ScoutNut

Seattle Asks : "are those who would pass someone as a swimmer who will only jump into water as deep as they are tall saying---" There is not one single person on this thread who said that they would only have boys jump in water as deep as as they are tall. You do seem to like to embellish. "1) This is the standard we expect of Eagle Scouts" Eagle is a rank, with it's own requirements to meet in order to earn it, just like Tenderfoot, Life & all of the ranks in between. The "standards" we expect boys to meet are the same for all ranks. They are called the Scout Promise & Law. "2) A person who is in a canoe, rowboat or powerboat shouldn't be expected to be able to jump into water if called upon to do so unless the depth has been measured in advance and found to be no deeper than the boy is tall?" There's that embellish thing again. Except that now you are being downright silly. So, since you insist on being silly, you are the one who stated that boys must only be allowed to jump into water where they can not touch the bottom at all. So I guess that means that you would be the one pre-measuring the depth of the water. I still can't figure out how you would decide on the perfect depth for each boy though. Maybe keep tossing them in until they don't come up any more?

Instead of trying to cram in lots of money earning in one year, why not spread it out a bit & do the trip as an 8th grade blow-out. That way the girls will be able to do a better job & spend some money on other fun things too. 6th grade is usually the start of Middle School. Will all 5 be in the same school?

"On money raising BSA Vs GSUSA. The GSUSA has huge money contributor in the cookie sales. Our popcorn sales can't even come close. Thus BSA dues must be higher to compensate." Both the BSA & the GSUSA charge the same for National Registration - $10 per year. "AFAIK, Girl Scout cookie sales fund National, Councils, and units. Boy Scout popcorn sales only goes to councils and units. Nothing goes to BSA National." You have obviously never participated in a GS Cookie Program Activity. Just as with BSA Councils & their popcorn sale, the individual GS Councils pick their cookie vendor, set their cookie cost, pick their incentives & set their own cookie price & Troop profit, based on their council budget needs. None of the $3-$4 per box (average cost country wide) of cookies goes to National. After all of the sale expenses, the end profit goes to the individual council to pay council operating expenses. Nationwide, councils are desperately trying to reduce their reliance on the Cookie Program for operating funds.

"Does he get to bargain with the person doing the testing over the depth of the water he is asked to jump into?" Of course not. But he should also not have to keep moving out further & further from shore until you are convinced that there is no way he can ever touch bottom. Unless you take everyone out to the center of the lake, there are boys who will be able to touch bottom when jumping into 9 feet or 12 feet or even more. My son is over 6 ft tall, 220 lbs & could easily touch bottom at 12 ft & push back to the surface. Heck, in 2nd grade he could jump into the deepest end of the pool and hit bottom. What does the scout have to do to convince you that he is deep enough that there is no way he can touch bottom? The requirement states "jump feetfirst into water over your head in depth". It does NOT say to keep moving the boy into deeper & deeper water until the adult has decided he is deep enough. The intent is to see if a scout can swim & not just walk along on the bottom. If the scout is "bobbing up & down" he is NOT swimming & should not pass the requirement.

Requirements are meant to be taken literally and not interpreted however you want. If you change "water over your head" to "water deep enough that you could not touch bottom" you are adding to the requirements & that is not allowed by the BSA.

BTW Gern, girls camp in tents too. Actually, many councils own their own tents which they let individual Troops borrow so that the Troop does not have to purchase any. Some Troops purchase Troop tents, other Troops use the members personal equipment. Comparing GSUSA & BSA is never a good idea because of the different ways the two organizations are set up. Jkhny - I'm really not sure what point(s) you are trying to make by your comparisons.

We never went, but I have heard some good comments about it. Several Troops I know from GS lists make a point to go every year. How old are your girls?

Go ahead and do your fishing derby too. Who knows, you just might "hook" a few more!

Bear Electives showing the changes : http://usscouts.org/advance/cubscout/changes/beararrow-03.html

DS, you stated - "He was turned down for second class because he was not wearing the tenderfoot patch that the troop failed to give him." I take it this happened at his BOR for 2nd Class? Did they give this young man something in writing stating why he failed his BOR? Did they give him, in writing, things he should do in order to pass his next BOR? Did they set a date for his next BOR? My bet would be that this BOR did not follow corect BSA procedure in any way, shape or form & you will answer "no" to all of the above questions, except for the first. "Is there an acceptable way to force the troop to proceed with the board of review for second class" Yes. Have the family give the District Advancement Chair a call & file a request to have the BOR result reveiwed & overturned. Maybe that will wake up some of your leaders. Always interesting to see that I am not the only one dealing with a Troop it it's own little strange universe!

First of all a BOR is supposed to be, in part, a check up of how well the Troop is functioning. Although it should not retest the scout or be an inquisition, it should ask the scout how well the Troop is working for him. Second, why is it that "the SM generates 90% of the guidelines"? If your Troop decides, for whatever reasons, that it needs "guidelines", they should be generated by the Scouts, NOT the SM.

It sounds to me like she is basically just venting about 2 separate issues. The first is the raffle. Although raffles are not allowed, many units (both Pack & Troop) still do them. The raffles are not held as "Adult Games". They are fundraisers for the Unit, & usually do pretty good. Also, the boys (all ages) do understand what raffles are & realize they are for raising money. They have fun trying for the prizes. Please, do not get the idea that I condone BSA raffles. I do not. However, our church often has raffles at their events. The second issue seems to be how their recent Cub Olympics was run. Specifically, the way 1 person ran their event. It does sound like the judging was not very well thought out. If you are going to have winners (probably Bronze, Silver & Gold?) you should not be "guessing" at the results. There should have been specific (& clearly laid out) ways in place to measure the results of the events. I would suggest that ethicalgrandma attend the next Pack Committee Meeting and voice her concerns.

We used a parent who was already in the Pack as permanent Tiger Leader (me). By February or March I know the parents well enough to be able to ask 2 to be the leaders once the boys go to Wolf. It has worked very well for us. The parents don't feel pressured and get a chance to pretty much talk themselves into it by March! A good choice to look at would be your Webelos parents. They have been with the Pack for 5 years, know how it is run & might like to stay with the Pack instead of moving to Boy Scouts.

There is nothing in the Tiger program that should be to difficult for him to handle physically. Also, Tigers are in Partner Teams, one of his parents will be doing everything with him for this year. That should give the new Den Leader a good chance to get to know & work with the family. Because of his disabilities, one of his parents might want, or have, to stay with him for his Wolf and/or Bear year too. Together, the family & Den Leader, should be able to work out solutions to any problems that come up.

You said he has been a registered leader for 3 years & each year he has filled out a new adult application form & the felony conviction WAS listed on EACH application. So what is the problem? Each year his application (with the conviction clearly spelled out on it) has been viewed & approved by your CC, CO and your council. The BSA has been doing mandatory background checks since 2003, so I am sure his was investigated & approved. So, what is it you hope to accomplish by bringing it up to the entire committee? Are you trying to have him removed from his leadership role? Is it that you feel that everyone in the Unit should know about his problems 17 years ago? I do not understand your motivation here. In my opinion, the people that should know about this already DO know. He was honest on his applications & was approved to be a Scout Leader by your Unit & Council leadership. I do not think he mentioned this to you so that you could spread the news all over town. It is no one else's business & should be kept between the CC, CO, & the SE. Leave it alone.

I am not sure why you equate enrollment incentives to fraud. The boys like the incentives & that encourages the units to turn registrations in promptly, & not hold on to them for months at a time. I would really hope that most of the boys would be signed up by mid October anyway. How does registering a boy by Oct 15 & giving him an incentive automatically mean he will not stay in Scouts. And how is it BSA's fault if the boy quits before the end of the year? Giving the boys a good Scout program is the job of the Unit & it's CO. The council provides support. They are not the ones running the weekly meetings. BTW - most of the promotion of the incentive is to the unit & it's leaders, not the boys. We never tell the boys - "sign up now & get this real cool thing". We tell them - "sign up now & belong to this real cool program". Then a month later - "oh, by the way here's a cool thing for you too!".

Well I guess we are kind of eye-ballers & and not hard & fast budgeters. We know what we usually spend on Pack meetings & activites. We know when we have taken an increased cost on an activity & weather it was a one time only thing or will be a consistent cost. We look at what we ended the past year & the previous year with in the bank. We look at if we expect our activites to be about the same as the past year or if we are adding new things or an expensive thing. We see how many new boys we have added & how many we have lost. Then, when we have sifted all of this together, we decide if we want to raise the per boy popcorn goal or keep it the same (we never lower it). Our overall goal is to have the Pack provide as much as possible for the Scout and keep the out-of-pocket cost to the families minimal.

Is this a separate night set aside for recuitment, or will this be a part of your Sept. Pack meeting? Are you in charge of recruitment in you Pack? Will you be the one running the round-up? If you go with the national theme of "Race to Cub Scouting - Fun at Every Turn" you could bring out your Pinewood track, some old cars (or purchase some kits & let the boys color the blocks of wood) & let the boys have a sample race. You could have the boys make individual cars out of cardboard boxes & run a Cubanapolis. If you do the Western Round-up theme you could go with rope making & tossing. Leatherwork is always fun for boys. They love the idea of hitting things with hammers! You could make "ponies" from mops & have a race. You could also go with the 75th Anniversary theme. 2005 is not over until December & you still have time to earn your Anniversary badges. Have a marbles tournament. Learn yo-yo tricks. Eat twinkies!

Our Pack supports itself off of the Popcorn sale alone - No Pack dues. We set a reccomended sales goal for each boy & most either make it or come pretty close. This year we are considering making the profit cost madatory. Either thru the popcorn sale or as a check. Personally I prefer the boys to work the sale & earn their way, rather than have mom & dad pay for it. Den dues are up to the individual Den Leader. I do not charge dues for my Tigers because the cost of supplies is spread out to each family running their meetings. When I was leader for my son we charged $15 per year.

Push-ups used as punishment is not constructive. The Troop CMpack58's (original poster) boys belong to has lost boys because of this. I asked my 16 yr old Scout his opinion on push-ups used as punishment. His answer was - "Boy Scouts is not boot camp. There is no place for that in a Scout Troop." That's definitive enough for me.

We meet at 7 PM on a Tuesday for our regular Pack meetings. Snacks & drinks are at the end of each meeting and are the responsibility of the hosting Den. As of last year, we have made a determined effort to cut back on the sugary stuff & junk food. We usually do cheese/crakers, pretzels, & lots of fruit, with milk & juice to drink. Complete dinners we save for B&G & Christmas Pack meetings. These both are held on a Saturday and begin by 6 PM. I would not do one every month. It is a lot of work, extra cost (paper products, Pack purchased food, etc), & IMO, would tend to burn folks out. If you have a problem getting families to show up for Pack meetings then the solution is not food. You need to first, have each leader impress on their families the importance of attending & having their boys recognized in front of everyone. Second, you could have an incentive for attendence. Something like a flashy Den flag ribbon to go to each Den with 100% attendence at the Pack meeting. Or, use the BSA attendence award for the boys who attend ?? # of Den & Pack meetings. Once you have everyone hyped up to attend, you have to give them their money's worth. Make sure your Pack meetings are FUN and involve the WHOLE family in the FUN. Recognitions are only 1 part of the Pack meeting, and even those should be FUN! Games, songs, skits & other FUN activites should be a part of each meeting. If you remember your Leader Training, part of your Den meetings should be preparing for the monthly Pack meetings. If the boys, & their families, are having FUN, they will be much more likely to try their best to make every Pack meeting possible!

littlek - While WLOT might be required by your council, that is a local council decision. WLOT is NOT required by BSA National in order to take a Webelos Den camping. It is an extremely good idea, but not required.

From the BSA Adult Application - "All leaders must be 21 years of age or older, except assistant Scoutmasters, assistant den leaders, assistant Cubmasters, assistant Webelos den leaders, and assistant Varsity Scout coaches, who must be 18 or older."

Granted push-ups are not "flogging". However, per the BSA - "Discipline used in Scouting should be constructive and reflect Scouting's values. Corporal punishment is never permitted." Definition of "corporal" from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary - "Of, relating to, or affecting the body" Definition of "corporal punishment" - "The infliction of physical pain upon a person's body as punishment for a crime or infraction." You can use whatever convoluted logic or selective reading you want to convince youself that push-ups, as a punishment, are a fine thing. They are not. At the VERY least, they don't follow BSA's rules for punishment to be "constructive and reflect Scouting's values". CMpack58, If you sons feel up to a confrontation, have them step forward & intervene the next time your Troop's "Senior Scouts" start to pull this kind of stuff. They should let them know that what they are doing is against BSA policy & wrong. It will take courage on your boys part to stand up to the older boys & their SM, but IMO, it will teach them that you do not just sit back & say/do nothing when you see someone doing something that you know is wrong. Meanwhile, look for a different Troop that respects it's youth members & follows BSA policy. Let us know what happens & good luck!

BALOO (Basic Adult Leader Outdoor Orientation) Training has been around for a few years. It is usually held at a local council campground and is a one day event (our last one went from 8:30AM-4:30PM). BALOO is REQUIRED in order to take your Pack camping. The course teaches how to plan & carry out a successful Cub Scout Pack camping experience. National Camp School, while a wonderful thing, can NOT be a substitute for BALOO. I would recommend that you have 2-4 (or as many as you can get) parents (preferably not leaders, we do enough) to take the training. That way you will never have to cancel a camping trip because the BALOO leader had to cancel. BTW - Welcome!