Bob White

BALOO is training for pack level volunteers leading a pack familiy camping program. It covers safety, hygiene, planning, and event organizations, with a small smattering of basic outdoor skills. OWL which is an often used local name for the Webelos Leader Outdoor Skills course teaches Webelos leaders how to teach the outdoor related Webelos Activity Oin topics and teaches them some basic skills for leading a simple outdoor program including safety, hygiene and planning. The Introduction to Outdoor Leader Skills is for Scoutmasters and Assistant Scoutmasters and covers the skill information from the Boy Scout Handbook that a boy needs to progress from Scout through the first three ranks of Tenderfoot, Second Class, and First Class Ranks. But this is what really caught my eye... "This is going to sound ridiculous, but I never had enough interest in the CS side of training, to get the two CS courses done when I was training chair." Are you saying you didn't see that those courses were held because you weren't "interested enough" in Cub Scouting even though you were the training chair?(This message has been edited by Bob White)

Are you using the photos to sell a product or service? Who took them, How did you obtain them? Do you intend to identify any minors in the photos?(I would hope not!) Based on these answers it is likely that a photo release is not needed.

And BrotherhoodWWW as an Advisor in the OA do you routinely go to a 31 year old resource to get information onthe current program rather than use the current handbook. The 43 year old resources I mentioned belonged not to you but to another poster, who is seems is almost an entire decade further behind in his information than the three decades you are behind. I am curious what you feel my membership in the OA has to do with being able to tell that a current official resources is more accurate to use regarding today's program than a resource from 30 or 40 years ago?

I don't mean to disagree with you emb021 but the Sea Scout Manual and the National Committee sure seem to. Since when was the correct uniform based on what individual feels? As far as using other people who wear it wrong as your example is that really the way you want to to measure right from wrong...by what others choose to do rather than what the people charged with making the decision determine the uniform should be? isn't that one way these myths get started. The Council strip is worn on some uniforms just not on the khakis or the adult dress whites according to the Handbook. Not being a uniform policeman, since there aren't any such thing. I am just comparing what you say you do with what the Sea Scout Handbook says the uniform is, and by comparison you have 8 items that do not belong on that particular uniform shirt (11 if you count each knot separately). But the choice is yours, I would hope that as an officer you would want to do things correctly as a way to set the example for others, rather than based on your personal feelings? But it seems that a lot of the creative uniforming I saw came from folks who were more into the customs and courtesies of the Boy Scout program than those of the naval heritage that the Sea Scouts were based on. What "naval issue"? As far keeping the uniform from looking like a Navy uniform, it would seem to me that the "Sea Scouts BSA" strip alone takes care of that, not to mention all the First Class Anchors on the collar and hat, and the ship patch on the sleeve. The manual seems very explicit on what goes where on the uniform, I guess I just don't understantd the choice to ignore it. (This message has been edited by Bob White)

the BSA programs has for many many years recommended that patrols be made of youth of similar age and intersts. There is nothing wrong with your current patrol groupings. The fact that the scouts do not want to see their patrols chaged is evidence of that. What you need to do is train the leadership to understand that this is how the patrols are supposed to be and teach them how to use this sense of team to function toward the common goals. This is a leadership issue and not a problem caused by the patrol membership.

Denounced it? When did the BSA denounce it? Here is what the Sea Scout Manual says on the uniform. "the National Sea scout Committee adopted the uniforms in this manual as the only official Sea Scout uniform."

"BW is it beyond your ability to not ever wonder if perhaps there was a mistake in printing and editing. The OA releases periodic updates to correct and clearify actual policies and proceedures" Brotherhoodwww, do you have any evidence that the information that jet526 shared from the current offical OA Handbook is incorrect in any way? If so please share, otherwise I do not see how or why you would not accept that information as accurate. I have no trouble wondering about things. For instance, I wonder why you have such difficulty understanding and accepting something that is clearly explained in writing in a current BSA handbook. I wonder why someone would use a resource that was 43 years old to show what the policy or procedure is today? I wonder why you don't question the 43 year old information but you question the current information. My ability to wonder seems as endless as the ability of some folks to do things that causes one to wonder.

If you follow the uniform regulations found in the Sea Scout manual you will notice that Not only are the Wood Badge beads not worn, neither are OA devices or patches on any official Sea Scout Uniforms, They can however be worn on the Venturing Uniform and as a Sea Scout that is an optional unioform to wear. There are no temporary patches, no unit numbers, no council strip, no beads, no OA flaps or devices, on the work uniform. The Sea Scout manual is specific about this. At the Seabadge I attended faculty wore Sea Scout khakis with OA strips, temporary patches, knots, Council Strips, unit numbers etc etc. It was disappointing. It speaks to the credibility and knowledge of the trainer and what it says is not good. OGE BSA training is designed to not just share the information but to also pair it with the resources material that the information is from. (This message has been edited by Bob White)(This message has been edited by Bob White)

And he probably got that idea from someone who told him that when he got trained, etc. etc. I do not diagree that it is important for trainers to stick to the syllabus and avoid including other information unless they have varified its accuracy. "Back in the dyas" we had fewer resources. The Guide to Safe Scouting has only been out for about twenty years now. Those of us who got trained for the first time prior to than had very little in the way of resources to varify that kind of information. But with the abundance of resources available today there seems to be little reason for such falsehoods to continue. Many or the urban legends of Scouting can be easily dismissed simply by reading the Boy Scout Handbook. The bottom of page 78 in this instance.

Didn't jet526 give the "official word from national" when he quoted from the current offical OA Handbook and not from a handboook that was 43 years old?

When you consider that the scouts who are aging out of Venturing this year, were eligible to join when the program was only 3 years old, you realize it is still a very young program. Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts are mult-generational where as Venturing is not. How long will it remain a "new" program. I think that feeling will remain at least another 10 to 15 years. Once it has second generation members I think that feeling will go away. Think about how many people referred to the current uniform as the "new uniform" for almost 25 years.

Patrols are supposed to be "cliqueish". They are independent teams with a stronger relationsghip to the patrol than to the troop. It is supposed to be that way. A patrol leaders job is first to represent the needs and characteristics of his patrol to the troop. His second job is to represent the needs of the troop to the patrol. It is the SPL's responsibility to balance the two. So that troop provides the patrol the support it needs and the patrol supplies the troop the support that the troop needs. If the problem is duty assignments that is the SPL respoonsibility to manage. Realligning the patrols is the wrong way to go. As far as the SPL determining troop operations. Youth lead the activities. Adults lead the program. There is a reason for difference. Your problems are ones of troop leadership and not patrol configuration. If the patrols have a close inner relationship between its members that's a good thing, that's teamwork. Leave them alone. If the team is not working toward the right goals then that's a leadership issue...train the leaders.

The difference between facts and legends. Facts can be proven. My point of course ghermanno is that what you state as fact based on your personal knowledge...is neither. Certainly if what you say is true you, do not have the data or the knowledge to proclaim it as fact. This is a problem that we find ourselves in from time to time on a forum and in scouting and this is how the legends get started. One person proclaims it as fact and other blindly follow. You have not talked with most the scouts in Texas let alone most the scouts in the Northeast or the Midwest or the Northwest. You have met a very small number of the BSA membership and a very small number of unit leaders upon which you have claimed a "FACT". The facts is no one has any idea how many scouts have been taught sheath knife use or safety now or ever. The fact is that your scoutmaster did not determine the requirements for Totin' Chip the BSA did, and by the way I looked in the handbooks from the 70's and there is nothing on sheath knives in the requirememnts or in the Handbook contents. So while your SM may have taught it it was not a part of the BSA program. And the fact is the District cannot ban the use of anything in your troop except on council property or at a District or council event. Those are facts. They can be sustantiated, your "facts" cannot. No need to reply, I just felt is was related to the thread topic to show how legends are born.

"I am saddened by the fact that most Scouts are NOT taught how to handle a sheath knife." Just how many scouts and scout units have you talked with in order to establish that fact? Is it really most scouts, or just most of the scouts you have met? "My new District bans ALL sheath knives because they are afraid the boys will sit on the knives and hurt themselves. (Guess I shouldn't take them out in the woods for fear a tree would fall on them too?) Your district has no authority to do that. They can ban sheath knives on council property or at council events, but they cannot prohibit a unit from the general use of any tool other than a log splitter and a chain saw. "By the way, when I earned my first Toten Chit, I had to demonstrate handleing a sheath knife. (early 1970)" I will check my handbook but I am pretty sure that the care and handling of a sheath knife was not a part of the Totin' Chip at that time. (This message has been edited by Bob White)

emb021 is correct. The Sea Scout Manual states what a sea Scout with the Quartermaster rank would wear on each uniform. Those are the positions that I posted previously. Do some ships wear the incorrect uniform or wear the unifoprm incorrectly? Absolutely. Just as some troops and some packs wear the uniform incorrectly. At the Seabadge training I attended most the staff wore incorrect uniforms treating the Sea Scout Adult Work Uniform (Khaki) shirt as a Boy Scout Uniform shirt hanging all kinds of things on it that did not belong on a Sea Scout Uniform. But then they had a very unusually attitude toward uniforms to bein with.

If you loook in the Insignia Guide there ar POR patches for Venturing Roundtable Commissioner, and Venturing Roundtable Staff.

I don't know if you have spent any time in commissioner service Beavah but you have spent enough time on this forum to see that most the problems people write in about are caused because the program was not followed. Not knowing the safety regulations, not using the patrol method, not having good relationships with the CO, not being trained,committees not following the right procedures. Those are just a few of the repeating themes we see in the posts.

have you looked at the on-line resources for Cub Scouting at the National website? http://www.scouting.org/CubScouts/resources.aspx

"I will also point out that Sea Scouts have had their own committees at council, area, regional, and national since the 20s. It has worked for them, and IMO, the long-term survival of that program over the years has been due to their existance... " Relatively few councils have Sea Scout Committees. Area committee seem to have been sporadic over the years. I do agree that there have been National and regional committees for the time period you said. (This message has been edited by Bob White)

What the youth Sea Scout with the Quartermaster award would wear would depend on which youth uniform or which adult uniform he wore. Keeping in mind that there are three adult unforms and three youth uniforms. On the adult work uniform the Youth would wear the Round patch on the left pocket or the knot, on the adult dress White Uniform the youth would wear the knot over the left pocket. on the Adult Dress Blue Uniform the Scout would wear the knot over the left pocket. With the youth uniforms the youth Quartermaster would wear the Quartermaster Rank Badge.

I'd still like to know how they figure "universal sizing" for adults is going to fit men and women equally well in the hip/waist When did "they" ever say that they felt that way? "They" probably think that it will fit most, some better than others.

I'd still like to know how they figure "universal sizing" for adults is going to fit men and women equally well in the hip/waist When did "they" ever say that they felt that way? "They" probably think that it will fit most, some better than others.

I'd still like to know how they figure "universal sizing" for adults is going to fit men and women equally well in the hip/waist When did "they" ever say that they felt that way? "They" probably think that it will fit most, some better than others. Does everything you try on in every store you shop in all fit the same way?

Gosh thanks beavah, if I hadn't already said that what jblake was doing seemed to be following the program I never would have realized it without you saying it again. No one was shouting. I have said twice that what what jblake says he is doing appears to be very close to what the BSA program supports. What I saw as the difference was that jblake doesn't know that he is following the program, he felt he was training his patrol his way and that is was somehow different from what the BSA training and program supports.

I was at Yellowstone National Park in 1983 with a bus load of Scouts on our way to the World Jamboree in Canada. During lunch I was talking with a park Ranger about a number of different things. One being, that very morning we had watched a visitor get flipped into the air by a Bison that he gotten to close to while taking a picture. So I asked the Ranger "'what was the dumbest thing you ever saw a vistor do trying to relate to a wild animal." One time" he said, "we had a mother trying to get a picture of her small child with a black bear cub that had wandered into camp, so she spread honey on the 3-year-olds arm in order to get the cub to lick at it." Wanna guess what happened next? They were lucky that the boy was not killed, the arm was badly mauled by the bear. Here's the thing about common sense...it ain't common at all.