ScoutNut

From another list I am on - ************************************** GSUSA Proposed Uniform and Program Changes The GSUSA National Board will vote on these proposals on Aug. 28th. Please send your responses about the proposed changes to GSUSA before time is up. Kathy Cloninger Chief Executive Officer, GSUSA 420 Fifth Avenue New York, NY 10018-2798 kcloninger@girlscouts.org Phone: 212-852-5000, Fax: 212-852-6517 Eileen Doyle Vice President, Program Development, GSUSA 420 5th Avenue New York, NY 10018-2798 Edoyle@girlscouts.org Phone: 212-852-5733, Fax: 212-852-6515 In addition to letting National know how you feel about these changes, be sure to also let your council know (in case National asks them what they think). Uniform Proposal from GSUSA: Girl Scouts at each level will have one official uniform item (e.g. tunic, vest, sash) for the display of official pins and awards. This uniform item will be required when girls participate in ceremonies or officially represent the Girl Scout Movement. Girl Scouts at the Daisy and Brownie levels will continue to have a full uniform ensemble available. A uniform national dress code will unite girls as Girl Scouts: Girl Scouts will wear white shirts and khaki pants or skirts with their official uniform item. Girls at the Daisy and Brownie levels may choose to wear the full uniform ensemble. Teen Girl Scouts will also have a scarf uniting them in the WAGGGS tradition. The adult uniform will be a scarf worn with the membership pins for women, and a tie for men. This will be required when adults participate in ceremonies or officially represent the Girl Scout Movement. Girl Scouts of the USA will continue to evolve and offer a range of appealing casual wear for girls and adults. Age Levels: Recommendation from GSUSA: Grades K-1 ,Grades 2-3 ,Grades 4-5 ,Grades 6-8 ,Grades 9-10, Grades 11-12 Notes: K-1 girls will participate in the Cookie Program Activity. Combining K-1 gives girls and adults opportunities to learn from each other from the beginning of the Girl Scout experience. Grouping girls consistently by grade responds to the "social age" of girls. Distinct age groupings (NO OVERLAP) provide real differentiation. Levels respond to research on three distinct stages of adolescence. High capacity councils have the flexibility and discretion to adjust for local needs. Proposed Girl Scout Level Name Changes: Option #1 Daisy Girl Scouts, Brownie Girl Scouts, Junior Girl Scouts, Juliette Girl Scouts, Senior Girl Scouts and Ambassador Girl Scouts. Option #2 Daisy Girl Scouts, Brownie Girl Scouts, Pathfinder Girl Scouts, Trailblazer Girl Scouts, Navigator Girl Scouts, Ambassador Girl Scouts. Option #3 Daisy Girl Scouts, Brownie Girl Scouts, Girl Scout - L, Girl Scout - E, Girl Scout - A, Girl Scout - D (for this one girls would just be called "Girl Scouts" once they are in grade 4 and would wear a patch depending on their age level which would come from the word LEAD.) Option #4 Daisy Girl Scouts, Brownie Girl Scouts, Juliette Girl Scouts, Navigator Girl Scout, Sojourner Girl Scout, Ambassador Girl Scouts (Meanings behind the level names: Daisy - Plants the Seed, Brownie - Does Good Deeds, Juliette - Lights the Flame, Navigator - Finds Her Way, Sojourner - Walks the Path, Ambassador - Leads the Way) ************************************** I like some of the aspects of this. Studio 2B & Girl Scouts 11-17, never did go down very well. Breaking the levels up is a good idea, but there might be a problem with combining K & 1st. Their abilities are pretty different. I don't know how sticking strictly with grade levels & not age will fall out. What happens when a girl is either held back or moves ahead a grade? I think no overlap of grades is OK. For names, I like either #2 or #4. Personally, I think someone at National was hitting the margarita's a bit to heavy when they came up with #3. That has got to be the worst ever! Unfortunately, knowing GSUSA's track record, that will be the one they go with. I can see it now - Hi, my name is Jane & I'm a Girl Scout E! Sheesh!! You could kind of see the uniform change coming. Everything in the catalog is khaki & white already! Giving families the chance to supply their own shirt & pants is a good idea too. Then, there's the addition of NECKERS! YEA!! I think that will be a grand idea. You can take all of those crazy SWAPS & turn them into necker slides! All in all, it sounds like GSUSA is trying to bring our model a bit closer to those in our sister WAGGGS organizations. Well, it looks like National is moving things right along. Realignment looks like it will start to be implemented in many areas this October and in many more by next April. Fun times ahead.

Your SM is going to suspend your son simply because he dropped one "f-bomb" at summer camp? That is what the whole meeting is September is going to be about??? Sorry, that's nuts. The talking to & apology SHOULD have been sufficient. Geez - What does he do if some one gets hit? Have them drawn & quartered? I would also bet that every one of those adults at camp said an inappropriate word once in their lifetime AT LEAST. I am against rude/lewd language, however 1 word - 1 time is not a hangin' offense.

Sounds like lots of fun! What was your den's name & did you have a den cheer? Did they have an ending campfire with skits & songs? A one day event is fun & a LOT less tiring & headache for the staff!

Most councils will have the dates of their various district's day camps on their council websites calendars. So, even if a district does not send out a flyer in a timely fashion, you can give them a call and ask what is up. Usually it is the responsibility of each district to put together, promote & run their own day camp. This does NOT mean the DE. It means the district day camp camp director & day camp program director. These folks are VOLUNTEERS. Like anyone else, some are good at it and some are not. Sometimes things fall thru the cracks. Your district might have had a hard time finding someone to be Camp and/or Program Director. Things might have been late because they simply had no one to do them. Why not volunteer to be a Camp Director or even a Staff member for next year's Day Camp? You can make sure things run smoother AND have fun! BTW - You can go to ANY Day Camp. You are not restricted to just the day camps in your district.

The original poster's Troop was planning on giving a donation to their council because they were not planning on participationg in their councils popcorn sale. There is nothing wrong with that & is their choice. They were looking for ideas on how to allocate a donation amount, not on weather they should donate or not.

The Program Helps are, as the name states, a great help. They have lots of good ideas for den & pack meetings. Den meetings shouls NEVER be 100% focused on achievements. If you do that you are eliminating one of the purposes of Cub Scouting (family understanding) & one of the methods (family involvement). Cub Scouts is a FAMILY BASED program. If your pack's families do not agree with that then what they want is babysitting, not Cub Scouting.

According to the popcorn companies, 70% of the cost of the popcorn supports local scouting. With an average unit profit of 30%, that leaves council with 40%. If you made an FOS donation of 40% of your money earning profit it should be on par with what council would get from the popcorn sale.

There is not a lot you can do about the last minute problem other than what has already been mentioned. We promote "Early Bird" discounts, the dates are on the council calendar as soon as it comes out (2006-07 has been on our council website since June!), promotions start at the District Kickoff in Aug. We usually have registrations start to dribble in by the end of April. The bulk of them seem to come in at the end of the school year in May & June. Then we get another rush at the beginning of July, right before & right after the early bird cutoff. That number holds pretty steady until the week before camp when we will get the - "Oh gosh we forgot about Day Camp" crowd. District will not put out a firm cut off date & will even accept walk-ins (although we do not advertise that). The only way to handle the uncertainty is to look at your historical numbers, your registrations, & plan on an estimated number of boys. We have space for 150 campers. Based on history & the flow of registrations, we planned on supplies for 75 and ended up at 67 campers. We ended up redoing the den listings the day before camp started to include extra boys. We had figured on plenty of dens & allowed for den growth, so we did not have to increase the number of dens, just the number of boys per den. Using shirt availability as a stick will not work with our camps. Having every camper, den leader/walker, and staffer in a camp t-shirt is required so we know who belongs & who does not. It is one of our inspection points. Also, the cost of the camp includes the shirt & patch. Do you refund a portion of their registration (or charge less) if they do not receive the shirt and/or patch that they paid for?

National has released a new combined youth application. There is no longer separate applications for Cub Scout, Boy Scout, Venturer, etc. All program levels are included on a single application with check off boxes for the different ones. National has also eliminated the health history on the back of the form. Applicants are to fill out a Class 1 health form. These new applications should be in your Service Center now, or coming in soon. Personally, I think it is a good idea. Saves on forms & I always hated that health form on the back because info would get transfered to other pages making them unreadable. After this summer of multiple camping trips, my Pack had decided to get Class 1's on every boy & adult anyway. Copying scanned Class 1 forms will be a LOT easier than getting families to fill them out multiple times after the originals get lost or accidentally turned in to council or what have you!

You could also simply assign Denner & Asst each time for the Wolf & Bear levels, saving the elections for Webelos to better mirror a Patrol Leader & Asst. It rather depends on your boys & how you want to set things up. Either way would work well.

Elections are the way to go. You have it right when you say the top 2 are the initial Denner & Asst Denner, with the Asst replacing the Denner after a specified time period. Keep electing the Asst, taking out the names of the boys who have already served. After everyone has had a chance, all of the names go back in again. However, if you divide up your year evenly between the number of boys you have, you might not need to start over. Or, if you do it should only be a one time only final election for a short stint at the end. Denners are a natural progression from the Shared Leadership of Tigers (from the Teams to the Boys), and a great transition tool for Webelos (more responsibility, more like a PL).

I have to disagree that adding the stipulation that Star & Life service can NOT be to BSA is not adding to the requirements. Of course it is. You are ADDING a stipulation. SM approval is simply to make sure that what they are doing is actually service & not just cleaning up their room or cutting the grass in their own back yard. I also have to disagree that service to your council or district is not "community" service & should not be allowed. You do realize that just about everything that your council does is worked, run & staffed by volunteers? Without people (adult & youth) giving hours (& hours, & hours) of service, these events (training, camporees, Cub Days, Roundtable, Day Camp, popcorn distribution, etc) would never happen at all. Think about that when you are asked to unload your own Troops popcorn off of a semi because no adult or youth felt that it was worth their service time to do it for you. Think about it when you can not get new leaders trained because no adults felt it was a proper use of their community service time to volunteer to be trainers. Think about that when you want your younger son or nephew to attend a Cub Day Camp or Webelos-Ree but your council can't provide them because they have nobody to run or staff them. Think about that when you can not get any Cubs to sign up with your Troop because they NEVER see Boy Scouts in action. If service to BSA & it's camps is not real service, then why bother with OA? Also, if service to BSA is not good enough for the boys to do, why should I waste my time volunteering with YOUR Troop? Working at your Troop's popcorn Show 'n Sell booth does NOT qualify for Star or Life service hours, but working as youth staff for Cub Scout Day Camp sure as heck DOES.

Actually, BSA membership all over is good for only 1 year at a time. Everyone, everywhere, has to pay the $10 National registration each year. This is not just a Texas thing. Also, I'm a bit unclear on how ways to cut costs pertain in any way to youth protection, but maybe I just need more coffee. OK - Ways to help fund your Troop's Scouting program - Ask your CO to help in some way. Troop Dues Troop money earning events These are the 3 main ways that most Troops pay for their year of Scouting. Some Troop money earning events might be - Car wash Pancake breakfast Spaghetti dinner Sell stuff - popcorn Christmas wreaths cookie dough entertainment books hot dogs pizzas first aid kits flowers Donation days at area eateries (with coupon % of everyone's bill goes to Troop) Garage sales

"I would suggest using the guidelines established for the Eagle when considering service projects for Star and Life." Nope - Can't do that. That would be adding to the requirements & is not allowed. The requirements state to "take part in service projects". The ONLY stipulation that the requirements put on the service projects is that it be approved by the SM. Star & Life service projects do NOT have to be planned & developed by the scout. They are also allowed to give service to BSA (where do you think that districts get many of their staff for Cub Scout events? That being said, the only way I would consider working a Troop fundraiser as service hours is if the hours were considered "Troop Service", and went toward a Troop goal of some kind. One possible goal could be if you work so many Troop Service hours, you get a percentage off your summer camp cost. Fundraising for your Troop is basically working for yourself. Troop fundraising pays for Troop activities. Service should be for someone other than yourself. Otherwise, why not just have the scout count the hours spent cleaning his room?

Des Plaines Valley Council Wood Badge C-20-06 09/15-17/06 - Camp Oh-Da-Ko-Ta http://www.bsa-dpvc.org/Wood_Badge/WB_OhDaKoTa.htm 3363 Dyer Lake Road Burlington, Wi. 53105 AND 10/06-08/06 - Camp Tomo-Chi-Chi Knolls http://www.bsa-dpvc.org/Wood_Badge/WBTomo.htm 40W095 Freeman Road Gilberts, IL $190 - if paid in full by February 1, 2006 $200 - if paid in full by April 1, 2006 $210 - if paid in full after April 1, 2006 http://www.bsa-dpvc.org/Wood_Badge/index.html

Well, since all Venturing Crews/Ships are high school or older, an urban HS Crew is not really a rarity at all. I am sure that Houston already has a number of Crews. What I am concerned about is that you want to have the school be the Charter Org. If this is a public school, then that will not work. You can have a school ORGANIZATION cahrter a Crew, but not the school itself.

Your average Joe on the street ISN'T going to have a clue that selling individual bags is not legal, so of course they will not complain. The complaint will come down the road when someone has a bad (fatal?) reaction after eating the individual bag of popcorn. Then the lawsuits will start to fly because the person who bought the popcorn, & thought they were doing a good thing, had no idea what was in the stuff or how it was processed. My council has been banning this practice for at least 4 years now.

If you have never had Scout Accounts before, this is a very big step. Your Committee should be discussing the hows & whys. They should make the call on the percentage given to the boys. This is not something that you should be deciding on your own.

FScouter is spot on & to add to that, while the CM & DL's are not technically members of the Committee, they should attend Committee meetings & work TOGETHER with the Committee to create the best Cub Scout program possible for the boys in their Pack. The operative word here is TOGETHER! BSA (Cub or Boy) is NOT a one man show. Cooperation is needed by everyone involved in order for the program to work the way it should. (This message has been edited by ScoutNut)

Popcorn cheer : Var #1 - Everyone starts making intermitent popping noise, Slowly the popping increases until it is popping fast & furious. Then it goes back down again until all of the popcorn is popped. Var # 2 - Similar to #1, but the popping does not go from slow to fast back to slow. Everyone stands up in an open area & jumps up & down as they pop. The popping starts slow & goes to (stays at) fast. When they bump into another "piece of popcorn", they stick. You will eventually have 1 very large "popcorn ball".

Jeffrey H - BSA is not CHANGING the pants. The new zip-offs are NOT replacements. They are additional options only. If you like the current pants/shorts you can continue to wear them if you wish.

Yep, Booth Sales (Show & Sell) work well for families who do not want to go door-to-door. If a boy helps out for an hour or two and can get credit for even $40, it's better than nothing. Trails End also has the ability to take orders from folks online (they pay with a credit card) with the profit going to the unit & the boy getting credit for the sale. With those 2 options, there is really no reason for a boy to do no work at all for the popcorn sale. We set a Pack sales goal per boy (not family). Last year it was $350. Some make it, some don't. Some go way over & some do the least possible. It evens out in the end & we very seldom have any boy who does not get credit for ANY sales at all. We also do extra incentives. If the boy makes the goal he receives a rocket kit. The top 10 sellers get to throw a whipped cream pie (paper plate w/whipped cream) at the leader of their choice at our December holiday Pack meeting. Last year we had a 4th grade boy who had us give his 1st grade brother credit for all of his sales so that his brother would be able to be in the pie toss. The little dickens hit me square in the left eye!

I have not used Access enough to be that good with it. I would go with Excel spreadsheets for each boy feeding into a total page with data either input or imported from the fundraiser spreadsheets.

You live in an area with lots of things to do. Historic sites, state parks, battlefields, museums, battleship overnights, etc. What to do depends on what the boys are interested in. Why not have your SPL do some searching on the 'net to find some ideas to bring to your years program planning meeting.

I have 2 words for you - SHARED LEADERSHIP!! Please don't skip this EXTREMELY important aspect of the Tiger Program. Your Tiger Teams are doing more than just working toward Tiger rank. They are learning about Scouting, your Pack, & each other. Shared leadership helps show the Tiger families what "Help the Pack Go" means. It immerses the Tiger families in Scouting, & family participation is what Cub Scouts is all about. Have your Tiger Teams each sign up for 1 month (more or less, depending on how many Tigers you have) of activities. If you take the first 5 months & work on 1 of the 5 Tiger achievements each month, you have a pretty good chance of meeting the goal of reaching rank by B&G. Don't plan the activities for your Tiger Teams. Help them with ideas & resources, but do not do all of the work for them. You will be surprised the ideas they come up with. Here's an idea to give to your September Tiger Team - A Reenactment. There are medieval, Revolutionary War, Civil War, Voyageurs, etc. There are usually a number of them around in the fall months because it is cooler then for wearing the costumes. For #1G we have gone to a Revolutionary War reenactment complete with weddings, battles, & hatchet throwing, visited a historical farm, visited a War museum, gone on a local historical tour, visited a historical mill that was a stop on the Underground Railroad, gone to nature centers, visited a historical schoolhouse, visited the dinosaurs & lots more. I will usually keep the library for a "back-up" trip for when families miss the regular one. Many parks, zoos & museums have scout programs. Keep them in mind for all levels. Don't feel intimidated! Take training ASAP, use your Tiger Teams, & have FUN!