going "over their heads" for approvals would not improve. Some more information is needed here.

I am a little unclear on this. Is this an olive t-shirt, turtleneck, or low cut tank top? Are all of the buttons on the Scout shirt undone, or just a few? Are both shirts tucked in or completely untucked? Is she wearing the proper pants, belt, socks, etc?

"When the boys in my pack earn something they do get it right away." Fine! Great! That is the way it should be! "I think that you should go back and re-read what I have wrote because the special awards for rank advancement is what we do as a den." Why would you treat a rank award any differently from any other earned award? When the boys finish their requirements for their rank award they are supposed to receive it at the very next Pack meeting. They are NOT supposed to wait until everyone else in the den or Pack has finished theirs too. I'm with the Den Leader & the boy's parents on this one.

Hi & Welcome Ekmirand! I am a bit confused. On the one hand, you say that you "know the issue of giving out awards when they are due and when they are earned". Then you go on to say "how will the other boys feel" and "My pack is all about team effort and doing things as a group". If you "know" BSA's policy on recognition for earned awards, than what exactly is the problem? "How will the other boys feel"? Maybe they will feel like THEY should ALSO get recognized for things they have earned ASAP after they have earned them & NOT be made to wait months on end. BSA's Cub Advancement Program is that boys work mainly at home with their families on rank requirements & electives. Cub Scouts use the Methods of Advancement & Family Involvement to achieve the Purposes of (among others) Family Understanding & Personal Achievement. Boys & their families work at their OWN pace (not the Pack's). Sorry if I sound harsh, but instead of your Pack being "all about team effort and doing things as a group", you should consider being all about the boys & doing things they way the BSA has written them. Good for the Den Leader! Give the boy everything he has earned, with an appropriately cool ceremony, THIS MONTH! Edited to add - Include any other boys who also have things they have already earned, but have never been awarded!(This message has been edited by ScoutNut)

Did you remind the parent that they told you they were going to use last years car? How unique was the car design? Could the parent be telling the truth? These questions/issues should have been settled the night of the PWD. At weigh-in on PWD night you should have talked to the family & decided if you believed this parent or not. If you did not then you should have stated plainly that due to XYZ evidence, their son would be able to run in the Pack PWD, but would not be eligible for the District PWD. At this point it is to late & you really have no choice but to believe the family.

"A hypothetical situation: a group of individuals (family group, fraternal organization, etc.) with a specific agenda fills out adult applications, pay $10USD each, and become (by default?) a voting bloc (of a unit committee). This voting bloc supports a specific agenda. The agenda is adopted by sheer weight of numbers. The voting bloc then disappears, having no further involvement in the unit." OK, First of all there is no such thing as a "voting bloc". The Committee should not be voting on things. The CC appoints Committee members to do specific jobs (even simply being an available BOR member). The Committee is there to support the SM & the Troop, & to that end the entire Unit's leadership (SM, SMA, CC, MC, etc) should work together. If by some chance you do have a Troop with a Committee that votes on everything & your senerio happens, the CC & COR can simply say nope, it's not happening, & ignore the "vote". Or, they can wait until the "voting bloc" disapears and vote the changes out. Or, the CC & COR can see what the "voting bloc" is doing, recind their membership, & boot them out. Little "Tin Dictatorships" can develop, but it is usually at the CC/COR level & with an uninvolved Charter Org.

From BSA COR Training - "Provide primary general liability insurance to cover the chartered organization and its board, officers, chartered organization representative, and employees against all personal liability judgments. This insurance includes attorney's fees and court costs as well as any judgment brought against the individual or organization. Unit leaders are covered in excess of any personal coverage they might have, or if there is no personal coverage, the BSA insurance immediately picks them up on a primary basis." From the Guide to Safe Scouting - "The BSA general liability program is not just insurance. In fact, insurance plays a very small part. Our greatest efforts are spent on safety and injury prevention. BSA self-funds the first million dollars of each liability claim. This means that almost all money spent on a liability claim is Scouting money, not insurance money. Accident and sickness insurance pays regardless of fault as long as the accident occurred during an official Scouting activity and the unit or council has purchased the coverage." Also from the Guide to Safe Scouting - Camping section - "Overnight camping by Tiger, Wolf, and Bear Cub Scout dens as dens is not approved and certificates of liability insurance will not be provided by the Boy Scouts of America." So, while BSA does cover for just about anything, the last quote seems to imply that there are cases when BSA liability insurance would NOT cover you.

In my council they hold a training at our Scout Camp in Spring for any new shooting sports range officers.

In my son's case, he never "went around" the SM. The SM does not believe in the the Den Chief program. He does not use Den Chief as a POR at all, for anyone. He does not appoint Den Chiefs. If a CM asked him for a Den Chief, at the end of a Troop meeting he will ask the boys present if anyone is interested in being a Den Chief for Pack 1234 & if no one raises his hand that is the end of it for another year or 2, until he gets another request. My son asked the SM for permission to take Den Chief training & to be a Den Chief in the Pack. The SM said he did not care. My son took that as permission, took Den Chief training & became a Den Chief when he was in 6th grade. That first year the Pack Committee put him in with the 4th grade Webelos. The following year, the Wolf den leaders asked for him. He was their Den Chief from Wolf thru crossover to Boy Scouts. He then became the Den Chief for the Bear den & will see them cross to Boy Scouts this year. He also got other Boy Scouts involved in becoming Den Chiefs. Some worked out & some did not. Currently 2 of his former Cub Scouts are trained Den Chiefs & doing great jobs. Thru the examples set by all of our Den Chiefs of what a Boy Scout is, more of our Cubs have crossed to Boy Scout Troops & stayed in Scouts. Tommorrow, our church's Scout Sunday service will be my son's 1st official duty as an Asst. Den Leader for our Pack's Wolf den! Thru all of the years he has been a Den Chief, although he has periodically helped me out with games & Pack meeting awards for my Tigers, he has NEVER been a Den Chief for any den led by either of his parents. However, maybe in 3 years, when his Wolves cross to Boy Scouts, & he is 21, he can take over my Tiger Den & I can retire!

My son's SM is another dino. He does not wnat the boys helping with Cub events, he does not even tell them there is a request. He is not big on Den Chiefs, especially young ones. My son asked if he had an objection to him being a Den Chief in Sept of his 6th grade year. SM pretty much said he didn't care, but don't look to get any kind of credit for it. My son took the training on his own & was a Den Chief until last week. On his 18th birthday he turned in the paperwork to become an Asst Den Leader. He has also staffed CS Day Camp & Summer Camp & various other 1 day Cub events. All on his own. He never did get credit for Den Chief as a POR or anything else from his SM. He also never got credit for any service for all of the service he gave Council & Cub Scouting. He did it all on his own. Have your son talk to his buddies in the Troop. The SM can NOT stop the boys from signing up if they want to do it on their own.

A Boy Scout does not have to be a Den Chief in order to be on Day Camp Staff. These are 2 completely different positions. To be a Boy Scout youth staff member of your Cub Scout Day Camp, simply call your Day Camp Director & sign them up. They might need to provide the DCD with a current health form. To be a Den Chief the Cubmaster should be contacted to find dens that are in need of Den Chiefs. The boys really should be appointed (or at least approved) by their SM & SPL. There is no hard & fast age requirement for a Den Chief, however, they are more effective when there is more than 1 year difference between them & their Cubs. The boys do not need SM approval in order to take training. Find out from your council when the next Den Chief training is taking place & have the boys sign up if they are interested.

"This guy isn't BALOO trained, but has everything else that "supercedes" BALOO." There is no such thing as one training that "supercedes" another. "Fast Start, YPT, IOLS, Scoutmaster Fundamentals, Woodbadge" all focus on different things. BALOO's focus is different from all of those. If you want to take your PACK on overnights then you need to take the training that focuses on THAT. It does not matter if you are already a master mountain climber, OPIK instructor, or SE. BALOO training is required by BSA. If all you want to do is take your Webelos den camping, for some strange reason BSA has decided that, while it recommends that the leader in charge SHOULD have Outdoor Leader Skills for Webelos Leaders, it is not MANDATORY. It is also not mandatory to have BALOO training for a Webelos den campout. Go figure! Hopefully this will get corrected by National at some point.

Simple - There were Webelos along. You were quite right to cancel. Webelos are NOT Boy Scouts. Webelos are Cub Scouts & should be following the Guide to Safe Scouting rules/guidelines for Cub Scouts. The G2SS, Age Appropriate Guidelines, recommends winter camping for Boys Scouts and older, not for Webelos. As for your council, I can't say I agree with their decision, but I can understand it.

Simple - There were Webelos along. You were quite right to cancel. Webelos are NOT Boy Scouts. Webelos are Cub Scouts & should be following the Guide to Safe Scouting rules/guidelines for Cub Scouts. The G2SS, Age Appropriate Guidelines, recommends winter camping for Boys Scouts and older, not for Webelos. As for your council, I can't say I agree with their decision, but I can understand it.

There is more to a Troop than blue jeans vs Wood Badgers & how many Eagles they can turn out. I would visit Troop 2XX again in a Troop meeting setting. I would also visit other area Troops. Personally, I am not impressed with Troop 3XXX's Eagle mill. A 40 min lecture every week sounds like it would bore most of the young men I know to death! According to the way the BSA program is put together, boys are SUPPOSED to advance at THEIR OWN rate. Advancement is only 1 of 8 Methods used in the BSA program(as is Uniform). The final decision rests with you & your son. It depends on what the 2 of you want him to get out of the Boy Scout program.

"I just don't anticipate the parents wanting to go and actually purchase stuff and go somewhere, and then have to set their gear up." This is why you don't have them do that! Find cabins or lodges. Our Council camp has a lodge we can rent out. It is one big room, but has curtains that can be pulled across to create separate areas. We also have a few county Youth Group Camping areas that have cabins available. If you can't find any Youth Camping with lodges or cabins, then contact your local Troops to see if they would be able to loan the Pack some camping equipment. They might also be willing to loan some older Boy Scouts to help with the equipment & your program! The non-camping families don't have to purchase anything & the camping families can bring their tents to set up. BTW - You don't need the CC's permission to offer a family camping trip to the Pack.

"I never asked for any verbal or written explaination of any elective. That is called adding on the the requirements and that is wrong." Nope - Not adding requirements at all. We do a LOT of stuff. Between family, den & Pack activities there is a lot going on. As Den Leader it is my JOB to keep track of what the boys are doing, to keep every thing straight, to keep good records & to make sure the boys get ALL of the recognitions they deserve. Having the families (AND ME) put a note in the handbook saying what their elective activity was, a date helps too, does 3 things - 1) It helps me to make sure they are getting credit for EVERYTHING they have done & that I am not accidently counting (or leaving out) something they did at a Pack/den activity when their family has already signed (or not signed) for it. With the notes I can easily tell that the elective signoff is for X activity they did & I can then add Z activity that they have also done but not signed for. 2) Especially with new families who are unfamiliar with the program, it is easier to tell if an activity was done while a Scout or when they went to visit Aunt Jane while in preschool. 3) It gives the boys a more detailed history of their Scout year. In years to come they can look thru their handbook and more easily say "Gee, I remember when we did that!" "I think what needs to be done is that the parents should be told that upon repeating an elective, the "Do _Your_ Best" bar should be raised." THAT, IMHO, is where the adding to requirements comes in.(This message has been edited by ScoutNut)

SpongeBob - You should not just assume that no one will be interested because they don't want to go to Day Camp! For many Cub families (especially the Tigers) this is their FIRST experience with any type of camping. Many have no equipment, no idea of what they need, and no inclination to go out and buy expensive stuff if it turns out they don't like camping. As I stated, give your families incentive to attend. Keep it easy, fun & affordable. Keep it to a 1-nighter. Find a place that has cabins or an indoor space you can sleep in, and room outside for those that want to tent. Make sure your camp is close enough so that families can EASILY come out for the DAY ONLY. Plan your program to include the Day Trippers & all sibs. Advertise the heck out of it. Push the cabin & day trip aspect. If you can at least get them there for the day they can get an idea of what the area is like. They can see the facilities, see how well you run the program, see how much fun their son is having, & see how much fun their whole family can have. Then you might get them out the next time to spend the night. You took BALOO training to get your ENTIRE Pack out camping. The training you received gave you the tools to do just that.

Of course it's DA BEARS!!!!! It is fate. The last time they made it was the year my daughter was born. This year she turned 21. GO BEARS!

"The Wolf den maintains advancement records, and I have been training the TDL to do so as well, the problem is with the Bears and Webelos boys (from their Tiger/Bobcat rank on up). They do not maintain records on these boys, nor have they filed any advancement reports at council." Unless your council is VERY lax about Cub rank badges, the only way that any of the boys could have gotten the rank badges they currently are wearing on their uniforms is if SOMEONE (den leader, CM, CC, friendly neighbor, etc) associated with your Pack has been bringing a filled in Advancement form to your council shop. The rank badge awards are restricted items. As to den advancement records, they are nice to have & keep from year to year, but they are NOT really necessary. The only time they would come in handy is if a family transfered to a different Pack. You could then send them to the family for reference. Even then, the boy would have the badges on his uniform & his signed Handbook. Den leaders should be keeping some kind of records for themselves of what their boys have finished Scout Year-To-Date on rank & electives. It makes it easier to keep track of where everyone is, what everyone still needs, what they need to tell the families they still have to work on, & what awards they need to tell their committee to purchase for the upcoming Pack meeting. These records do not really need to be kept from year to year. The dates a boy received his various Cub Scout Rank Awards have no bearing or impact on a boy earning his Eagle Rank. Except for Arrow of Light, many councils do not keep Cub Scout rank award records. Advancement in Boy Scouts is VERY different.

The "Guide to Safe Scouting" is on the BSA National website. http://www.scouting.org/pubs/gss/toc.html It is updated regularly. The updates go online here (& are detailed at the end) before you will see them in the printed version at your local Scout Shop. The "Age-Appropriate Guidelines for Scouting Activities" is an appendix at the end of the G2SS and are updated along with the Guide. This updated appendix is what Cubmaster Randy linked to. The HTML chart you linked to is an online copy of a printed hard copy flyer. This has not been updated with a new picture. Always go with the actual "Guide to Safe Scouting" link. Tell your Tiger families that Sorry, but according to the most current BSA Guide to Safe Scouting, the BSA does not recommend pocketknives for Tigers. They are not considered age appropriate.(This message has been edited by ScoutNut)

There is no grey area. A gathering of friends is just that, a gathering of friends. It has nothing to do with you, their den or the Pack. A Scout event is - a Scout event. It is run by a Scout unit, publicized in a Scout unit, approved & insured by a scout council, & has Scouting program elements. Many of the Cub requirements have them cooking food. Do you usually tell the boys and their families that they must hold a cookout at their home for their friends only, that the den & Pack can not be involved? Of course not. Then why would it even come up in a den meeting about camping? As your Pack's BALOO trained person you need to STOP focusing on ONLY the WOLF DEN!! You are the camping leader for the ENTIRE PACK! Talk to your Committee at it's next meeting & settle on a date for a Pack camping overnighter. You should have received a list of Cub Scout approved camping spots at BALOO training. Find a spot & start talking it up at every den and Pack meeting. Create your camp program so that families can come for the day only if they are not comfortable enough to stay overnight. Send out catchy flyers to every family in your Pack. Make it as easy & as affordable as possible for all of your families. You just might be surprised at how many families you end up with!

OK, a few things. Den Leaders, even Webelos Den Leaders, should know where all of their boys are in relation to earning their rank award (rank awards, except for AOL, have nothing to do with advancing to the next level). It does not matter if you have an Advancement Chair or not. The Leader of the 5th grade Webelos Den is responsible for making sure the boys all earn their AOL and move to Boy Scouts, not the CC. There is also no way that a 5th grade Webelos could reach the end of 5th grade and not be able to cross into a BS Troop. He might not have earned his AOL, but at the end of 5th grade he can still become a Boy Scout. I can understand that if the CC is staying in the Pack until May, that she wants her son to stay with her. However, that is not fair to either her son or any of the other boys who will be ready sooner. You need to explain this to her AND the Webelos Den Leader ASAP.