Eagle1993

Definitely a good idea. We had a local Troop run a service project once where they colllected old camping gear from the scouting community. These could be individually owned or old Troop equipment. The scouts then setup and tested the equipment and donated the usable items to new or struggling Troops. I thought this as a great idea as there is a lot of equipment gathering dust.

50,093 girls are now registered 5,994 Lions; 8,990 Tigers; 19,362 Wolves and Bears; 15,747 Webelos. Pace slowed a bit this week. I’ll be curious to see more October numbers.

Building resilience in our scouts is key. If we step in too much or often we will rob that learning opportunity from our Scouts. My son and I recently went to a AOL/Troop activity (he is AOL) and one of the Boy Scouts asked for volunteers to help cook. My son volunteered and went to work. Another Boy Scout came to the kitchen later and yelled at my son to get out... he didn’t belong there. I didn’t know what happened until I saw my son kneeling and crying behind a tent. I told him to go talk with the SPL or go back to the kitchen to see if they could still use his help. It took some prodding but eventually I walked him over and he asked the Scouts in the kitchen if he could still help and they said yes. Small issue, easily worked out by youth. Hopefully in the future I won’t even need to walk him over. YPT doesn’t mean a scout won’t have his or her feelings hurt. Even though the language is vague, I see YPT as a last resort where there is systemic or serious acts that require intervention. For the most part, adult unit leaders should be able to handle most Cub Scout situations and SPL/PL should handle most Boy Scout situations.

We ended having to reject a girl from joining our Pack since we didn’t have a female AOL den leader. Well, actually we gave the girl’s parents two choices. Either join our 4th grade den or have her mom register as a leader and come to all the Den meetings. She is definitely not interested in the 4th grade den and her mom is too busy. This is a biased rule that will hamper the experience of female scouts. I typically can get moms to go on campouts... but at a much lower rate than dads. I think moms willing to go on HA will be even rarer.

I don’t see this as a long term need, but adding girls to Scouts is new for us. BSA will still have many units who desire to remain boy only. The vast majority of Scouts will be boys. If there are enough units that are Boy only and desire a bit only camp it should be offered. As long as girls are not regulated to the inferior camps or very limited weeks we should be able to accommodate these units. Boys and the parents who want them to have a boy only experience should still have that option in the BSA. Girls have that option in GSUSA and they have the coed option in BSA.

You don’t need leadership positions to get first class. So, 17 year and 11 month person would join work all the way up to First Class while primarily registered as an Adult in Scouts BSA. Then once they achieve First Class they would register in Venturing to start obtaining the leadership positions for Star, Life and Eagle. I may be wrong, I just don’t see them allowing anyone over 18 registering as a Youth in Scouts BSA and I believe you have to be under 18 for the approved leadership positions below. However, I could be wrong and they may just allow 18 YO take on one of these roles... Boy Scout troop. Patrol leader, assistant senior patrol leader, senior patrol leader, Venture patrol leader, troop guide, Order of the Arrow troop representative, den chief, scribe, librarian, historian, quartermaster, junior assistant Scoutmaster, chaplain aide, instructor, webmaster, or Leave No Trace trainer.

Report just came in that we are at 45,856 girls. A DE noted that the majority of them are in southern states as northern states generally start school later. I know several Join scout nights in my area are just starting. Who knows but thought I would pass it on.

Leadership positions in Venturing count towards Eagle. Don’t know if this is how extensions are handled but a National volunteer is indicating that is what would occur. Venturing crew/ship. President, vice president, secretary, treasurer, quartermaster, historian, den chief, guide, boatswain, boatswain’s mate, yeoman, purser, storekeeper, webmaster, or Leave No Trace trainer So, one would have to be over 16 but under 18 as of Feb 2019. They would then need to join and kick into high gear as they can only have 24 months. Then they need to file an extension by early Jan 2020. They then may need to find a Venturing crew or ship to join if they do not have sufficient time for Scouts BSA positions before they turn 18. That is my understanding. If someone did all of this I have no issue with them achieving Eagle rank. Over/under 200 total do this.

It may be less if what I see is true. Based on what I am seeing in FB discussions: the scout would either have to complete all the life to Eagle leadership requirements by 18 or transition to Venturing to finish out the leadership requirement. They would not be able to be a youth leader after 18 in Scouts BSA and ASM is not an approved leadership position for Eagle.

Why didn’t he join earlier? Was he excluded by BSA due to issues out of his control? If so, I would expect he could pursue an exemption under #3. Not sure if it would be granted. I would have been fine if BSA would have announced that no exemptions would be granted for girls joining in 2018, at the same time I understand why they decided to do this.

Lawsuits would have been filed regardless. Now they can point to a consistent policy for the 2019 new Scouts instead of what some Councils would have done by pushing exemptions under the following reasons. To be clear, I don’t know if Nationals would have granted any due to #1 below; however, there may have been groups pushing for exemptions under #3 below. Now it is clear how to handle the situation. 1. The member joined or rejoined—or became active again after a period of inactivity—in time to complete all requirements before turning 18. That is, the time remaining between joining, or rejoining, and when the Scout turns 18 is more than the total of the active-time requirements for the ranks left to achieve. 3. The circumstance is totally beyond the control of the youth member. Injuries, unanticipated family incidents, or various mistakes or omissions by adults, for example, could be legitimate causes. The Boy Scouts of America assumes anyone working on Scouts BSA ranks has a Scouts BSA Handbook and has read the requirements. Despite this, misinformation from unit leadership is often cited as grounds for extensions. These cases will be considered, but they should be very rare and would point to a need for basic training and assistance.

It should be handled the same way current extensions are handled. It is rare, but there are extensions granted beyond 18. This just makes it clear how Nationals will handle these extension requests. I also expect this exception will be rare. First, you need a youth to join in 2019 that is 16 or older by Feb 1. Second they need to be motivated enough to file and extension by Jan 7, 2020. Third they need to be willing to stay in Scouts probably past High School. I think we are talking hundreds not thousands of extensions.

I actually found this solution to be much better than what was being asked. There was pressure to shorten the time period between ranks or even give credit for work done before joining Scouts. They are offering to this to boys as well and are not changing requirements (other than max age)... plus you have to earn this within 24 months so it is not for those who want to abuse this exception. I would have been completely happy with no modifications and I’m surprised they are allowing the exception, but at least they didn’t follow some of the suggestions that would have weakened the rank.

https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/pdf/Implementation-Details-for-Scouts-BSA-FINAL.pdf It is in the interests of the entire BSA, and in fact our nation, that all girls who join the BSA in 2019 should have an opportunity to earn their Eagle badge should they diligently and promptly complete all requirements. Accordingly, after carefully considering recommendations from stakeholders, including feedback from volunteers and professionals at the 2018 Top Hands Meeting, the National Executive Committee of the Boy Scouts of America has approved the following temporary transition rules regarding extensions for youth over 16 but not yet 18 years of age on February 1, 2019 to complete the requirements for the Eagle Scout award.... ... Since the BSA has determined that the minimum period of elapsed time to complete the requirements of the Eagle Scout rank is approximately 19-20 months, the extension is not available to any youth who is under 16 years of age on February 1, 2019 (as they will have adequate time to earn their Eagle before turning 18) nor to any youth who has already turned 18 years of age on February 1, 2019 (as they will be ineligible to join Scouts BSA). 1. Youth 16 years of age or older, but not yet 18, on February 1, 2019 who register as members of Scouts BSA on or before December 31, 2019, may request extensions to complete the Eagle Scout Award requirements after they turn 18 years of age. 2. Requests for extensions must be received no later than thirty (30) days after turning 18 years of age. Extensions must be in writing by submitting the designated form to the National Service Center and the form must be received no later than January 7, 2020. Only the National Council may grant extensions. The actual extension will be based upon the individual’s registration date and age at the time of the request and will provide not more than twenty-four months from the date of initial registration to complete all requirements. 3. In the interest of fairness, these temporary transition rules apply to all youth joining Scouts BSA during 2019–both girls and first-time joining boys.

Getting far off topic but We use real pocketknives but make every scout have their parent come to that meeting. That way we can have our 13-15 Bears work in parallel with proper supervision. Otherwise there would be a lot of waiting while the den leaders work with individual scouts. We have the scouts bring their own knives. The leaders can then point out differences, especially the impact of using a dull blade (some of these knives couldn’t cut warm butter).

In 10-15 years the scouts won’t necessarily remember what place they took but they will remember the memories of working on the PWD car with their parent(s). If some dad takes that away from their son it is a loss for them. I remember working with my father on my PWD over 30 years ago and am building memories with my son these last few years. I feel bad for the adults (and youth) where the parent takes over 100%.... I’m not jealous of them at all.

This is the first year I was asked multiple times about my pipeline. I don’t know what the DE reported by I reported my numbers to the DE (pipeline and actual applications).

Agreed... I had a few leaders take this months ago and a few others last week when I sounded the alarm. Our council had also been emailing and begging people to take the training earlier. Only about half of my 14 leaders completed the training going into this weekend. I talked with a few other units and they told me they haven’t even started driving this with their packs. They explained that summers they disconnect and September is for recruiting. Talking with my DE there is no real impact until recharter. However at recharter the local teams can not override this time which is why they pushed an earlier deadline.

Three of my leaders have contacted me today and they’ve spent hours trying to complete it. They keep seeing “Sorry, there was an error performing your action. Please try again, or contact your administrator”

That is crazy DEs would do that to a unit... unbelievable. If a DE wants a girls Pack in the area and existing Packs are boy only then: - Find a willing CO - Find if any Pack would be interested in mentoring their leaders or identify key council volunteers who will help. - Recruit girls and parents making it clear they would help found a new Pack. Sending then your way is garbage and lazy. In my area 60-70% of the Packs have decided to go coed, but not sure of the results yet. We have at least one girl from another Pack who decided to remain Boy only.

Updates are sent to councils weekly. DEs would have access to this. I’ve also seen it published on th Family Scouting FB group.

Will the Church Troop committee be willing to have a linked Troop if the girls Troop can find their leadership? That could help. If you have girls join I would explain the situation and encourage their parents to help be founders of a girls Troop. Perhaps you and the SM could give some guidance. If there are <5 AOL girls then they would need to recruit more (AOL or older) to form the Troop. You may have a parent or two really energetic about this. Regardless, I would definitely let them know about the Troop situation before registering as Cub Scouts.

Good idea. We have started to accept PayPal and other means of payment but those charges are significant.

I believe this started to change in the!late 1980s. My father taught voc ed from early 1970s through 2000s. In the 1970s and early 1980s kids that went into voc we were interested in the trades as a career. The were good kids that worked hard. Then many schools decided that voc ed was a great location to put kids that misbehave. My father who became a director of a voc ed school was already having trouble hiring good teachers as most could make more doing their profession. Then the classes started filling up with BD kids. My dad complained and the response from the school was that they didn’t want these kids disrupting “normal” classes. The lack of respect of non college paths is an issue in our school system. No one is saying graduate HS with no further training, but the school system should recognize there are more paths than just college and show respect to all paths.

We have no council fees or insurance (per scout) so only the $33 BSA fee. We make BL optional and charge a $55 Pack fee. We will probably raise our pack fee to $65 to build up some cash reserves as the leaders typically have to loan the Pack money in August for all of our annual reservations prior to popcorn or fee payments are made. I had one parent object and I simply showed them our finances... they understood after that. Given that many of the parents are paying $1-2k per year per sports league scouts are considered relatively cheap.