Eagle94-A1

Something on my newsfeed. https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/soaring-price-youth-sports-50-174913819.html

Circa 2012 to 2014.

I see now that day camp is at least 2 days now. when NCAP started, that wasn't the case, and a district single day activity, like PWD, had to follow NCAP.

My old troop had 1 fundraiser a year. Every Scout had a goal to sell x number of plates. Paid for all advancement, weekend campouts (except food, $ varied by patrol) and depending upon the year 50% to 100% of summer camp. Before National skyrocketed the dues, also paid that and Boy's Life. Depending upon where you are at, you can get by cheaply, especially backpacking. One national forest nearby has no fees for backpackers. One state park charges only for parking if you are backpacking. One place we went biking cost us $100 for everyone for the weekend. That was less than $10/person. Key is willingness to explore new places.

Very true, adults cannot model the skills because they have no training or experience. And the powers that be think online learning is enough. Bill Hillcourt said it best " SCOUTING IS OUTING!" But I am leery of outside certifications. I remember when LNT Trainer was a Scout POR that required LNT Trainer certification, but most places offering it wanted you to be 18+. And to be honest even going through training is not enough. I went through Aquatics Supervision Paddle Sports training, and am certified to teach paddle board to Scouts. Just because I am certified, doesn't mean I have the knowledge or skills to do it. 2 to 3 hours on a paddle board was not enough time, especially with my balance to master those skills. Give me a canoes or kayak any day. Once upon a time, national allowed a test out of IOLS. You had to demonstrate ALL of the skills, and if you missed one, you had to take the course. That lasted a year or two because some folks were just pencil whipping the training. Which considering the standard of one and done, pencil whipping is the norm from national. Unfortunately pros are judged by the number of units they have, even if they are substandard. So there is a LOT of pressure on them. I tried to focus on quality, not quantity, and my boss gave me hell for it. And trust me pros cannot remove unit leaders. When I was a DE, we had a pack that had extremely poor leadership. I could recruit 30 Scouts for them, and 5 would remain. The #1 complaint was the CM, they needed to be removed. I had a chat with the COR/IH, who was an involved Scouter. But even he was unwilling to remove them because he had no idea who to replace them with. As for unit visits, I can tell you I had one unit I started having a lot, and I mean a lot, of challenges. I was doing my best to help them out by basically serving as their commissioner as we did not have a commissioner corps ( that is another story). My boss chewed me a new one for helping the unit out. I got around that by visiting them as a member of their CO, the service organization that I belong to. Until national wants quality over quantity, we will continue circling the drain.

Gotcha. It has been so long since I had to deal with NCAP, I can't remember what year it was. I do know all three of my kids were Cubs, so it was over, 10 years ago, and closer to 16. I know my council was ticked off with me for doing the inspection necessary because the camp was a D+ or C- grade.

Unless things have changed, NCAP also covers day activities.

Everything fall under NCAP now if it is a district/council event. And officially that is anytime you have units from 2 or more COs. Even in my day, Professional Development Level 2 was not automatic, because it was not required to be a DE like PDL-1 was. In fact i know of only 2 DEs of the 12 I worked with having completed PDL-2. One completed years earlier, and one somehow got a two week, all expenses paid trip for PDL-2 and an Exploring Conference at FL Sea Base in January.

My thoughts, 1. BSA's standards for Scouts BSA have dropped. Once upon a time the standards were "Master the skills," and "The badge represents what a Scout CAN DO (sic), not what he has done." Today its is "A badge recognizes what a Scout has done toward achieving the primary goal of personal growth... It is thus more about the learning experience than it is about the specific skills learned. " Best example of this is the "First Class Camp" After doing all the basic Scoutcraft requirements, they needed to lead a campout for a minimum of 24 hours with at least 1 other Scout without and adult. Nowadays 2 adults over 21 are needed. A lot of folks I know complain about the new standard. And we see what "One and Done" is doing to the program. When you have a Life Scout, with their Eagle Board of Review scheduled, can not do basic T-2-1 first aid, let alone First Aid Merit Badge requirements, there is a problem. 2 Adult training is a joke. I had scheduled and was prepping a CS Basic Leader Training course when the CS Leader Specific Training courses came out. I cannot tell you how much information was left out, especially at the Webelos level. We did CS Specific, but added a lot from the old CSBLT that was missing. Ditto with ITOLS.. I supplemented a bunch of material from older BSHBs and Field Books, to make sure they got the info they needed. And they have watered down the syllabus since I taught it. 3. There use to have experienced folks called commissioners to help units out. Problem is that they had no authority to enforce stuff, and insure a quality program. Worse is when you have new folks telling commissioners they don't know anything about the program and they need to butt out, or Scouting needs to change with the times and their ideas are better. Very discouraging and makes folks not want to help. 4.National and councils seems to be focused on advancement, not program. How many Scouts you see with all the MBs? How many councils have summer camps that give away MBs or have MBUs that are essentially MB giveaways? Sadly that is what the majority of parents want today: quick and easy advancement. They do not care if their Scouts actually know anything. They do not care if their Scouts have adventures and fun, they care about 1 thing: getting Eagle. Some who know Eagle should mean something see this and ask themselves "why bother?" Others are fighting tooth an nail to stop the degradation. However we are getting fewer and fewer.

WHAT?!?! Please tell me you are joking. That was a significant part of PDL-1 back in the day. Everything from creating a list of prospects, figuring who to go with you to the prospect, how to dress when approaching the prospect, etc. While we use a nominating committee to get names, DEs were also supposed to come up with names for the nominating committee as well. And if you didn't have a nominating committee.... More Later

Regarding training, I was appalled at what was left out of CS Leader Specific, especially the Webelos Den Leader Specific, compared to the old CS Basic Leader Training. There is no mention of the differences between being a CSDL, and being a WDL, and how the transision is suppose to go. I beleive that the retention rates for Crossed Over Scouts is for this very reason, and national has doubled down on it, making the transition a few months in 5th grade, instead of the 18-24 months. BSA did the research once, and it stated transition takes 18-24 months. Regarding DE training, WOW. Prior to going to PDL-1, we had to have YPT, CSBLT, SM Fundamentals, and Explorer Basic Leader Training. Additional YP stuff was covered, but it was mostly a reemphasis of get the Scout to safety, call the SE, call the police.

Thank for the correction. You are right, it is end of month, June 30th, and Dec. 31st.

Going from memory. The membership reports could compare by date, or month, as well as tracking for the June 30th, or December 31st goals.

Let's be honest, we won't get actual numbers until March when all the December 31st expirations go into effect. And I bet the March numbers will. be down. While I do think more Unit Serving Executives may help, they will need to get the right type. For whatever reason, BSA seems to think educators make good execs and program folks. Yet BP realized when he started that educators make lousy SMs. As for IT systems, this is what happens when you put a former SE into being the CIO without any experience in the field.

Ebay, or Scouting memorabilia shop. Good luck finding one. It may take you 30 years to find one you can afford.

Trust me I know. My council is about to launch a capital campaign for repairs and upgrades at camp. What happened to the money from a camp they sold that they told volunteers would pay for these renovations? Yes, I know, it went to pay the council's share of the lawsuit.

Supposedly, if every CO in a county petitions to leave and join a council, it can happen. BUT every single CO has to agree to it. I do not know if they have everyone on board or not. But I told them to have patience as mergers are coming.

Registrars are extremely overworked this time of year, and usually until February/March One of the ways we found more Scouts were registration audits. We asked each unit to give us a list of their active Scouts, and compared it to the charter. I can tell you Scouts who should be on charters were found not to be on it, and other Scouts who should have been removed from the charter, were still on it. I know I still find that I have found folks still on charters that I took off the last year, and missing others, even with My.Scouting.Org. You cannot take off the ones still listed, but you can add the missing ones. The December 31st number doesn't actually come out until March. They do have a grace period. I have heard some pros joke about "December 42nd"

I do not know about today, but I know about back in the day. The #1 membership stat was the December 31st number. That was the one used in reports, media, etc. It is also the reason why a lot of councils had recharter December; delinquent units are still on the rolls until February or March. Rational was that paperwork was a pain, and it can take that long to get things fixed. The #2 stat was the June 30th number. That was used to set goals, see how much work will need to be done in Round Up, etc. Finally you had a monthly stat, and that compared to the previous years monthly stat. That is why you can see different numbers supposedly covering the same thing. While some will say it is "apples to apples," It is more like Granny Smith Apples to Gala Apples to Red Delicious Apples.

Trust me there is a lot of indignation. One unit now refuses to have anything to do with the council except paperwork: no camporees, no using camp, no purchasing supplies, no FOS, nothing at at. Most of the units do not use the local summer camp because the program sucks: it is a MB giveaway. Last time I went, inadequate supplies, equipment breaking, large Scout to Instructor ratios (30 people in Lifesaving MB; 15 minutes max on the water each day because you don't have enough canoes?!?!?!), and no improvements from complaints. Families are seeing all this and no longer want to support the council. There is actually discussion about the county leaving the current council, and joining a neighboring one.

@Tron, Since FOS has dried up, and only 1 unit in the district goes to the local summer camp, The "troop" is being charged $37.50 per Scout in addition to $100 recharter fee. Next year it goes up to $75/Scout. That is in addition to the individual 's national registration fee, council service fee, and insurance fee. That is $120/Scout. So a family with 4 Scouts in the program costs $480 individual fees plus $150 for "Fair Share", plus unit dues. And that doesn't include camp outs and summer camps. I know folks say scouting is cheap compared to sports, but there are a lot of folks who cannot afford to do sports, but could afford Scouting. Not any more.

Friends of mine have been hit with "Unit Fair Share" fees from their council. Unit is being assessed a per scout fee. This is being added to the charter fee, so not directly on the Scouts, but who pays unit dues. They are complaining of no services being provided by the council to warrant that fee, or FOS for that matter.

When I was a DE, my district had 45% of the current membership numbers. And that was just 2 counties.

WOW

It is dying. And the majority of folks do not want to put quality control measures. They want 'High Speed, Low Drag" advancement and increasing the number of Eagle Scouts. They would rather celebrate the 13 or 14 year old with all 130+MBs than the troop that is doing trail work on the AT, or the troop running Red Cross evac stations.