Twocubdad

When OneCubSon was a Web2, we went camping with the two troops where he had friends. On one of the campouts, the SM pulled all the parents aside for a talk about the troop's philosophy. His main point was that any boy who stayed with the troop three or four years was basically guaranteed Eagle. I was appalled. You get service stars for hanging out for a few years. Eagle should require extra effort, ambition and perseverance, right? I gritted my teeth trying not to influence my son's selection of troops, and was GREATLY relieved when he chose the other troop. Unfortunately, IMHO, (and having watched their program for a decade or more) that troop is more in keeping with the current direction of the BSA advancement program. I have posted many times about my concerns with the current direction of the advancement program. I have no evidence or first-hand knowledge of this, but it is my opinion that the marketing/branding MBAs in Irving decided Eagle Scout is THE BSA brand (which to most people in the general public, it probably is). Their mission is to defang the curmudgeonly old Scoutmasters who know nothing about running a highly-profitable non-profit organization and get in the way of them maximizing the brand. Or something like that. Consequently, we now have this high-speed, low-drag advancement program where any 12-year-old whose parents put their shoulders to the grindstone can make Eagle. Throw in a troop program committed to conflicting as little as possible with lacrosse and band, a compliant, Kool-aide drinking Scoutmaster and a couple years of merit-badge-driven summer camps and Johnny has a pretty red white and blue medal he doesn't know how he earned and a plum resume entry. I'll not bore you with examples from the Guide to Advancement which support this theory. Most of you have heard it from me many times before. | rant off | So back to the OP -- As NJ points out, BSA differed from B-P's concept of merit badges almost from the beginning of the program. They are an iconic part of the program and I don't think you're going to get rid of them -- nor do I think we should. Just the opposite, national seems to be adding MBs at a pretty good clip. I'll not take the time to look up the reference, but most BSA publications describe Scout advancement as a progressive series of surmountable obstacles, or something close to that. Horse hockey. My greatest complaint with the advancement program is it is not at all progressive. There is no difference in degree of difficulty between the T-2-1 ranks. How many troops cover all T-2-1 first aid requirements all at the same time? (And for that matter, how many ignore the First Aid MB requirement to complete the T-2-1 first aid requirement before starting the merit badge?) Is there really a significant degree of difficulty between a square knot and a bowline? There is not a single merit badge which cannot be completed by a brand-new, 11-year-old Scouts. In fact, policy dictates that any Scout, regardless of age rank or ability, be allowed to tackle any merit badge at any time. Granted, some, like Personal Management, "become" more difficult as Scouts grow older and their personal circumstances change -- a 10-y.o. with a $10/wk allowance vs. a 16-y.o. with a job and car payment. Consequently, many curmudgeons buck policy and encourage Scouts to hold off on similar badges until they are older and the MBs more meaningful. I would like to see the program changed to become truly progressive; Make the merit badges required for Eagle more difficult than those for Star. This could be accomplished without a total disruption of the existing program. First, get rid of the baloney policy that Scouts be allowed to complete any MB at any time. Then organize merit badges the way college courses are with certain MBs designated as Star, Life or Eagle MBs -- the way college courses are designated 100, 200, 300 or 400-level courses. Life would require 10 MB, the six you earned for Star, plus four more "Life level" courses. Eagle would require the 10 MBs earned for Life, plus some number of "Eagle level" badges. Understanding BSA's rolling update of MBs, the requirements for the Life- and Eagle-level MBs should eventually become more robust over time. If Cit. Comm. is considered a Star-level MB, it should be at the level of a middle school social studies class. If Cit. Nat. is an Eagle-level MB, it should be at the level of a high school government class with an understanding of Constitutional government something beyond Schoolhouse Rocks. NUMBER TWO -- an advantage of this system is its ability to link certain merit badges to progressively more difficult "tracks" -- or to continue the college analogy, minors. An easy example would be the three citizenship badges. Or an example of something new, Camping may be a Star-level MB, which would be linked to Hiking or Pioneering as Life-level badges and Backpacking or Wilderness Survival at the Eagle level. Not only does this fulfill the promise of a truly progressive advancement system, but allows Scouts to build on his knowledge and experience to develop some true expertise in an area. No one earns a college degree with 120 hours of 100-level courses. A couple other points: Dump First Year/First Class. The post above are correct. It is the genesis of an Eagle mill troop. We quit using it five or six years ago with no ill effects. Yep, some Scouts flounder around at Tenderfoot for a few years, but at some point the spark takes hold and they take off. First Aid I and First Aid II. There is very little taught T-2-1 which isn't in Webelos Readyman. The current First Aid MB requirements should be covered in T-2-1 and a higher level of first aid covered in the MB. Or make it two MBs, I don't care. An Eagle Scout should know more than very basic first aid. You want your older Scouts interested in first aid? Teach labor and delivery. Return to the emphasis on Scouts having to make and keep appointments, meet with and learn from an adult with some expertise in the topic of the MB. The Method of Adult Association is based on Scouts working with adults of high character and learning from them. This doesn't happen during the drive-by signing of a blue card during a troop meeting. Crack down on the wink and nod given to gimme summer camp merit badges.. Nuf said. And for Pete's sake, dump the stupid "no retesting" policy. For the life of me, other than pure ease of administration, I can think of no conceivable educational benefit for mandating "one-and-done" as official policy. The only rationale I've heard is the lame, "well, I bet you can't still do calculus." No, but when I was TAKING calculus, I could still do algebra. And when I was TAKING algebra, I could still do basic math. Once I graduated and was out from under the requirements of the Department of Public Instruction, I could choose for myself the subject for which maintaining proficiency was important. There is no reason we should be precluded from asking an Eagle candidate to demonstrate basic skill. If you're still reading, thanks for hanging with me.

Precisely how we handle things, resqman. It is a rare occasion that anyone is excused from returning to the Scout house.to help with the unloading. The year my younger son was SPL he had the entire troop stand down and stop unloading for about a half-hour until two guys who left early were called and returned to the scout house. The troop then resumed unpacking. The parents who were forced to wait were P***ED OFF until I explained what was going on. Then they got behind the SPL, giving him attaboys and high-fives. They appreciated the lesson. When the two arrived. one's mom was very apologetic. The other's dad was P.O.'d he had to drive back but the other parents got hold of him and handled the situation. It was a good lesson for both the Scouts and parents.

I have a friend from high school who is active in all sorts of social causes, including the food pantry where she lives. A year or so ago she shared an article on FaceBook from some minister calling for churches with ministries for the hungry to "embrace the government." The premise of the article is that the government provides something on the order of two-thirds (I don't remember the exact figure) of all nutrition programs in the country. Between school lunches, AFDC, food stamps, and good ol' guv'ment cheese, that's probably right. His point being that churches couldn't begin to feed the poor, so they should focus their resources on supporting government program. That's the second step. The first is telling people not to collect food or clothing, to help the poor, just send a check. It's easier on everyone involved. You never have to get up from your chair, charities and buy what they need (or electronically add it to their debit card) and the poor are never embarrassed by actually accepting help from another human. Yes, we want to actually help folks and we each have personal obligations to do so. But as a Scoutmaster, I'm charged with teaching young men personal development, citizenship, kindness and helpfulness. As with most things in Scouting, efficiency and productivity are frequently a hindrance to teaching young men these lessons. I want my guys to freeze their butts off in a cold February rain collecting can goods. I want them to have a backache and sunburn from working the troop garden. And I want the to see the faces of the folks in line as the food pantry when we show up with a pickup truck load of melon in the summer. that's how they learn the long lessons. Maybe down the road, may Scouts will be motivated to go online and type their credit card number into some charity's website. But they already know how to do that. I'm working to give them the motivation to do so.

That's wimpy. Why 18 months? Why not pay the current year's dues and be done with it?

Our troop does a lot of stuff like this. We collect or grow more than 15,000 (that's right, fifteen-thousand) pounds of food for the local food pantry and soup kitchens. This summer one of our Eagle projects was to build a reading room for a community afterschool program and collected over 8,000 books. Another Scout did a juice drive (collecting juice boxes for the same program) as his Second Class service project. He's continued it every year and is trying to figure out how to make it into an Eagle project. While all that is important and meaningful, the one thing we miss is direct contact with the beneficiaries. Charities these days are so sensitive to clients' privacy, they hardly allow any contact between the Scouts and the clients. We're frequently asked to bring donations before or after hours or to use side entrances to avoid contact with clients. Worse yet are charities which only want cash. I understand the logistics, but it is short-sighted. When I was a kid, my mom taught sewing classes to needy moms so they could make clothes for their own children. As a side project, my mom found used sewing machines for some of these folks. I can remember helping her deliver a treadle sewing machine to a family literally living in a tar-paper shack. While my mom helped the lady set up the sewing machine, I played in the yard with her kids. One was a friend from school, and a younger brother was later in our Scout troop. Making personal connections with folks should be a big part of service to others. Unfortunately concerns about privacy and self-esteem come at the cost of real compassion and empathy. Scouts need to learn to help other people while helping them maintain their dignity. Knowing and understanding the people you are helping teaches that.

Our lodge require you to pay back dues (max. two years) for lapsed members. Seems to encourage a lot of members to stay lapsed.

WOW! 12 hours?!?!? I wig out after about 30 minutes. I don't know what the legal definitions are, but seriously, this is getting into neglect/abandonment area. After a few hours -- far short of 12 -- I'd be calling the SE. Too many fuzzy YP issues here.

Been there, done that, too, SP. If folks know you won't leave until some agrees to take your place, they all start looking like my father-in-law does when the dinner check arrives. That your first job responsibility is to find your own replacement is one of those BS scouting saying. Sorta like "one hour a week." In the first place, recruiting volunteers is not on everyone's job description. For units, it is primarily the responsibility of the committee chair. We've had several instances where a volunteer recruited folks wholly unsuited to the job. If any ol' warm body gets you off the hook, that's exactly who gets recruited. Training your replacement is another matter. But allowing individuals to pick their own replacement is a recipe for self-perpetuating disaster.

No, it's not a success, but where does the failure lie? I agree with Base. Scouting is a voluntary extra-curricular activity. If either parents or Scouts cannot play by the rules they don't need to be in the program. You could tack the money onto the boys recharter fee, but, frankly, the money is beside the point. The mother's utter contempt for the troop leadership is the real concern. Parents must be on board with the program and a partner with the unit. This broad ain't. What would have happened if her son had been injured or his behavior necessitated him going home? I tell my parents (sorta jokingly, but not completely) if they aren't available to pick their son up within drive time of our location plus about 30 minutes, I turn their him over to Social Services or law enforcement.

For a single incidence to cause me give back the patch it would have to be WAAAY out there. Trust me, if so I wouldn't have made it through the second year when a dad called me an SOB because I apparently "didn't know who he was." I think it is more of a balance point that a single event. When the bad stuff starts to outweigh the good stuff or when your attitude or lack of enthusiasm starts to negatively impact the program, its time to go.

That's fairly standard here, too, Skip. Can't say we include it in every email, but it is written in the troop handbook and is repeated numerous times when we are collecting dues and summer camp fees. Our council has "campership" funds for summer camp and a special fund for things like Philmont and jamborees. That said, it depends largely on the local unit. If the troop or pack doesn't have the money, it can't cover the costs.

I doubt anyone among us haven't done the same. Twocubmom and I have sent several kids, besides our own, to summer camp over the years. If you've followed the forums for awhile, you know Base's troop is in a underprivileged area and he constantly picks up the check for his Scouts. But there is a clear difference between offering to help a deserving kid and the sort of demanding entitlement these parents demonstrated.

First and third lets you start of with a low D instead of a middle G and effectively buys you a "step down" as far as lip goes. Although I played though part of college, I never had enough music theory to know what the proper terminology is for the steps.

I'm working on it.

For about seven years I missed two roundtables -- one was when I was on Wood Badge staff the other was National Camp School. Then my son's Communication MB counselor suggested he go to RT to take notes instead of the town board (which conflicts with troop meeting night). On the way home he asks if that was a typical RT meeting, which it was. "Well that was the biggest waste of time I've ever sat through. I can't believe you put up with that crap every month." From the mouths of babes. Basically, I haven't been back since which has been about six years now. It's hard to get around the waste of time. Frankly, physical meetings of RTs are an anachronism. If me killing an evening and three or four gallons of gas could have been replaced by an email newsletter, spend the effort on the newsletter. Unlike meetings, newsletters are self-editing. I get to skip the stuff which doesn't pertain to me. Short of that go with handouts. I don't need a 15 minute pitch on Wood Badge. I need an info sheet (or better yet email) I can distribute to the folks in my unit who need to know. I don't need to be regaled with the whole story starting with Mafeking yet again. I'm with E90 on the value of a true roundtable discussion. Our RTs were 180 degrees from that. We were prohibited from discussing the number of gorillas in the room -- the lack of appropriate inventory in the scout shop, the disgusting condition of the camp shower houses and the fact that our (then) Scout Executive was an utter moron. Any controversial comments were immediately quashed by the RTC or DE. If we're not going to discuss important issues, what's the point? And don't make me watch glue dry. I'm a grown man, a licensed general contractor, not a Wolf Cub. Show me the craft of the month, give me a sheet of instructions and maybe a take-home kit and tell me about tips, hints or sources you may have. I don't need practice gluing cotton balls on construction paper. Cut out the inside jokes and stupid songs. Next time someone sings the Announcement Song, I'm going to punch them in the teeth. All that is is and opportunity for the egos to get up and strut.

A two-man patrol. That's evil...... I like it! LeCastor -- I'm not suggesting the Scouts be booted from the troop, just sent home from the campout. These guys have no consequences for their poor behavior. My understanding from Lee's post is the youth leadership is at the end of its rope in dealing with these two. The adults can counsel the boys, but at the end of the day they have to make a decision to participate or not. We can't beat them, we can't skin them, we can't eat them. If they don't want to participate, our best option is to send them home. The door is open for them at the next troop meeting and on the next campout, but if their behavior is the same the result will be the same. A big part of doing this is to get the parent's attention. If they have to interrupt their "free" weekend and drive a couple hours to camp and back will likely focus more on their son's behavior. Our best hope is the ride home results in some adjustments in attitude. And if the boy and his parents decide Scouting isn't for him, so be it. That is their decision to make. Scouting is only beneficial to a young man if he is willing to partake of it. Showing up, sitting on his duff and causing problems for the other scouts is of little benefit to that Scout. Sooner or later the troop will lose boys who want to participate but are frustrated with the slackers.

I've had guys like this. The normal result is misery. The key is control who gets miserable. The best outcome is for the other guys in the patrol to make them miserable enough that they comply or leave. Unfortunately, sometimes they don't take the hint and hang around making everyone else miserable. So your best option is this: Send them home. If they want to be Scouts, they have to act like Scouts. Frankly, I'd pick a campout at least an hour away from home for this. Then have a nice long chat with the parent before putting them in the car. The lynch pin of Scouting is trust. I have to trust the Scouts to do the right thing, make good decisions and at least try. It doesn't always work, but if a Scout isn't willing to at least put in a good effort it won't work at all. If they can't be trusted to follow the patrol duty roster and do what their chain of command is reasonably asking them to do, they can't be trusted with the other stuff either. Sounds to me like these guys, the first one at least, don't want to be in Scouts. That's okay too. Not everyone does. If not, give them what they want.

We have a guy in the council who wears something on the order of 22 square knots. Even him I don't think I've ever seen wear multiple medals or ribbons. I think d-rat has the right answer. There probably isn't the market to support mini-medals. Our council doesn't even stock the training awards or Scouter's Key medals. I think you would have a better case if there were consistency between the medals and ribbons. But thinking about it, silver beavers, antelope and buffalo and the religious emblems can be awarded to non-BSA members (religious emblems are't even BSA awards), so I suppose that could be the distinction between medals and ribbons. Personally, I think I'd be eligible for five medals, but never wear them together now -- I don't even own the medals for a couple of them. I do make it a point to wear my Eagle to Eagle courts of honor and my God & Country to Scout Sunday. Because our troop wears neckers, I find the Silver Beaver cumbersome and a little too conspicuous so don't like to wear it. But since I was nominated for the SB fairly recently by some of my ASMs and parents, I wear it at a courts of honor mostly to show my appreciation to them.

Greetings from a fellow Carolina boy.

I got an early Christmas present from the father of one of my Eagles. His son is completing college applications and one of the prompts was, "Tell us about something which shaped your character." This was part of his essay: "If I had to say the one singular way that Scouting has shaped my character, it would be the instillation of empathy into my life. Empathy is not a common trait that would be used to describe a teenage boy, but I feel it is the underlying characteristic that Boy Scouts actively shapes. "Empathy, in the way that Scouting presents it, is the ability to connect with another person at the emotional level and to feel what he is feeling as well. I have many firsthand experiences with this. My first experience with empathy in Boy Scouts was also my strongest and most memorable. It was my first year as a Boy Scout as I had crossed over into the troop when in February of that year. I was essentially still a Webelo at my fist Summer Camp. I had never been away from home for a whole week and it surely seemed daunting to be able to last that long. The first day and night I was there everything went fine, and I was holding strong. It was the second night, however, that things began to fall apart. I was sad, depressed really, and I wanted to go home. I was on the verge of calling my parents to beg for them to come and rescue me, but then a boy in my troop came to talk to me. He was much older, about four years my senior, and he was nearing his end in Scouting as he was about to become an Eagle. He didn’t try and bribe me to stay or tell me I would not be allowed to go. All he did was talk to me. We talked for over an hour about Scouting, camp, school, and everything else we could think of. Just having someone to talk to was all I needed. "I believe that the older Scout who had helped me understood my pain, he empathized with me. Scouting forces all boys to go through the same struggles: trying to remember the difference between a simple and compound fracture in first aide merit badge, going camping in the harshest of conditions, even hiking uphill both ways for miles to complete the Second Class hiking requirement. Scouting instills a sense of brotherhood and comradery, and I feel that these traits are the essence of how one will connect with another. Truly, if Scouting has shaped my character in any way, it has shown me the power of connecting with another person and the positive long lasting effects of simply caring enough about another person just to have a simple conversation to pick him up when he is feeling down."

Let's not go there. There are threads ad nauseam on scout accounts. Base -- I'm as disgusted as you are. You should total all the things you've spent money on over the past few years, divided it by the number of Scouts and send each family an invoice. Here it's not about money, but I'm having the similar frustrations. I'm thinking it's time for me to find a new pastime. Sounds like you may be there too. If you find yourself saying "I'm about done with this" more than a couple times, you probably are. Shoot, just based on length of time we've been members of these forums, we've more than done our share.

My advice on your ticket is the same as for First Class Scouts asking me about Eagle projects. Start collecting ideas, but don't become wed to anything. I think it's okay to ask other leaders in your unit for ideas and input, but stay open minded. Part of the course is learning what makes a good goal and how to approach the projects. The idea, as with Eagle projects, isn't just to do a service project, but to put into action the processes you've learned. Plus with Wood Badge, there are specific requirements regarding the projects you can do. Seems like those rules are constantly changing, and it's been years since I was on staff, so wait until you go through the first weekend before you lock in anything. Showing up with absolutely no ideas for ticket items or showing up already locked in to your ticket both create equal problems.

Not a goal I would encourage.

My older son's Eagle app was kicked back because he didn't include the statement. Apparently it had been recently added to the application (it isn't list as an actual "requirement", although I understand that will change in the next edition of the BSHB.) When our Eagle coordinator (who also serves as a district Eagle BoR rep for other troops) returned the application to him, he quipped, "My life's ambition is to be Chief Scout Executive so I can fire the idiots who come up with this stuff." To which the Eagle coordinator replied, "if that's you life's ambition, who am I to argue?" Of course he though better of that idea when he actually wrote the essay. But, our Eagle guy had the right idea, who are you to tell me what my life's ambitions are? Personally, I've always thought of this as nothing more that a conversation starter for the Board of Review. That the second half is to include a resume-like listing of accomplishments and activities would seem to back that up. Then again, if the Board of Review members aren't sharp enough to ask the candidate about his future plans, we probably need to recruit better board members. I don't really see it as some big, hairy introspective process. If the Scout has the statement ready when I do his conference, I'll read it and make it part of the conversation. If not, I just make to check the box and make sure it's included in the final packet. Your committee chair needs another hobby. It's not his life's ambition, not his Eagle application, nor is it his job to critique Scout's essay.

No bugler, but over the years we've had two different pipers. The troop being led into the opening campfire at summer camp by bagpipes is pretty cool. I play the bugle, counsel the merit badge and have volunteered for Bugles Across America in the past. We've had a couple guys take a stab at bugling for the troop, but never really stuck with it. (Maybe it's tough to compete with bagpipes.) The troop has a bugle which we loan out to the guys. I think guys really need a couple years on the trumpet/coronet to have a good shot at it. They need to hit a high G comfortably, and it takes a couple years to develop the lip for that. ( But there are ways to cheat that on the trumpet.) Funny story -- one of my older guys decided he wanted to be the troop bugler. Great. So I gave him the troop bugle, the MB pamphlet and showed him what work on. Next week he came back and decided to play the taps for the flag raising (yeah, I know, but it was his first week so we went with it.) He was AWFUL. He could play only one tone (and that poorly) in the general rhythm of Taps. I let this go on for a few weeks but finally asked him how long he had been playing the trumpet. "Oh, I don't play the trumpet." What instrument do you play. "I don't play anything." Really? What made you think you could play the bugle? "I don't know, I thought it would be fun." Although I offered to teach him, I noted learning any instrument is a long term commitment. But I was willing if he was. He wasn't. I suppose he figured since a bugle doesn't have keys, holes or buttons it must be easy to play.