MarkH

Thanks for the Reply. My son is very active in the O/A and has already seen the hard work that is involved in this position. I am glad that he took on these positions to keep him active in the troop. There was a point that he was considering leaving the Troop and Venture Crew (He is active in both). He ran for Senior Patrol Leader 4-5 years in a row but was never elected and only last year was he selected as Assistant Senior Patrol Leader. In our troop the scouts can be elected for multiple terms as SPL which doesn't allow other eager scouts to have the chance to lead the troop and of course it is the most popular scout that gets elected. When he was Assistant Senior Patrol leader he was at every meeting and at most outings and the SPL was hardly ever there so he felt he was doing all of the SPL's work (I was even approached be other Adults of scouts asking where was the SPL many times). So when the election came back up the same SPL was elected again and in our troop new ASPL's are selected. This just caused my son to loose all drive to continue on and we were worried that he would not finish his last 2 years as a youth in the troop. So now he has duties that keep him active but we can still see that his frustrations with the troop.

Junior Assistant Scoutmaster Position My son is now 17 years old and has bee an Eagle Scout since he was 14 years old. He as been an Assistant Senior Patrol leader but due to popularity and term limits he has never been selected as a Senior Patrol leader ( another debate). When he approached the Scoutmaster about the possibility of becoming a JASM he was told it was just a named position with no real responsibility. So why would my son take on a leadership role without a real responsibility? So he decided to stay as the troops Outdoor Ethics Guide and take on the Troops O/A rep. So as a ASM and Parent I don't want to question SM take on the JASM role but I disagree on how he sees this leadership position.