ScoutNut

Hi ! Welcome ! Tigers are G-R-R-R-R-R-E-A-T!!!!!! Make sure you throw in a lot of active games & participation songs! The Tigers love to be active & having fun! Remember - You don't have to do it all yourself. As Tiger leader you are really more of a coordinator & liaison with the rest of your Pack. Use Shared Leadership! Sign up your Tiger Teams right away for their meetings. HAVE FUN!!!

Conflicts between sports, school, other extracurricular activities & Scouts will always be there. What you do NOT want to do is to make them choose. If you do that, more often than not, they will not choose Scouts. Work with your 2 Scouts, their family, & their den leaders. If they are not Webelos, make sure they know that they can, & should, be working at home on all rank achievements. Can your den leaders change their den meeting nights every so often to give these 2 boys a chance to attend? Can any upcoming den field trips be scheduled at a time when these 2 can attend? Make sure their den leaders mail them all den & pack newsletters, fliers, etc. Have your Popcorn Kernal (head of your popcorn sale) personally bring to their house the popcorn info. Explain the program to them, give them all due dates, & sign them up for Booth Sales if you are doing any. There is no reason they can not participate. As far as the pack dues, I would not charge them for the time they are not active. As has been brought up, they are not costing the pack anything if they are not active. If you want these boys back, you must make them feel comfortable that they are not "falling to far behind". You need to make it easy & painless for them to be able to participate as much as possible now & then feel good about coming back full time when they can.

Pop Tarts for breakfast??? I have never had Pop Tarts for breakfast on a camping trip. Do you eat them raw (so to speak)? Kinda gross. The only time I ever ate a hot dog on a campout was with the Cub Pack! Will you be doing your presentation over a campfire or on a Coleman stove? How long will your presentation be? Will it be just a one time presentation or ongoing as a part of rotating stations? How involved do you want to get? Do you want to do some quick & easy, some long & involved, or some of both? Are you going to have some type of theme (foil packet, dutch oven, cardboard box baking, pie iron, etc)? Will they be making & eating or just watching? How many attendees do you expect? This could affect what you have due to the cost of the items needed. All of these questions will impact what you choose to do. Here are a couple of good resources: http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/5307/toc.html http://www.scoutorama.com/recipe/index.cfm If you have limited time & want a diverse menu Pie Irons are fun, easy & versatile. You can make breakfast, lunch, dinner & dessert. http://www.pieiron.com/recipes.htm http://www.greatcamps.com/recipes.htm#HOBO%20Pies:%20 http://www.chuckwagondiner.com/categories.php?id=3

Both Ships & Crews would fall under the Venturing YPT. While there are less Venturing Units than Cub or Boy Scout Units, there are still a good number in each council across the country. Learning for Life/Exploring is an entirely different organization within National BSA. They also have Youth Protection Training available. Current YPT for Cub/Boy Scout Leaders & Venturing can be found online at most BSA council websites. The YPT for Learning for Life/Exploring can be found online at the Learning for Life website.

What we usually do at Scout Sunday mass is tell a little about the medal & what the boys did to earn it. Then we present them with a certificate, & tell everyone when/where the actual medal will be awarded. This year could get a bit tricky as both our parish & our Annual Cathedral Scout Ceremony are on the same day. We may have to just read their names & tell about the award.

"don't really want to join another troop as co-leader, just for the purpose of changing the way the leader does things" Why would you go to a new troop that you felt needed "fixing"? You might as well just stay with the old one then. You also don't need to join as a co-leader if you don't want to. Surely there are troops in your area that are being run correctly? We don't have a lot of Juliette's in our area & the ones we do have were older. With having to fund the whole thing themselves & finding groups to do activities with, most decided it was easier to just find a troop that they & their daughter liked. It sounds like you are planning on putting a lot of time & effort into this. Good luck & Happy Scouting!

You can be sued for any number of logical & illogical reasons. Get into an accident driving anyone anywhere (not just scouts on an outing) & you could be sued by everyone involved & all of their relatives. Be helping out at school & a child falls down & gets hurt. Every adult in the school at the time of the incident (& probably some who weren't) could be sued. Walk down the street and bump into someone & you & your whole family could be sued. Solution - Never go outdoors, never allow any family member to go outdoors, put a VERY high wall around your entire property line & never let anyone come near it. Oh Heck, someone will probably bump into your wall & sue you anyway! Reality - Get trained, follow the G2SS, follow all local & national laws, & FILL OUT YOUR TOUR PERMIT PROPERLY. If you do all of that & something still happens, BSA insurance will cover all involved & will back you up in any lawsuit. Still not happy - Go for the never have anything to do with anyone approach above.

You should contact your council about training and any council specific rules about Juliettes. Most councils do NOT let Juliettes do money-earning activities or even sell cookies. They can not have an individual bank account. I would only go the Juliette route with a 1st grade Brownie as a very last resort. Half of the fun is being with a group of girls, learning new things, independence, & leadership. The girls learn a LOT from interacting with the other girls & their leaders. If the only reason you are going Juliette with your 1st grader is because her Troop Leader refused to recognize outside badgework, then you should just move her to another Troop. Or talk to your SUM about forming your own Troop. Most communities have a waiting list for Brownie Troops so this might be an option they would jump at.

All 4 sets of parents, & I assume all 4 kids, are aware of the situation & of the expected behavior. The 4 kids in question have done nothing to warrant any censure, other than dating each other. If you treat them like they have either already committed a crime or are about to, you will be sending a VERY clear message that you do NOT trust them. If I was one of those Scouts (or their girl friends) I would be very upset. Make an announcement to ALL attendees on the expected behavior. Keep an unobtrusive eye on EVERYONE's behavior (not just these 4). Have fun.

"Your son's program cannot be launched until we have the minimum number of uniformed and trained leaders as required by the BSA." That would be only 1. There is no 2-deep requirement of any kind for Den meetings. The 2-deep requirement is for trips & outings only & then only 1 of the 2 needs to be a registered leader. There is NO requirement at all that the registered leader be either uniformed or trained. If your DL wants to run with it then you should support him. A den of 11 2nd graders is large, but it can be managed. As has been suggested here, get the parents to sign up to help at meetings. I would say, with that big of a group, 2-3 parents per meeting would be good. Have your DL put together a sheet showing each meeting of the year & what he plans on working on at each meeting. Based on the number of boys & the number of meetings, he can tell the parents that they each need to sign up for X number of meetings with a MINIMUM of 2 parents each meeting. He can then send a copy of the sheet, along with contact info for everyone in the den, to all den families. Do NOT pull the plug on this den. It CAN work. Communication will be key here. He will need to make sure each parent is reminded of their meeting dates & any specific things that they will be responsible for at their meeting. Utilizing the Denner/Asst Denner system will help too. You might also look into getting a Den Chief from an area Boy Scout Troop.

I can't seem to find my historical uniform site right now. If they look like they are BSA & not something homemade they should be fine. Even if the shirts are rather old & out of date, as long as they are from BSA, they are still "proper", & official uniform pieces. Let the boys know they are wearing a bit of Cub Scout history in this, our 75th year.

The Cubmaster's main job is to run the monthly Pack meetings. He also oversees other Pack activities. You plan them with the help of the CC & the Committee. You should be in contact with your area SM's to help obtain Den Chief's & help with the Webelos to Scout transition. You are also responsible for making sure the dens are running well. Everything else is the responsibility of the CC or one of the Committee members. Not knowing exactly what all it is you have been doing, perhaps the best way to go about this is to get yourself a copy of the job description for both the Cubmaster & the Committee Chair. Then make a list of the things that you have been doing that fall into each category. (This message has been edited by ScoutNut)

CM Jerry - In another thread you said that your District had tried a few times to start up a new Pack in your area and that the Packs keep failing. Why would this new split off Pack be any different?

Actually the CC & COR are responsible for recruiting ALL Pack leaders, including the Cubmaster & Den Leaders. The CC is in charge of all Pack administration issues. The CC does the yearly re-charter. He helps the CM & the Den Leaders with running the Pack program. He should form committies and/or appoint members to handle specific duties for the Pack (Newsletter, Outings, Advancement, Treasurer, etc). If your Dad has read the job description & gone thru Fast Start, he should already have a good idea of what is expected of him.

The Fall 2005 Cub Scout Program Helps For New Den and Pack Leaders, & Cub Scout Outdoor Program Guidelines for 2005 are both in the New Cub Scout Den Leader Kit. I have not seen a new printing of the Character Connections & I can't say I have ever seen a Boys' Life calendar. You should ask your DE or your Council Training Chair for all of the above copies. In the meantime maybe these sites will help : http://www.boyslife.org/lo/index.html http://www.wtsmith.com/rt/chardev.html You can also get a complete copy of the 2005-2006 Cub Scout Program Helps at your Scout Shop or online at : https://scoutnet.scouting.org/BSASupply/default.aspx (This message has been edited by ScoutNut)

Most of our dens meet once a week for about 1 hour except for the week of the Pack meeting. We have had Webelos dens that met every other week for 2 hours & it seemed to work well for them. There are times, if the den is working on something special or going on an outing, that the meetings run longer than 1 hour. Once a month meetings are just not enough.

"Would "soliciting funds" for the charter organization be prohibited?" Yes. Although service projects are highly recommended and technically all money in the Units treasury already belongs to the CO. BSA youth are not in the business of fundraising or soliciting funds. That should be left in the hands of professionals. Units can, and should, do money-earning projects. If your unit wants to donate a portion of their unit funds to the Red Cross to help in the relief for Katrina they are quite able to do that. If your unit plans & gets approval for a money-earning project & then donates a % of their money earned to the relief effort that is their choice. They just can NOT advertise that the money-earning project is specifically for raising money for the Red Cross, Salvation Army or any other organization, no matter what the purpose of that organization is. Have you looked at the Katrina Disaster Relief flier National has on it's site? It is very nicely done & I would recommend that everyone puts one up in their place of employment.

Our council also allows us to rollover our left over Show & Sell into Take-Order. And, we can return unsold cases of Show & Sell popcorn. When we put in our Show & Sell order we order enough (based on estimates & last year's sale) to cover both Show & Sell & Take-Order. The Show & Sell return is also when you are supposed to order your Take-Order popcorn. We know at that point what we still need & what we don't. We usually only have to order a very small amount and we pick that up at the S & S return. That way if one of our families need to get their order filled early we have the popcorn available. It also gives the families extra time to collect the money. For quick cash to pay bills you should consider doing a car wash. FB - It could be your DE was using last year's leftover popcorn which had gotten stale.

Actually rk, the religious knots & the devices that can be worn on them ARE BSA recognitions. The religious awards themselves are NOT, but the knots ARE. The purple religious knot can be worn on the front of BOTH the Cub Scout & Boy Scout uniform shirt. A Boy Scout does NOT have to earn a religious award as a Boy Scout in order to be able to wear the knot on his Boy Scout uniform. If he earned a religious award as a Cub Scout he can still wear the purple knot on his Boy Scout uniform even if he never earns any other religious awards. He can also wear the purple knot on his Adult Leader uniform later in life. wahoonfp - It is a shame you are having such problems getting the medals. Our Office of Youth Ministry is a bit understaffed, but if I give them a call they will have the medals ready for us to pick up in just a day or two. We can also order them by mail. Another possibility is that some councils are now being allowed to sell the medals. Our council is one of those. It is a bit of a pain because they have to collect all of the paperwork & can only order a set amount at a time & have to wait until they are gone to re-order. The medals go fast & you need to give them plenty of advance notice. All in all I find it easier to just go pick them up myself. As far as promoting the religious program to the whole Pack, you might try looking at the PRAY publishing website. They have some materials that might prove useful. You can display one of those nice, large, color posters of all of the different medals at one of your Pack meetings. Your Pack might even purchase one booklet from each religion represented in your Pack & have them on display too. Sometimes being able to actually look at some of the materials will grab their interest.

We do a combo of Take-Order and Show & Sell Booth sales. We have a per boy goal for them to meet. If they meet the goal they get an Estes rocket kit. The top 10 sellers get to toss a paper plate of Cool Whip at the Leader of their choice. This is one of the highlights of our Christmas Pack meeting. The families also know that the popcorn sale pays for what we do. The more we earn, the more the Pack can pay for & do. If you are having problems with folks participating you can give them the option of making the sales goal or writing a check for the profit. Make sure that they know that if they do not pay their son's Scouting will be on a pay-as-you-go basis with the Pack charging them for everything including awards earned.

Not in my council. Have you considered booth sales at your local grocery stores & banks?

They are smaller than the Webelos activity pins. Actually, you can get a "parents pin" when you order your medal. They are kind of cool & are about the size of the BSA rank parents pins. They are also considerably bigger than the knot devices (that will give you some idea of the devices size - think tiny). The religious parents pin are nice for the "mother's ribbon". One other thing that you might not know about the Catholic awards - you can get replacements. Your local CYO (or whatever organization is handling it) keeps all of the paperwork. If one of your boys loses his medal all you have to do is give them the name, & approximate date earned. They will then look it up, verify it, & sell you a replacement medal. Works for Girl Scouts & Campfire too! BTW - Get as many folks from your Council, CO, & Unit, to the recognition ceremony at your local cathedral in February, as possible. Drag your local paper along as well. It will be a memorable event! Are you the trained counselor for the boys? You might be interested in looking into other Catholic awards. Check out the NCCS website for info on the Rosary Patch, Duty To God, & International Awareness Activity programs. http://www.nccs-bsa.org/emblems-awards/awards.php

The youth religious knot can be worn by anyone (Cub, BS, Venturer, Adult) who has earned a religious award as a youth member. This means that yes, the knot can be transfered from the Cub Scout uniform to the Boy Scout uniform. Only one knot can be worn regardless of how many awards he has earned. This is where the knot devices come in. They are tiny pins that denote the level the boy was when he earned each religious award. He can wear a knot device (on the knot) for each award earned (including the first). The unit is not obligated to purchase either the knot or the knot device for the boys. It is a nice thing to do, but some will buy only the knot, some will buy both the knot & the knot device, & some will not buy either. If your unit does not provide the knots or the devices to the boys, parents can purchase them at their local Scout Shop themselves. Our Cub Pack gives the knot with it's knot device for the first award. After that we present the knot device. Our CO's BS Troop does not provide the boys with either knot or device. My son wanted to keep his on his Cub shirt so I purchased him a new knot, 2 devices for Cubs & 1 for Boy Scout. He still has his last award to earn. (This message has been edited by ScoutNut)

This is part of National's registration theme this year - Race to Scouting, It's Fun At Every Turn. It is a National promotion, but it is up to the individual council how (or if) they implement it. Contact your District Exectutive.

When I attended BALOO training there was a fellow there from another council. My council made sure to give him the paperwork showing he had taken the course & he was good to go. I believe they also mailed something to his home council. BALOO is a National syllabus & should be the same all over.