Tampa Turtle

re: Enders Game. I got him Enders Game in Paperback and e-book. So far no biting.

1 (Kudu) to tell that the bulb needs to be turned by the Patrol method. 1 (Eammon)to tell us a heart warming lightbulb story whn he was a lad. 1 (Me)to use it as an excuse to tell a story about candles and kill the thread.

If I had to do it all over again I would make all the Wolf's learn to sew patches. At a meeting. It is a good life skill. I know I never criticize a scout for a crooked patch if he sewed it himself. My youngest learned to sew, by hand and on a machine. I one campout he was sewing patches for other boys for $1 (then $2 as he got tired)each. He made $8.

Basement, That (comment)is pretty shocking and makes me really wonder about some folks. Yes I cannot use the language appropriate for that comment here. Thanks for your work. I know you have it tougher than a lot of us; but I think the difference you are making has the potential to be greater. I am at a pretty affluent Troop and some of the comments I have heard from parents and scouts are pretty shocking. I stomp on it when I hear it but it is discouraging. A lot of elitism, classicism, and racism. My older son has a few disabilities and gets a lot of "buffalo chips" about it. Kind, indeed. I agree that the most important metric would be the growth of character and what is in the human heart but it is so hard to measure that. I regret the size of the Troop at times like that...I only can know so many boys.

I now see it takes time-years. We are 18 months into our transition and I see push back all the time. Sometimes it is from the older parents and scouts who had things invested in the old way and liked it because it was "easier" in some respect. A Helicopter Parent (and it is always some other parent--not me! is not going to respect boy-led at scouts while he meddles in the sports team. I see that the progress is a ragged march upward with downs as well as ups. The big challenge is when something goes wrong or if it makes things too chaotic for the adults. But when you see it works, the change is worth it. We have 5 patrols and (site permitting) we have room to spread out only 2 of the 5 took the opportunity to move 300' feet away. They are also the best performing patrols (highest campout attendance, win majority of skill competitions, high morale). Some issues --like food stealing--went away with those two patrols because it was very clear when someone was in their area and you need permission to enter another patrol's area. Conversely the other 3 patrols had more issues and conflicts. Keep it up.

ntrantham--welcome aboard. I had to laugh, my wife (an old school ex-Girl Scout) "suggested" I attend a Q&A BSA meeting with my 1st grader years ago and I got roped in to ! It's all good. To get back to the original topic. My first Pack, about 30 scouts, did once a month (with Tigers) in a shortened season. About 6 trips a year and it went Friday to Sunday. My second pack (which had 150+ at campouts--a real mob) did 3 then 2. We had a hard time getting folks out for more then 2. The Webelos usually camped out twice a year as "Patrols" (yes I know they are dens). With a Brownsea campout and a Scout Troop campout the Webelos were doing 4-6. Until my son got into Tigers I had never been camping. (well once in backyard for 1/2 the night). So Cub Scouting got me and my family out for family camping two or three times a year. We even did an AT trip (OK with a nice stop at a cabin for the wife)because my cubs got into hiking and the woods and all that. So I am personally grateful for Cub Scouting opening up this new world for my family. Never underestimate how many new families are reluctant to camp because we have had a "lost generation". After I got a little experience I passed on the knowledge to each years "newbie parents" and tried to make (usually) the moms mellow out. We tried to make it easy with simplified packing lists, loaner tents, tent help setup, group meals, and organized activities so the parents could kick back. Did tutorials. We also picked sites close to home. But still it was hard to get past two, and pressure to go down to one. My Troop has kids from several(3) feeder packs. Not surprisingly, I have noticed that the Boys that stay in Boy Scouts and feel comfortable with camping got a lot more exposures in cub scouts. Especially the ones where they started showing more responsibility at campouts (tent set up, cooking help, etc) as Bears on. The boys who had the parents do EVERYTHING on campouts had a much harder time transitioning to Boy Scouts even if their program was pretty string elsewhere. So, ntrantham, it is a good fight worth having. In our Pack we had "over scheduled" activities to give multiple options for busy families to participate. Few families do all of them. As to the Council "suggestion"? Pweft! You can have all the Den Level "Family Campouts" you want. We did this with 100+ folks, just added the cub rules and uniforms. We just made it really clear on the permission slips that this was a "Family Campout" and they were responsible. And why not just have 2 Pack campouts and encourage several smaller ones. Or do several day-trip activities (we did a very tame canoe trip on a very shallow river) with an option to stay overnight for those that want to. Believe me if 1/3rd of the boys are setting up tents some of the others will start nagging their parents why they can't. Anyway, ntrantham, thanks for your work.

Please see link to "Tiger Throwing Knife Games" on Kudu's old fashioned Patrol games webpage.

I'd tell Dad that if the boys get to throw knives in Tigers it only leaves Panzerfaust-Tag when they are Boy Scouts.

Ah Enders Game. One of the great ones. I tried to turn my son's on to it but no luck thus far.

Yeah I saw some of new shorts and they looked pretty good. Unfortunately son #1 will not wear shorts...

I think it is mostly custom or tradition. I used to do them chronologically because I was not resewing. Now I do not wear them, but if I did I might assume since folks read left to right that putting the most important (say Eagle)first would be good.

In a week or two I'll get back to you...Thanks!

When I was a young boy I took Art classes one Summer at the local rec center in Hollywood Florida. This was back in the 1970's. The Art teacher there was locally known for being a Titanic survivor. She was very young when it happened and remembered very little. Her parents did not survive and she was brought up in an orphanage. She had a collection of articles and copies of the paperwork. She was always happy to discuss it except she was always sad about losing her family. It made quite an impression and I read Lord's "A Night to Remember" that year. Made me realize that reading about disasters, while quite an exciting subject (used to be a quite popular youth category for boys) involved real people and personal tragedy. So I had a little tenuous thread from me to the event.

EagleDad, We had similar experience. I think it is "reducing churn". I see in my church. New people in, other people out. You may have a problem but as long as incoming outnumbers outgoing you think you are a success. Start to improve your situation (say delivering a more exciting boy led outdoor program) and cut down departures and you start to swell. That is our experience. Also I am aware there is always a danger of false causality (is that correct?)--finding weak or irrelevant correlations. That is why I think FCFY may have missed the point. I think we have about two years of pre-change data and two years of post change data. Perhaps I will look at: -Retention rates of each year's class. -#Camping vs Camping Offered -Miles Hiked -Nights camping vs advancement time (Are some boys paper advancement?) -Summer Camp vs retention/advancement. Just wondering of I can scope out some trends to show the committee/SM.

Kudu, TroopMaster now allows you to track that by Scout and Scouter and by left and right side. (Reports>Advancement>Individual Report>click box for SSBS index. Pull down menu for left, right, or both)I find that the ones that sit by my right side, and in air conditioning, seem to develop better character and leadership.

Thanks for the comments, John -- I didn't think yours were harsh. Trying to find something beside advancement, MB, and eagle production. I guess camping nights and retention may be good. We have a pretty big Troop so the one on one progress issues is kinda limited. Wanted some other ammo if committee discussions to keep us on track.

For those enough to have good data (we use Troopmaster) what is some good/bad metrics to look at? I can extract nights of camping, participation in activities, MB earned, time between ranks, miles hiked, etc. I thought of this after checking up to see if some of the lads got credit on a recent hike. I saw that a number of the 2nd years had 24-30 nights of camping and 45-50 miles of hiking their first year. Is that good? I mean we focus probably too much on rank advancement...is there a better way to measure progress? (putting aside that many things are NOT measurable)

Yeah I wouldn't have my boy wear Camo pants--we have HAD that discussion. The pants in question look pretty much like the BSA Switchbacks without the switchback.

Forgot the 150th ACW anniversary (touchy subject with my southern wife our great great grandfathers were on opposite sides in several battles)so yeah if you could hook up with a good reenactments that's usually good fun. And you thought scouters are crazy! Eamonn's comment's are true and funny--I guess we all are kinda proud of our areas! Cambridge, if you did NYC last time I would go out in the country somewhere to get a different feel. Its like a visitor who only spends a week in central London and thinks they have visited the UK. The "historic triangle" is a good choice. But all the suggestions are pretty good. I don't know about anybody else but I got a few good vacation ideas.

johnponz, Understood. And ignored. I doubt many could tell the difference. We will take our chance dodging the uniform police.

OGE, Maybe off topic but greatly appreciated! I smell a new project. I only wish AI hadn't cut up my old wool army blanket.

We try to be pretty tough on FC 9a--you know it might just save a life. It kinda depends on the boy. We had one boy who must memorize the stuff and we were going on a canoe trip and he is asking the SPL for the buddy boat assignment, who was the chase boat, etc. So I knew he had a good handle on it. Other boys won't learn it until they physically practice it. Another time a boy fell in off a dock (was not a big deal). Our Asberger boy on the dock kept yelling at another "you reach, reach!" and ran for the life ring and rope "throw, throw!" and threw it in. Boy grabbed rope, pulled out all's well. "No Row, then" said our Asbie. We were all pretty proud. We then spent the next 15 minutes going over the Safe Swim guidelines.

Common confusion especially the AOL/Scout Rank. We practiced it for a Year in Webelos and the boys still forgot it, we want them to be able to recite even if it means a little prompting or maybe a chart in the room. I can be a little tougher on the Oath, it always seems like the Law takes awhile. Boys learn stuff and then forget it. We never treat the Scout "joining rank" as an automatic but they do have to go through them all. This last year went great as a ASM worked with the WII's the last month on practicing all the stuff. They were ready! We have had a few boys lag on Scout Rank.

Yes. I am pretty frustrated over the poor quality of the Centennial pants seams. I returned a pair where the inseam stitching was unraveling and yes they did exchange it. With the exact same pants with the poor quality stitching. For $50 I expect a heck of a lot more. So our SM made the decision to say "or equivalent" for our uniform pants. I am not getting some BDU type pants of much higher quality for less cost for my son. We know that it may trip us up at some events but who cares?

If you do DC drop me a line and I can suggest more ideas. I went there with my family 2 years ago. Even did it without a car (Amtrak to Union Station, Metro and buses in and around DC). My wife learned a lot she later said though it was really for our boys. I might look you up on Cambridge! Trying to find a smaller city to hit first after the flight and do London at the end. Got to fit some Scotland in as well. Yeah I keep hearing that about Portsmouth. I am a Naval History Buff and really enjoyed seeing the Victory as a teen but have had more than one person tell me about the "rough parts". Not really into seeing any beaches as I can see some pretty good ones here within one hour...I am pretty spoiled. (My family has lived in Ft Lauderdale and Waikiki so we do enjoy a good beach)