Eagle94-A1

Well Said!

Good for you for going to the SM to propose a fundraiser for the PLC to approve. Maybe they were not interested. One challenge we had was new parents "persuading" the PLC to do a joint fundraiser with the pack. PLC had to cancel their trip in order to do it. While the Cubs sold the bulk of the tickets, I discovered the troop 95% of the manpower. And that 5% was either parents in both the troop and pack, or about to cross over parents. And you are not mandating what the monies are going to. We got some extra money from the fundraiser due to providing manpower. However, the folks in charge said the troop can have the money only if we put it towards equipment, and nothing else. Fair enough. I just hope they don't want us to buy what they want to get. Looking at some of the stuff they proposed in the past, it was not practical, nor cost efficient. Plus the Scouts won't have ownership, and will not take care of it.

One of the things I remember not only being taught when I did BA 22, but also taught when staffing JLT was "Counseling." I remember when I had issues, I went to the ASPL or SPL. They were my mentors, not the adults. Even when I was ASPL and acting SPL, it was my peers I went to, not the adults. @Col. Flagg brings up a very good point regarding adult intervention. Heck it is even discouraged that Scouts deal with discipline problems in their units anymore.

I got both noble and selfish reasons. Noble: I want to pay back the adults who were involved in Scouting when I was a youth. I want my sons and their friends to have as good, if nor better, experience in Scouting than I had. I want to be a positive influence in my community. Selfish: SCOUTING IS FUN! "SCOUTING IS OUTING" I get a "rush" talking to my Scouts and hearing about their lives journeys and seeing their successes. This topic came up at a funeral this weekend. Oldest son's first SM, "went home." He left instructions as to what he wanted done. Scouting was such a factor in his life, he was buried in his uniform. Our Honor Guard detail provided a color guard for his service. 98% of the troop showed up and in full uniform (we haven't gotten this ever, including COHs!) It was standing room only as many folks who were Scouts under him, or served with him as a Scouter came from out of town to pay their last respects. The "eulogies" were all reminiscing about Scouting events in the past. When the service was over, and folks went to pay their respects to the family, Scouting was the topic of conversation, and it lasted so long that many had to leave and could not attend the graveside service. Long story short, this one guy made that much of an impact on many peoples lives. I hope the same can be said when my time comes.

Yes, I've encountered situations where Explorers/Venturers here in the States have hooked up on outings. One case involved two summer camp staffers, one of whom was the director of support services's daughter. In another, the young lady ran away from home because she disagreed with parents. As she was 18, nothing the parents could do, but the council pros involved were in a very uncomfortable situation. Thankfully everything worked out with her family, and the couple are married.

Correct. That is why I like folks to step away from Boy Scouts directly from Cub Scouts, observe what is being done, getting trained, and being mentored. Even I stepped away as an ASM when oldest joined, not only because I was a DL, but also observe troop dynamics and learn how things are doen in the troop. And this is from someone with years of experience, and has served as an ASM previously, and was a training chairman. I had to step back at times and remember it is not Cub Scouts that first year.

If your sons are Boy Scouts, they know about girls being able to join already. The word has been out since before Jamboree. Scouts in my troop know it is coming. That's nice you know parents, especially a mom, who will be involved. But will it be enough? For the trip that got cancelled, we have 9 active Scouters, plus the helicopter parents, yet only 3 adults were willing to go because it was backpacking. More importantly will the moms be comfortable doing the trips? One helicopter mom, who refuses to let her son camp without her, would not do the survival camp out, nor the survival camporee, nor the backpacking trip. Guess which Scout didn't attend these camp outs. And you never addressed the experienced factor. We have an avid outdoorsman and survivalist as a Scouter in the troop. I admit he knows more survival skills and techniques than me, or anyone else in the troop save the ASM who went through SERE. Great resource right? WRONG, AS THE EXPERIENCED SCOUTS HATE HIM! (caps for emphasis). He is constantly interfering, treating them like Cub Scouts. It got to the point that he started doing cooking and KP on two camp outs, and the older Scouts walked away as they were fed up with him. Since he is a nationally certified wilderness survival instructor with one of the survival schools, you would think he would teach great survival classes? SPL asked him to do just that. First session he did on shelters was boring as all get out, no hands on teaching, and was essentially doing the tarp shelter from Webelos. SPL got the SERE survivor to finish up the rest of the sessions instead because there was protest with the way he was doing things. The problem was that all his experience in Scouting has been Cub Scout based. He was never a Boy Scout, and while "trained," having completed online SM Specific and ITOLs at summer camp, he has not truly made the transition to Boy Scouter mode. He does not know how to interact with the Scouts. He does not know how to work with the Scouts, He does not know how to relate to the Scouts. And instead of being a blessing to the troop like all of us thought, he has turned into a big detriment. He is one of the helicopter parents we are having issues with. He is the one who lets his son sneak into his tent or shelter when Scout son is afraid. He is the one sitting outside the tent until his son falls asleep. He is the one who is taking over cooking and cleaning when son is suppose to do it. And according to National, he is a fully "trained" ASM entitled to wear the "Trained Strip." Outdoor knowledge, skills, and abilities do not equate to being a good Boy Scouter. A lot more than knowing how to tie lashings, camp, etc is needed. You need to know how to work with YOUNG MEN ages 10 - 18. You need to be able to relate, mentor, and advise. And that does not come from training. And just being male, or growing up in the program make you an expert, it takes time and mentoring. For all my experience as a youth, I was a lousy ASM fro the first year. I kept going into SPL mode, and not Scouter mode. It took time and mentoring. That is one of the problems we are having. Unfortunately because we have been desperate for adults in the past, we didn't have the cooling off period. It is now biting us in the butt. Troop growing up made folks wait a year, sometimes longer, to become an ASM. The SM, and COR/CC vetted folks before making them an ASM. I think they may have had problems before I was in the troop. It's not that I am against adults around. I don't want adults INTERFERING (emphasis) with the Patrol Method. Growing up, the only time I had interactions with an adult was for a health and safety issue (MD gave me free summer camp physical and examined for a concussion on one camp out. Even when I got hypothermia in Canada, it was a Scout who treated me, not an adult), when I was acting as SPL, and my first time I was PL, when I modeled a leadership style from my original troop that the SM did not approve of ( Yelling and screaming at my Scouts). Even then, my SPL was the first invovled, and counseled me. THEN the SM came over and chatted with me. Otherwise all the adults did was sit around the campfire, drinking coffee, and doing their own thing.

Growing up in the 1980s, I too read BL cover to cover. I especially loved the comic serial, specifically the WHITE MOUNTAINS TRILOGY. I remember drooling over the gear they advertised, and when I found a Coleman Peak1 Ramflex backpack for $2.50 at a thrift store, I jumped at it, but gave it to the wife so that she would no longer use my internal frame pack. I was so in love with BL, I remember a neighbor who was in Boy Scouts was moving and the family had a garage sale. He was selling all of his BL magazines. I bought them all up. Sadly my BL collection from my youth was destroyed in a hurricane. But my wife and sis-in-law got a hold of the microfiche files of BL magazine from 1985-1990, and gave that to me as a Christmas present. Happy Scouter. But then I had the chance to look at older BL and Scouting magazines when a friend passed away, and I inherited some of his collection. WOW they were a lot better in the 1930s, 40s, and 50s.

They changed the belt buckle back in 2010 or thereabouts.

The elephant in the room: "more leaders." In my neck of the woods, getting Scouters is like pulling teeth or herding cats. Several units have told me that they will go full fledged coed irregardless of what National wants. At my council's town hall meeting on the topic, this was mentioned, and every Scouter there, except the council key 3, said that will happen in their units and/or districts as they all have challenges getting enough volunteers. Key three ignored the comment. Even the CSE in his video indirectly acknowledges this. He stated that dens of different levels had to merge in one of the districts because they didn't have enough Cub Scouts of a particular level and/or den leaders. Having a been a pro, I can tell you that professionals will toe the line officially, but tell you ways to get around the official line. The CSE's tale is one. Officially you do not combine Tiger Dens and Wolf/Bear Dens and Webelos Dens. It need to be at a minimum 3 separate dens. But as long as each Cub is working out of his own book, the CSE is fine. A better one is the DE calling waterguns "Personal Water Soaking Devices" or "PWSDs" and allowing them since they are a fun way to cool off Scouts and keep them from getting heat exhaustion. ( an aside when we followed the ban, #1 cause of illness at day camp was heat exhaustion over a 5 day period, over 20 kids went home early, following year PWSDs were not only allowed, but encouraged. NO ONE went home early due to heat exhaution) Sadly BSA no longer allows patrols to camp on their own without adults. That's a recent change, since 2012 or thereabouts. So adults are important since "OUTING is three-fourths of ScOUTING" (That is not only the correct quote, but the mathematically correct one. Current BSHB has a misquote and is mathematically wrong). Not enough adults equals no camping. While the new YPT has not come out yet, we can reason that the new YP Guidelines will be similar to Venturing: if girls are present camping, a female Scouter needs to be there. While there are women who love to camp, will there be enough? Will they be available? Someone in another thread asked about troops poaching his female Venturing Scouters so they can take the girls camping. What happens when "the boy troop and girl troop" are camping the same weekend at the same location and no female Scouters are able to camp with the girls? Do you cancel just the "girls troop" camp out, or will "both troops" have to cancel? While this may not seem possible, I have had a trip cancelled because we did not have 2 adults to camp. 1 backed out a week before for back reason. Another backed out 2 hours before leaving to have emergency surgery. So that is a real possibility. And that does concern my kids. My youngest just found out about girls in Cub Scouts this morning when I showed him the picture. He freaked out saying " NNNNNOOOOOOOOOOO!" (Yes he was shouting and woke up his brothers). When I asked him "What's the matter with girls in Cub Scouts"" he stated "Boy Scouts is for boys. Girls have Girl Scouts." And then I said "Well there are girls who want to do what Boy Scouts do." He replied "things are going to fall apart. Remember when we had the boys club and the girls club? The boys club met every week, and had awesome Nerf gun fights. The girls did boring things. Then they joined the two clubs and it became boring. Then everyone stopped showing up." Sadly I think this scenario will repeat nationwide with the introduction of girls. You will have units fold because they will try to follow national's official policy. Those units that go full coed will have boys drop because they will get bored.. And there is a big difference between learning something on a computer, and learning something from an experienced instructor who teaches from the syllabus. Sadly I know why BSA, and a lot of other organizations are going to computer-based learning: convenience and consistency. And I have noticed quality of BSA training go down since they implemented it too. And with all these new volunteers, how many will have experience in Boy Scouts? There is a big difference between Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts, and parents and new volunteers have an extremely hard time adjusting. This will become worse with female volunteers who are use to the GSUSA model, which is completely different than BSA's model, #1 issue with units I've been in has been been parents. This goes all the way back to when I was a PL of a NSP in the 1980s!

It's Official! Wolves will wear red neckers. Photo was posted on Facebook on a scouting page.

Regarding troops and going coed. I've been told by Scouters that it will happen in my district, heck my troop is the first one to tell me this, because of the lack of resources and manpower to have two separate units. When I brought it up to my Council Key three at the town hall meeting, they ignored it , and everyone else in the room agreed it will happen. Even the CSE in his 20 questions video indirectly states it will happen.

According to the current application the BSA is using NOW ( emphasis), there is no gender specific requirement for Cub Scouts, or Boy Scouts for that matter. The application replaced 'boys" with "youth" and "children"

Also in my experience. They were the are the originators of the NSP.

It takes a minimum of 19 months to earn Eagle. 1 month for Tenderfoot's Physical Fitness (PF)requirement 4 Weeks ( 28 days) for Second Class and it's PF requirement 4 weeks for First Class and it's PF requirement 4 months for Star 6 for Life 6 for Eagle So technically 18 Months and 26 or 27 Days, not including Leap Year.

One regarding BSA and Knives, while they do have policies, those policies stress"legally owned" so knife laws do need to be considered. As for school policies, how many Scouts have gotten in trouble for carrying a spork to school? Anyone remember the Eagle Scout with camping gear in the trunk of his car, including a knife and axe, that was suspended? Graduating senior, West Point bound, and a volunteer firefighter if memory serves, yet got suspended b/c of wood TOOLS ( emphasis) in the runk of his car.

One advantage of the NYLT strip if memory serves, is that once on the uniform, it stays on until they age out. It doesn't need to be worn in conjunction with a POR. EDITED: Regarding the color of the patches, Bryan stated "here are two versions: one with red letters and one with green letters. Either may be worn with any BSA uniform. It’s the wearer’s choice, though he or she may wish to match other leaders in the unit." https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2015/11/24/when-can-adult-leaders-wear-the-bsas-trained-patch/ And I remember readiong about the color doesn't matter in TRAINING TIMES.

They should not be using SEAL Training as a title as the BSA already has an official course by that name. It predates 1998 and stood for Sea Explorer Advance Leader Training. Then it became SEa scout Advance Leader Training. Link to an overview is here https://seascout.org/youth-training-and-education/seal/ SEAL pin can be found here: http://www.crventuring.org/Training/SEAL/

Regarding sizes, I remember the 'Made in the USA" merchandise was sized properly. The shorts and pants with elastic were sized with the elastic fully expanded. So the Scouts, and some Scouters , could buy a size or two bigger and have room to grow into. Last time I bought new pants, ok the son bought them with his Christmas money, it took several tries to get the right ones for my son. And when national put the Gen 1 switchbacks on sale, I heard they were sized too big. That wasn't a joke. I took the risk and bought XLs and Ls. XLs were HUGE, and thankfully I was able to sell them to someone. The Ls I still have, and they are a little big. I should have gotten the Mediums. Regarding the quality, my son's pants were so shoddy, they wore out in the buttocks within 6 months. Got a replacement pair free, thank you warranty, and they too wore out within 6 months. By that point, we saw a pair of the old red pocket piping pants. THOSE SUCKERS WERE INDESTRECUTABLE! Only reason he doesn't have them still is he outgrew them. Now he's using a pair of ODL shorts, and they are holding up extremely well.

Growing up, you had to order from JC Penny. But a local department store chain, Maison Blanche, was the primary distributor. I remember getting some stuff from them, with a discount, since my brother was an employee. When they went out of business, it was either the council distributor, or a then new army surplus store. while the council distributor had a good bit of stuff, they didn't have the hardcore camping gear, not the discounts and sales, that the army surplus store had. The jungle boots, medium ALICE pack, and other gear I needed for Canada came from them. Then the council turned over the council store to national supply. 95+% of what was in the national catalog was available. Naturally I went there for my official gear. Plus A) the office moved to 1.8 miles from the house and B) I started working there part-time in college. However, when there was camping gear I couldn't get from the shop, I went to the army surplus store. Funny story, that nearly cost me my job. Again I was a part timer in college working for national supply. The surplus store would have "Scout Night" once a year. They had deep discounts, games, and door prizes. It started before my Troop meeting did, so I go there in my 'volunteer" uniform. My DE, whom I worked summer camp with and knew I had a big mouth , dragged me over and got me announcing stuff over that store's PA system. Eventually I left for me meeting. Monday afternoon, I get called into the manager office and questioned about the "Scout Night" Only thing saving me was A) I was NOT in my employee uniform, and B) the DEs defended me saying it was their idea, that I did protest, and that they said they would take the heat for me. And they did. Sadly my area's distributorship closed shop. It's now an hour one way drive get get anything. Thankfully a council distributorship is in the same city I work in. That helps, but not always.

Regarding Boys' Life, the new fee increases have hurt. I use to have 3 subscriptions, one for each son. When the registration price went up, I dropped it to two: one Boy Scout version and one Cub Scout version. Now that the fee increased again, I cannot afford a single copy, let alone 3. And my kids are 100% ok with that because they did not even read it because it is boring. They all it appeared to be is a giant advertisement for gear and patches with a few Scouting related articles and jokes thrown in. I remember when BL was a great magazine. Artwork was good, they had serials ( White Mountains Trilogy anyone?) and of course Green Bar Bill. Looking at the current magazine, artwork is childish, the ads are overwhelming, and several articles have really been advertisements and not articles. Regarding Scouting Magazine, it has gotten to the point that it is really useless to me. little to no information I need is offered, and I can pick up stuff faster and easier via Bryan's Blog.

AND THIS IS WHY IT SNOWED!!!!!! http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2017/12/10/nfl-assigned-former-falcons-player-to-officiate-saints-falcons-game/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

I'm originally from New Orleans. Only twice in my memory has NO,LA had a real, true snow: when the Saints won the Super Bowl, and when the referees Atlanta Falcons beat the Saints last Thursday. In both cases, "everything" froze over.

This is LDS. Their program differs slightly due to their CO placing additional restrictions/ rules. Example of the all the 11 year olds in their separate patrol with a TG and 11 year old ASM (unique POR for LDS units) citef above, and how they get to First Class in a year led to the NSP program back in 1989. Sadly these issues appear to be ingrained in some, not all, LDS units. Talking to several experienced, long time LDS Scouts, part of the challenge is that being a Scouter is a "calling" and you are appointed to the position, whether you want it or not. I've seen major issues in those LDS units with Scouters who are called and do not want to be there really. On the other hand, you got LDS units with experienced Scouters who are not only called, but are willing to do the job. Those units tend to do a heck of a lot better. The other challenge according to one LDS Scouter is that " the further away from Salt Lake City a troop is, the more likely the differences in program."

You do realize that s n o w is a four letter word that I disapprove of? And the only reason we have it is because the referees Falcons beat the Saints Thursday. WHO DAT!