T2Eagle

Those kinds of ultimatums are just dumb, and bad parenting, bad leadership, etc. Because, among other things, they're not instilling discipline, rather they're relinquishing it. What if the kid picks pushups? The trash still isn't taken out. It's worth remembering that you're not the ultimate person in charge of the unit. The instances you've cited are bad. Write them down, with dates, places, and names, and take them to your COR. That is who is responsible for the behavior of the adults in the unit, and they along with the org are who is going to be held accountable.

I couldn't find it on a quick search, but I'm curious what the humidity and actual temperature at the time (10:30PM) were. I wasn't there, but several of my friends were working a medical tent during the 2005 BSA Jambo heat disaster. https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna87052 Heat exhaustion adds to Scout Jamboree woes About 300 Boy Scouts were treated for heat exhaustion Wednesday after waiting for President Bush to arrive at a memorial service for four Scout leaders who were killed while pitching a tent beneath a power line. Bush will appear on Thursday instead.

OK, so why the change to the policy? Why was it a matter of safety, or even just adjudicated as a wise policy, that last month Cubs should only campout for 1 night at a time, but now it is either safe or wise or both that Cubs can camp out for two nights? What changed? Why the change?

BSA Bullying Prevention Guide https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/training/pdf/bullyingpreventionguide.pdf

I believe that all that is true. My advice stands: talk to all the adults, the leaders and again the parents, before you talk to the scout. If you talk to the scout first, and he recounts essentially the story as you know it, where does that leave you? What are you going to tell the scout is going to happen next? Are you going to promise to punish the scouts? Promise to punish the adults? You have enough of the scout's perspective for now, in order to take any action on behalf of the scout you need all the other information available. This can, probably will, get very unpleasant very quickly. You want to proceed purposefully but cautiously. Listen to everyone first, then consult with people you trust or need to trust, like your COR and DE, before announcing what is going to happen or what you want to have happen.

You don't want "what happened in camp, stays in camp", on the other hand the leaders in camp should have handled it then and there in camp, and if they did then there's not necessarily a reason for it to have been brought home from camp or for anyone else to have been made aware of it. When I was at camp I was in charge and took my responsibility seriously. I handled any behavior or disciplinary issues right then and there in consultation with the other leaders in camp. Did the parent tell you because they were unhappy about how the leaders there handled it? Were/are they looking for some further action, or maybe just some further explanation? Before you move forward, what is it that you want to accomplish? Before I spoke to the scout I would go back and clarify what, if anything, the parent is looking for, and then, if you feel it's necessary because of your role in the troop to be involved, I would talk to whoever was in charge of the troop at camp: what their take on it all was, and share with them what the parent's concern is now. There's no reason to speak to the scout unless there is some gap in the information that you don't have after talking to the adults involved. Once you know all the adult perspectives, then you work with the adults to decide how best to serve the scouts.

AS CC, certainly he can decide who can and cannot serve on a BOR consistent with the rules Eagle94 posted. The real question is the wisdom of it. The primary purpose of the adults on the BOR is not deciding on the scout's advancement, but rather learning how well the troop is accomplishing its mission, from the perspectives of the scouts, of delivering a program that accomplishes the Aims and Methods of Scouting. If the decision helps accomplish this purpose than it's wise, if it hinders it, it's unwise. If it falls somewhere in between than it's probably fine on it's face, but then you look and say what's the point of the change? Was someone annoyed before, is someone else or more someones else going to be annoyed now? I would say that if the ASMs are supposed to be MCs of the other troop, than if they're not getting the feedback and knowledge about that troop's functioning through the BOR, how are they getting it? They have a separate role to play in each troop, they should have the tools to play both those roles. I'd also ask what the Advancement Chairs think of the idea, after all, if you limit the pool of possible BOR members than you might be making their jobs more difficult, and if that's the case, why do it?

Sigh, the lack of candor from the diocese dropping scouting is as bad as the lack of candor in BSA. That lack of candor is a big part of why both organizations are in trouble. If it's because insurance costs too much say so. If it's because you cannnot effectively monitor the programs because of a decline in your own membership, say so. But to say it's because of reasons related to the bankruptcy, that's frankly disingenuous. The bankruptcy happened. The results are in, the slate for past acts is wiped clean --- that's the whole point of bankruptcy. Just be honest and upfront about why you're doing what you're doing; it's not hard. “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples, indeed and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:31-32).

I was going to send this as a PM, but thought it better to proclaim it publicly. I make no excuses for anyone who has made you feel they don't care. But please know that there are plenty of people who do care. Undoubtedly some of them are your loved ones and friends who you know, and also there are strangers out there who care because you're a fellow human being, and we're all God's creatures put here to try to do our best for each other. If ever you have no on else to reach out to please feel free to PM me. My wife lives with and suffers from depression, as do both my kids. It's hard, but it can be fought.

Our council has run a program the last few years conducting QPR training in partnership with the Lucas County Suicide Prevention Coalition. QPR is an acronym for Question, Persuade and Refer. These are the 3 simple steps that are taught in suicide prevention training. The training has so far been just for adults. I haven't heard of anything locally for youth, but I love the idea. I've encountered this challenge as both a scout leader and a parent. I have been on more than one campout where a scout expressed suicidal thoughts and ideation, and it is frightening and challenging. I believe the more awareness there is of it as a danger, and the more training and openness we have about it, the better off we all will be. I'm gong to pass this along our SE, who is really good on this issue, just in case he hasn't seen it.

I'm not there but I suddenly have a cool story to share. I just got a text from a friend who's leading our contingent this year. He texted a picture of a hat from our 2013 contingent. Said a scout just came by whose father had asked him to track down our council contingent and trade for some gear. The father had done his LDS mission work in our area in the 80s and had traded with someone in 2013. That someone was me. Just made my evening, and brought back some great memories.

Wow, I attended the first Jambo at the Summit in 2013 and it was 40,000.

I'm trying to figure out how this is going to work for us, we also pay registration out of our fundraising. At a minimum, we're now going to have to have our treasurer keep track of and send a monthly payment to somebody. Will that be National or through Council? If it's National and Council also wants a payment then we need to do it twice for every scout? And how is this better as a process, for units that unlike ours don't pay collectively, there is no way this will do anything but result in lower payments and fewer scouts. What about units, like our Cub pack who do a hybrid: some money from fundraising and some direct from families? We're not going to send any money until the family pays. So that's even more tracking and bookkeeping. ETA, there is as usual no explanation given for why they're making this change in process. I suppose we're just supposed to accept that an organization that ran itself so poorly it had to go bankrupt knows what it's doing. This was not a better idea!

There are hundreds, probably thousands of youth summer camps across the country, for profit, non-profit, Church affiliated, that look at least at first glance as if they would have the same liability issues as a scout organization. It does not appear that they are being driven to extinction by an inability to properly insure themselves. This makes me wonder why the BSA/COR model looks so different. Maybe the camps insure themselves to the extent that they can, and then accept the risk that claims could drive them to bankruptcy, and that's acceptable to them because the camp is the core business and so it's fold the tents now or hope that they just don't get unlucky? This is a different view than that of a COR, where however much they value scouting, it's never their core mission/business and so the risk of losing it all is just too great for the benefit of supporting scouting. Maybe something about scouting is inherently too dangerous to be run in a financially safe way. This doesn't make intuitive sense to me, but I could be wrong. Generally you can insure yourself against virtually any risk, it's just that the cost of the insurance goes up with the level of risk. What we seem to be seeing now is that adequate insurance isn't available at any cost. Maybe, and I think this is likely, the recent bankruptcy and looming settlements have just made scouting too unpredictable for insurers to accurately price the risk. It's not that no one wants to provide coverage, it's that no one knows how much to charge and so no one will. If this is the case we're in for a long painful time. It may be a long time before insurers are comfortable that their pricing models are accurate. They will probably want years of data to see what the actual risks of modern scouting are, and how much they cost financially. The likeliest outcome then is going to mean CORs fall back, and BSA becomes effectively the COR for everybody, and has to run like the youth camps I described above: insure to the extent that you can, and hope you don't get too unlucky.

Welcome to the forums. There are so many things wrong with this it's hard to know where to start. First, the rules are clear. This is from the BSA Guide to Advancement: "The unit leader (Scoutmaster) conference, regardless of the rank or program, is conducted according to the guidelines in the Troop Leader Guidebook (volume 1). Note that a Scout must participate or take part in one; it is not a “test.” Requirements do not say the Scout must “pass” a conference." Further, "The conference is not a retest of the requirements upon which a Scout has been signed off. It is a forum for discussing topics such as ambitions, life purpose, and goals for future achievement, for counseling, and also for obtaining feedback on the unit’s program. " https://www.scouting.org/resources/guide-to-advancement/ More importantly, knots are not a thing unto themselves, they are a means to an end, a set of tools we use to accomplish other tasks. When I was a scout, many many moons ago, we learned them not because we were more virtuous than today's scouts but because we had to use them to keep up our tents and for other practical purposes around camp. If your scouts aren't learning to use knots, as opposed to just "learning their knots" that's on you and your program, not them. If you want your scouts to know knots, get your PLC to plan fun activities on campouts that involve using knots --- make some camp gadgets, lash together some toys, run some games, etc. If you incorporate the use of knots ON A REGULAR BASIS into fun things you do, scouts will learn knots. If you just expect to have scouts memorize knots at a meeting like they're memorizing the declension of a noun you'll have taught them to successfully cram for an exam, and then see that information dissipate just as quickly.

From the referenced news article the BSA's attorney "Ashida retorted that in its nearly 120-year history the Boy Scouts have never had a firearm fatality. "That's never happened, " he said." If that's true it's somewhat surprising and pretty impressive given the sheer volume of kids who have been involved and must have participated in shooting sports. I also have to say that every time this incident pops up I'm astounded by the poor judgment on the part of every adult present. How is it that none of them recognized how wrong an idea it was to bring their own completely inappropriate arsenal to a scout camp. If I even had an inkling that something like this was going on with my own troop I would have shut it down or gone to whatever authority was necessary up to and including law enforcement to put a stop to it.

I decided to make this a separate post for clarity. Generally, if a Pack and Troop are from the same CO, the Troop, for a myriad of reasons, is going to be more financially secure than the Pack. Unless you are talking about scout accounts there is no good reason tat a Pack would be financially supporting a troop.

I don't want to speak for others, but the way you're describing it probably isn't what people are referring to. Most likely what folks are talking about with individual scout accounts is that there is a general fund for Pack expenses, but in addition to the general fund there are opportunities for individual scouts to have some of the fundraising they do be earmarked for individual expenses they may incur. For instance, if there is a popcorn sale you may ear mark 2/3 of the monies raised by an individual scout's efforts go to the general fund. This generally will cover Pack expenses like advancement costs, Pack meeting costs, etc. Then the remaining 1/3 that a scout's efforts produced can be earmarked for more individual expenses --- maybe the cost charged for someone participating in a campout, or summer day camp, or other event where the Pack charges by the individual rather than covering everything as a group expense. These earmarked individual funds ALWAYS BELONG TO THE CO, but can also follow the scout as they move through the program within the CO. The clear incentive here is to not have someone stop at good enough. A real go getter scout who sells A LOT of popcorn sees the fruits of his labor not just in being a part of the Pack and "helping the Pack go", but also in helping himself and his family defer some of the costs of his/her scouting.

This rule was around for a long time, but either not understood or not emphasized. The emphasis came a few years ago, maybe 2018 or 2019. There was a good long thread about it on this forum. Our troop plus council's solution was to pay to have the range open during our Boy Scout/Cub Scout weekend, I mean overnight; we paid the fees for the range, the council supplied the rangemaster, but the range was open to every unit in camp for some part of the day, not just us, This made it a council event not a unit event; which frankly was fine with us, why not have more scouts taking advantage of the opportunity. Try to get in touch with a volunteer from your council's Shooting Sports committee rather than going through the camp director. The shooting sports guys tend to be more enthusiastic about their bailiwick, and are often more willing to find a way to make things work.

We also encourage all our parents take YPT so they understand the rules as laid out, both to govern their own behavior and as a backstop on others'. Of course not everyone takes us up on it, which is fine, but we do REQUIRE that anyone camping with us complete the training. I know that unregistered adults on campouts will soon be a thing of the past, and I understand the arguments for and against. For us, until the rules change, we're concerned primarily with the behaviors YPT lays out. A background check will weed out only those who have been convicted of malfeasance, the training helps guard the against the more negligent actions.

OK, so electric bikes are now verboten, surely we can still use these nifty electric hovercrafts. I know this is off topic, and as a moderator I should know better, but I couldn't resist.

When I was young scout you could buy a kit that would add an electric motor to your bike --- it was advertised in the back of Boys' Life.

Certainly riding along at a leisurely pace on a bike would qualify. Having relays of adults would also qualify. Switch out every five or 10 miles or so.

There is nothing inherently wrong or against the rules in what you're describing, i.e. an unregistered adult teaching skills to scouts. For instance, about every other year our PLC invites one of our local police officers to come in as a guest speaker for our scouts. They give a general talk, some about personal safety, some about careers in law enforcement, etc. They also teach how to do fingerprinting. They cover about 90% of what is needed for Fingerprinting MB, and then we have one of our leaders who is also registered as a Fingerprinting MB counselor, complete the mb with any scout interested. Similarly, on other occasions the PLC will invite various parents, parish members, etc. to give similar talks about their profession or hobbies, and these can also involve some skills training that may be relevant to advancement. My point isn't that what you're describing is the same as this, just that there's clearly no rule against unregistered adults providing training and advancement help to scouts. As far as APPROVING advancement and merit badges there are some rules. Signing off on rank advancement is the Scoutmaster's prerogative, they can do it themselves or delegate that authority for some or all of the various requirements. In the best of troops the sign off is done by patrol leaders and other senior scouts, in many probably most troops there is some adult authorization needed. Some troops are strict about exactly who can sign and under what circumstances; some will delegate it to any competent adult; many troops will prohibit parents, registered or not, from signing off on their own scout's work. Merit badge approval involves clear rules, you have to be both registered as a scouter and registered as a counselor for each particular badge. What I suspect you have and are concerned about is an unregistered adult, probably a parent, who is going beyond just incidental skills training and is acting more as a registered leader in the sheer volume of time spent working with the scouts. Again there is no clear rule against this as long as all the other YPT rules are followed. As long as there are sufficient registered leaders present when this person is present there is no restriction against him or her also being present and working with the scouts. Now, whether this is a good idea is a separate question. This is something that you should discuss with your Committee Chair and possibly your Chartered Organization Rep. They are responsible and accountable for the adults interacting with scouts. Frankly, if you have an adult acting like a leader, the best practice would be for them to apply, have a background check, and be approved to BE a leader. A friendly but frank discussion between the CC and the adult should cover whether there is a reason not to have this happen.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2023/01/30/boy-scout-duluth-sleeps-outside/ He spent night 1000 in a quinzhee!