ScoutNut

As it was explained to you back in August when you asked if you could turn down the former SM's merit badge counselor application - MBC is a DISTRICT position, NOT a Troop one. Neither your Troop Advancement person, or any other Troop leader, has any say at all in who can/can not be a merit badge counselor. Your parent simply needs to fill in the merit badge counselor form Buffalo posted the link for (I too recommend checking the "will work with all units" box), take it to your local Council office, fill in a BSA Adult volunteer application there, and hand it all over to the council staff. The parent does not even have to pay a BSA registration fee. It is the SM's job to recommend merit badge counselors to the Scouts in his Troop for particular badges. It is NOT the job of anyone in a Troop to say a person can not sign up and be a merit badge counselor.

I would bet that both Troops knew quite well they were going against BSA policy. A Local Tour Permit should have been filed for the outing. On the Tour Permit the leader in charge signs that they have READ the Guide to Safe Scouting, and have a copy in their possession. If they had stated on the Tour Permit it was a lazer tag outing the permit would not have been approved. Part of our job as a BSA leader is to be knowledgeable of the rules, regs, and policies of the BSA. These are not deeply hidden secrets. The G2SS is even online where anyone can access it.

Just a question on the May crossovers to Boy Scouting. Usually when you wait that late the boys are unable to attend camp with their new Troop that first summer. Do the Troops continue to have regular meetings, or do other activities, besides summer camp, over the summer months? Or must the "new" Boy Scouts wait until August or September to start doing things with their Troop? If they have to wait, do you know how that has affected their retention in the Troop?

Going to see a demonstration is fine. There should be no problem with that. Participating in it is another thing altogether. BSA does not allow martial arts like karate because of the physical contact between people. This is the same reason there is a belt loop for FLAG football, and not for TOUCH football.

The specific training breakout is for Pack Committee. It is for the Committee Chair, and Committee members. Check on your Council/District training calender for - Cub Scout Leader Specific Training. That is what you want to sign up for.

Our Pack generally awards AOL, and does Crossover, at the same Pack meeting. Usually that meeting is our February Blue & Gold. It happens this way because the Webelos den leader arranges his/her program to finish by February of the Scouts 5th grade year. Since most Webelos requirements are done as a den, this is fairly easy to do. We do both ceremonies at the same meeting because by the time the Scouts earn AOL, they are more than ready to move on to Boy Scouts, and they do not want to wait another month.

>>"Unless I am very mistaken, Daisy Scouts are 1st grade, not kindergarten, so would be on level with Tiger Cubs."

>>"Not my exact words if you were qouting me , but that is exactly what I was saying!"

>>" It does not say he has to complete a line item list of requirements.">"A boy earns beads by working on the five Tiger Cub achievements.">"For each achievement, the Tiger Cubadult partner team must complete a den activity, a family activity, and a Go See It.">"As a boy completes each part of the achievements, he will be awarded either an orange, white, or black bead">"When the boy has earned all five white beads, all five orange beads, and all five black beads, he is eligible to receive his Tiger Cub badge.">"The Tiger Cub badge is for boys who complete all parts of the five achievements and earn their 15 beads."

>>" Having re-read the above statement, I will again say give the patches to the kids. You would not be GIVING them the patches as they have earned them! They participated, so under BSA guidlines.. they completed the requirements. ">"Emphasize that the adult partner signs the book in the appropriate place when a required or elective activity is completed. A boys participation in THE ACTIVITY along with the adult partner is the criterion for completion.">"now we can argue about wether or not forms are signed off or not, but that is 100% speculation and guessing on our part since that was not stated in the original post.">"all but one of the boys show up for every Den/Packmeeeting and go see it""I know that the boy hasn't finished quite a few of the requirements because I went through his book as I spoke with his parent."

Have you considered that the problem might not be with the Troop? It might very well be with your attitude that you show to them. I don't know about you, but I sure would not want someone working with me who thought that what we were doing was a waste of time. I also would not want someone working with the boys who thought following the program was a waste of time. Why not simply step back, and let your wife, and stepson, do what they seem to enjoy doing. Edited to add - Don't blame the Troop because your SS is not picking up after himself. That is purely a parenting issue between you, your wife, and your stepson. (This message has been edited by Scoutnut)

WestCoastScouter is talking about a CUB SCOUT Family Overnighter. The form Infoscouter posted is the Pack Overnighter Site Approval form, and is what needs to be approved by your Council in order for your Pack to camp on the farm. The mandatory standards are the ones that must be met. The site amenities, while nice to have available, are optional. Contact your council to see who is allowed to do the site inspection (your Pack leadership, or a Council staffer). It is not "bureaucracy", it is SAFETY. Free or not, I would want to know that MY son is camping at a safe facility. Of course, your feelings are free to differ.

I am not fond of the Kinder Cub idea. At all. Yes, I have heard the argument (over and over) that the kids want it, and it gives you a ready made Tiger den. Personally, I doubt that many of the kids could care less, unless they have an older brother/sister in Scouts. They simply learn to wait, like so many other things in school and life, until it is their turn. As to the ready made Tiger den idea, that was one of the big pushes for Tigers. Tigers gives you a ready made Wolf den. Now we hear about problems retaining them into Wolf and Bear. Starting them younger is not going to help the numbers in the long run. It will not improve the program. If your Pack can't field a program good enough to retain Scouts now, adding a younger year will only make it worse. Thankfully, this pilot program does not seem to be taking off very fast.

You can get all of the information on the 100th Anniversary Year of Celebration awards here - http://scouting.org/100years/100years/ayearofcelebration.aspx For belt loops and pins, BSA now has the requirements online, including the new ones - http://www.scouting.org/cubscouts/awards/adults/sanda.aspx'>http://www.scouting.org/cubscouts/awards/adults/sanda.aspx If your son works on belt loops and pins, keep in mind that some of the belt loops are part of the Webelos program, and to be used as such, must be earned while a Webelos. There are plenty of others to do however, so it should not really be a problem. Some other things you can work on are - Emergency Preparedness http://www.scouting.org/cubscouts/awards/adults/sanda.aspx BSA Physical Fitness Award http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/Media/Publications/PhysicalFitness.aspx Not sure what this site is doing to the links, but clicking on the end one will open the page.(This message has been edited by Scoutnut)

Your son has completed the ENTIRE Bear Handbook? Wow! Between the Achievement and Elective sections, that could be around 160, or 16 arrow points. That is some accomplishment! If you are just looking for more to do with your son to keep him active, and interested, has he earned all of the 2010 ribbons? How about the BSA Family program awards? Leave No Trace? Outdoor Activity Award? How about belt loops, and pins for the loops he has already earned? Has he looked at any of the new Belt loops? How about if he picked his favorite elective (he has LOTS to pick from!) and helped the rest of his den earn it? There is still plenty of stuff he can do as a Bear until the end of the school year!

Nope, I don't do weekly meetings during June, July, and August. The Pack has 1 or 2 events each month, to add den meetings on top of that would be quite a lot. Especially when you figure in everyone's week or two of vacation (which we try to work around for the Pack events). The den leaders need some down time to recharge and plan for the upcoming year. Get your Pack to plan some fun events like a bike hike, fishing derby, picnic, Pack family campout, baseball game (some AA/AAA teams do Scout overnighters on the field after the game), etc. Attend your councils Summer Camp. Attend your District Day Camp. Have FUN!

Yes, "They participate , they get the badge." NOT they are registered - so they get the badge no matter what. 1st grade, or college, the boy has to actually DO SOMETHING in order to EARN an award. Yes, if "Akela" signs off on it, it is completed, and the Cub Scout gets credit for it. However if a requirement was NOT covered at any den meeting, or if it was, and the Scout was NOT at the den meeting when the requirement was done, and NO ONE has signed off on the requirement in the Scouts Handbook, you can NOT simply say - hey he is registered, he participated in some stuff, so we will go ahead and say he participated in everything, completed everything, and give him an award. That is NOT the BSA program. How exactly does doing that jell with Cub Scouting's Core Values of Courage, Honesty, Perseverance, or Responsibility? The BSA Scouting program states that awards must be EARNED. Give your Cub Scouts the opportunity to do just that - EARN their award. There is still plenty of time left for them to do it. Work WITH the parents, explain the program. How much time can it really take to talk to your son about the weather on the way to school in the morning, or talk to him at the dinner table about his day, or watch a sport together on TV? Stress to the parents that they need to attend meetings. Re-do things in den meetings in different ways. The boys who have already finished still have fun, and the scout who needs the requirement gets it done. Put the Tiger Team that needs requirements in charge of a meeting covering one of the requirements they need. The program is flexible. Use that flexibility, don't just toss out the program.

>>"If the Tigers show and and "DO THIER BEST"... Then the have met and completed trhe requiremnts for the Tiger badge!"

Tiger Cub Scouts ARE fully integrated into Cub Scouting. Tigers are listed separately because, like Webelos, they have a completely different, age appropriate, program from the Cub Scout level programs of Wolf and Bear. I have never used the online advancement, so I can not comment on how up to date BSA is on that. Since the AOL is the only Cub award that really needs to be recorded correctly at the council level, we never felt it necessary to deal with the online thing.

Remember, the point of Webelos is not to be a one man den leader show. The point is to be a transition into Boy Scouts. One of those transitions is using the Adult Association method more, to get them ready to deal with the whole Merit Badge Counselor idea. Your Webelos dens should be using a multitude of different venues, and people, to teach those Activity Badges.

Lisa made another good point, and one that I was thinking might be part of your problem. Cub Scouts do not HAVE to earn their rank award badge in order to move up to their next Cub level. That will happen automatically at the end of the school year, when they graduate into their new grade at school. BSA's computer system, Scoutnet, automatically moves all Cubs up to the next level on June 1. That is why councils can take newly graduated kindergarten boys applications for Tiger Cub Scouts on June 1. Cub Scouts also do not HAVE to earn their rank award by Blue and Gold, or any other arbitrary date. They have until the end of the school year to earn all awards for their rank level. Actually, if they want/need some extra time to earn their rank award ONLY, they can take a few extra weeks, but, since they can only work in ONE level at a time, they can NOT work on anything in their new level during that time. Your Tigers have at least 3 more months to complete the requirements for their Tiger rank badge. Give them all of the support, and help, that you can.

Yes, page 18 of the Tiger Handbook does state that ""Simply participating in the activities and doing his best constitutes completion." Directly before that it also states that there are no "performance requirements", and that Cub Scouts should NOT be tested. However, numerous places in the Tiger Handbook also state that a Tiger EARNS recognition by COMPLETING requirements. So, while we can not "test" the Scouts, they DO have to DO THEIR BEST while actually PARTICIPATING in the activities. No where in either the Tiger Handbook, or the Cub Scout Leader Book, does it state that a Tiger (or any other Cub Scout) should receive a rank award (or any other award) simply for being a registered Cub Scout. If that is what you want to do, why bother with Scouting? Save the dues and purchase your own patches at the hobby store. Then he can get patches for getting up in the morning, going to school, eating breakfast, putting his shoes on the right feet, etc.

For Tiger rank award and electives, purchase a Tiger Handbook from your local BSA council Scout Shop. Everything about the Tiger program is in there. You can also order a Handbook online at BSA National Supply - http://www.scoutstuff.org/BSASupply/ItemDetail.aspx?cat=01RTL&ctgy=PRODUCTS&c2=BOOKS_LIT&C3=CUBSCOUTS&C4=&LV=3&item=34713&prodid=34713^8^01RTL& For other things that a Tiger can work on, check out the BSA National Web site - http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/CubScouts/Parents/Awards.aspx

From the BSA National site on the Cub Scout Outdoor Activity Award - >>"Tiger Cubs, Wolf and Bear Cub Scouts, and Webelos Scouts have the opportunity to earn the Cub Scout Outdoor Activity Award. Boys may earn the award in each of the program years as long as the requirements are completed each year."

Why not simply ask them?