Trevorum

Kudu, I greatly resent your insunuations. The BSA Religious Relationships subcommittee did not "create" the UUSO. The UUSO is not a "puppet". As was posted, the UUSO was created by UU Scouters, who after several years of patient work were invited to join the subcommittee. Your statement is offensive to those who have been working behind the scenes on behalf of UU scouts. Your conclusion that the UUSO is not a legitimate sponsor of an emblems program for UU Scouts is also invalid. Not all religious emblems programs recognized by BSA are sponsored directly by churches or other "official" organizations. For example, the Ner Tamid is sponsored by the National Jewish Committee on Scouting and the Alpha Omega is sponsored by the Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting. There are others. Neither of these organizations are official arms of a religious body and neither are they "puppets" of anyone. Like the UUSO, they are associations of religious Scouters, albeit with longer histories. As far as I know, no one has ever suggested that the new Living your Religion should replace UUA's Religion in Life award. They are parallel curricula and can be taught that way. However, the LyR award and its knot may be worn on the Scout's uniform without the need for self-serving word-spinning of "honesty". Your assumptions about what the LyR curriculum includes - or does not include - are premature to say the least, and inflammatory. As was posted, the UUSO does not yet have a web presence and the pamphlets are not yet printed. The approval was barely 6 weeks ago. As was posted, the awards proram will be formally presented at the Jamboree this summer, although the requirements will be posted on the web before then. Until that time, your hand-wringing and mud-slinging are empty. Evidently, you are unwilling to believe that the LyR curriculum is "very, very familiar". I truly don't understand why you, and others on UU-Scouting, are so negative and ready to mistrust your fellow UUs. Are you so politically virtuous that everyone else must be an Uncle Tom? Is your glass always this half-empty? From your jumping to conclusions and mis-characterizations, I can only conclude that your posts are trolls. The LyR emblems program does not resolve - and does not claim to resolve - the important philosophical differences between the UU faith and official BSA positions. Where you are, perhaps all UU Scouts wear the RiL knot as "civil disobedience". That's fine. Where I am, I see many UU Scouts who do not undertake any RE program because "you can't wear it on your uniform". The sole objective of the UUSO is to encourage UU Scouts to learn about their faith. Where I am, that's a good thing.

"... clean handkerchief..."??? LOL! How about spats and a buggy whip?

Welcome back, BW! Diversity is great!

Yes, for the same reason that one shouldn't clean coins. But it's your collection and if you like the look of stiff patches, then it's your choice.

Hello Rick! Good to hear from you. I've always enjoyed your contributions on Scouts-L and also on UU-Scouting (I am a member of both). Your excellent InquiryNet is one of my favorite scouting sites. (btw, everyone should visit Rick's http://www.inquiry.net/). As I posted, the UUSO is an independent, grass-roots group of Scouters, not affiliated with UUA except though our individual congregations. To date, we have been singularly focused on reaching a rapport with BSA and with achieving BSA approval of a religious emblem program for Boy Scouts and Venturers. To this extent, we have not spent much effort on membership and, for your experience, I apologize. For the coming year we plan to move membership way up on our priority list. We will also be preparing a curriculum for Cub Scouts. Reading your itemized questions, I understand that you may be suprised to hear of the news. You want to be assured that the new curriculum is acceptable to UUA, especially given the history of the previous emblem. Until such time as the requirements are published on the web (very soon I hope), I will have to ask you to be patient - and please accept my assurances that the BSA approved curriculum will look very, very familiar. I will reply off-line to your specific queries, but let me say that we have been in coordination with Rev. Sinkford who has approved of our organization and its objectives. As we go forward, I hope you will renew (!) your membership, and as UUSO develops more of an infrastructure, become an active member in pursuing our mutual objective - helping UU scouts learn about our faith.

awheck, I agree with the way you handled the situation. In such cases, BoRs in our troop have been known to "adjourn" until a later date agreed upon by all. The scout is directed to correct a specific weakness before the BoR "reconvenes". Sometimes the adjournment lasts for a day or two (as in your case) but on occasion it has been known to last for a month or more.

I forgot to suggest that, regardless what happens with your old troop, you should get involved with a unit where you are now. (I wish someone had given me that advice!) Of course, being in a university town, there may well be a glut of Eagle Scouts looking to get involved. What a great "problem" that would be!

acco, we both know of course that there is no "silver bullet". I agree with you that maintaining and improving the programs we currently have should be our highest priority. In my area also, we have clusterings of units that give youth many options. However, my background in landscape geography leads me to wonder if there might not be gaps in our coverage that we simply don't know about because no one has done the analysis. I suspect that in most areas there are these zones with a "low density" of chartering orgs. My point is that by approaching potential COs in these zones, we could make the program available to a population of youth that is currently underserved.

fgoodwin is correct. Please see the spun thread for more information.

In another thread fgoodwin has stolen my thunder, but yes, BSA has approved the newly created religious award for Unitarian Universalist youth. At the Feb 8th National meetings in Irving, the Religious Relationships (RR) subcommittee approved the curriculum proposed by the newly created Unitarian Universalist Scouters Organization (UUSO), pending a review of referenced literature. The referenced items all had been approved under the previous emblem with no issue, and so we fully expect final approval sometime this month. I was waiting to hear of a formal approval before I posted to this forum, but fgoodwin now says that P.R.A.Y has acknowledged the event. The UUSO is not formally associated with the UUA but is an independent organization of Scouters. A memorandum of Mutual Support between BSA and UUSO was signed last year and UUSO is now a voting member of the RR subcommittee. Since then we have been working with the RR subcommittee to gain approval for the new curriculum. Currently, the UUSO is arranging to print the new pamphlet and manufacture the new medals. We hope to have a website up soon with the requirements and contact information. The new awards program will be formally kicked off at the Jamboree this summer. If anyone has specific questions, I would be happy to reply to posts or to private messages. We are very glad to be back in the tent!

Ed, I disagree. The ACLU is not "trying to find any way it can to harm the BSA". Rather, from where I sit, the ACLU is simply making sure that the BSA obeys the laws of the land and plays by the same set of rules as other private, discriminatory organizations. The BSA has defined itself as a religious organization and has itself decided to discriminate against those who are biologically different from the majority and against those do not believe in a god/goddess. If BSA is determined to maintain those membership requirements, then it must be prepared to accept the legal consequences.

As I originally read this thread, I thought it was going to be about getting *more* Chartering Partners ("increase the number of troops and crews"). However, no one seems to have addressed this. Instead most replies are about retention and recruitment. Those are valid issues, to be sure, but I do feel that if the program was simply offered by more COs, then there would be more youth in the program. (duh) The issues of retention would still need to be solved, but total numbers would be up. As I drive around through my district, I see potential Chartering Orgs (mostly churches) every other block, but 90% of these do NOT sponsor any unit. Perhaps the DE has all of these potential targets annotated on a GIS, with a matching plan to saturate the market, but I doubt it. I think we could take a page from McDonalds® here. Since all new units must have volunteer leadership, the question arises of who is going to lead all these new units? My answer would be to look at all the emeritus SMs we have in our district who are active on the district and council levels. I know that many of these fine scouters would, if asked, agree to "prime the pump" at a newly formed unit until such time as the leadership can be identified and trained from inside the new units. just my thoughts...

foto, I disagree. Cub Scout camping is family based. It's model is NOT troop camping. It's model is family camping.

Hi Phil, and welcome to the forum! I hope you'll stick around and share your experiences and perspectives. Sorry to learn about your old troop. The same thing happened to my old troop about 5 years after I earned my Eagle. It was sad. If you were still local you could be an Asst SM or SM, but being 2,000 miles away it'll be sort of hard for you do do much. Find out who the Unit Commish is and give him a call. See what he thinks. Maybe there is something specific you can do from Illinois. Maybe not. You don't point to a specific problem as causing the decline. A small unit can survive and grow if it has good leaders who are trained and are willing to work at the job. But, sometimes units do just fade away with the slack in their recruiting territory bein taken up by other healthier units. Good luck. Let us know how it works out.

I've found that by the time of an Eagle SM conference I can pretty accurately predict which scouts will be active after their Eagle CoH. Scouts who are focused on the Eagle to please their parents or because it will "look good" on a college application tend to drift off pretty soon. Those that are still actively working with the younger scouts and who already have their sights set on next years high adventure program will stick around.

Now that is strange. Did they offer a reason?

What a terrific experience for all of you! I feel that everyone should have the opportunity to live in another country as a youth. I sure wish I could have!

Thank you busylady!! I have wondered how to get these pubs and will order them today!

Welcome! There's a good bunch of Scouters here. While across the pond, will you have a chance to visit Gilwell?

Reminds me of when my youngest son joined the troop. He was getting to know the other scouts and their dads and asked one fellow, "Is that your dad?". Without skipping a beat the other fellow replied, "Naw, he's just the old fat guy who lives in our house and eats our food."

hey OGE, can we do something to prevent these spammers? Sunglasses are one thing, but if they can post their wares, you know what's next...

sitrep, I really apologize if it sounded like I was painting you any color at all. My sidebar comment was not directed at you specifically (or anyone in particular). I was trying to to use satire (not very successfully though) to make the point that changes are often improvements, no matter how dire they may seem to traditionalists at the time. (Of course my hidden agenda is to imply that BSA may not be finished changing, as America changes.) Please, let me offer you a belated but warm welcome to the forum! We look forward to sharing the campfire with you.

I'd remember that Cub camping is family-based. Since each Cub will have an adult parent, cooking may be more convenient by family rather than by den, possibly excepting Webelos dens.

resqman said, "The BSA uniform tries to perform both roles. A dress uniform for BORs and parades in front of the public. A field uniform to squat over open fires, hike peaks, and protect from weather." You are absolutely right! And that is precisely why scouts have adopted the notion of a "Class B" to use as a field uniform. Our current "Class A" uniform is designed for what Baden-Powell disparagingly referred to as "Parlour Scouting". I know of very, very few units who actually hike, camp, and squat over campfires in the official uniform. I'm sure there are some units out there who do, but they are in a minority. Years ago, before the current design, scouts DID wear the full uniform to hike and camp in. With todays outdoors fabrics, there is no reason to have all these informal Class B's. National could easily standardize the whole thing into a FUNCTIONAL uniform. I am sure the gurus at National are aware of this, but my guess is that they have contracts with current uniform manufacturers and can not easily change. However, sooner or later, they WILL change. It's just a matter of enough of us in the trenches letting them know that we don't particularly care for the disfunctional uniform.

sitrep, I didn't mean to offend, just wanted to point out that change is often good. How about these changes to Scouting that have promulgated by the socially conscious (PC) crowd: ahh, for the good old days when scouts with dark skin were "invited" to join their own separate troops (at least in my part of the country); when religious services routinely ignored and pointedly offended Scouts who weren't Christian; when women weren't allowed to be Cubmasters or Scoutmasters.