RookieScouter

We recently moved to a new Troop a few months ago. Two weeks ago Scoutmaster announced parents and committee members will no longer be able to be in building during meetings. Just the Scoutmaster and Assistant Scoutmaster with the scouts. I get this is a scout ran program but can they really ban others from being at the meeting? I typically stay outside anyway talking with other parents. But there are some parents that don't find this acceptable and feel that something isn't right. One parent has an autistic scout. Does this go against YPT?

Thank you! Scoutbook is a great source. But many of our new scouts are not setup to receive emails due to them not having one. Most of the parents use it. But there isn't information besides keeping up with their achievements and money on acct. This is a great idea to bring to the committee.

I have been in scouting since 2018. Learned quite a lot with both Pack and Troop. I've also completed all training for both units. I'm currently Committee Chair of Pack and Treasurer of Troop. With our Pack I always communicate with parents which I understand is different with the Troop. Troop is a scout lead program. However, with our unit most of our scouts are new which just crossed over. There were only four active scouts before crossover who are 12-13 years old. Six other Scouts Eagled out about a year ago. My question, being we mainly have younger scouts who are still learning. Including the four scouts troop already had. How would you arrange communication with parents or how does your unit communicate with parents? Currently our SPL who is 13 and Scoutmaster talks to scouts about events and upcoming meetings. Many scouts do not forward information to their parents. Including my son. This gets very frustrating. Not to mention meeting plans most of the time is not announced until they are at meetings. I have corrected the problem with my son but just a few weeks ago we didn't know he would be working on fitness so he wore in crocs which many scouts do. So therefore SPL would not let him participate in that days activities. Since then I have told my son to wear walking shoes to every meeting. Scoutmaster sends out emails but not very often with details. He is a friend of mine and have told him my concerns a long with many other new parents. However, he tells us it is our scouts responsibility to forward details to us. Is this normal with all troops? I get it and agree this teaches them responsibility. But I also feel like parents should know whats going on so we can make sure our scouts are at events, have the materials they need, and arrive on time. I finally understand why we don't have good participation with our troop.

Our pack is participating in a community event with our council. We chose to do bottle rockets. This was a fun event for our scouts so I would like to share with others. How I made our bottle rockets: 2-liter soda bottle, 3 Tbsp Baking Soda, 2 Cups Vinegar, Duct Tape, 3 Pencils, Construction paper to decorate, One cork, and Paper Towels 1. Assemble and decorate your rocket, using the pencils as feet. 2. Secure them to the bottle using duct tape. 3. Add vinegar to the bottle. 4. Add 3 Tbsp baking soda onto a small square of paper towel. 5. Roll the paper towel tightly enough to fit inside bottle, and so that no baking soda can spill out. 6. With an adult scouts place paper towel full of baking soda inside the bottle and plug with a cork. (We ask that they do not plug too tightly, but don’t allow any liquid to spill out.) 7. Scouts take the bottle to an adult leader. Turn the bottle upside down, place it on it's feet and STAND BACK! What would you change or recommend material wise to make this easier? Although our scouts loved this activity we ended up with vinegar on us or some bottles took a lot longer to go off. Just looking to improve our bottle rockets and hear what worked for others. *I would be interested in changing pencils to something else.

Our town has invited us to setup a booth at a community event. We are going to have information for our unit and the years calendar with trips, meetings, and events to come. One of our leaders plan to bring their corn hole boards. What are some other things we can do that isn't too costly and will add interest to our booth? Our council hasn't yet started popcorn sales. Incase someone suggests that.

What is Cub Scouts? Talking to a parent I can go on about what Cub Scouts is. However, I'm putting together a PowerPoint for new families gearing towards my audience being children. This PowerPoint will be sent to our two schools from Council for recruitment night. I personally wanted to do this myself being I know my Pack better then anyone and can give reliable information about what we have done and what we have planned. So my question is how would you break down what Cub Scouts is to a child in simplest form. But also keeping it exciting. Everything I keep putting together sounds like I'm talking to a parent.

We try to plan an event once a month on a Saturday outside of Den and Pack Meetings. What are some ideas we can do? This year we did a Flag retirement ceremony and it was very cold. So we decided for the future to save this event for warmer months.

Love it.... That is an awesome idea. I think I may have two leaders who would fit perfect to do this for our scouts.

I thought about bringing our Pack trailer and getting some items out of it to show to the Scouts. Our Parents are good and ready to go. Just got to encourage some of the younger scouts that this will be a fun experience. Looking for fun ideas to share with them.

With the group we have now we have not gone camping with them yet. But will at the end of March. We have some scouts who are nervous about camping. Last year we did a similar pack meeting letting them practice putting tents up and showing them items needed to go camping letting them answer questions about what they think they should bring. Basically I went through each rank finding things to talk about. It was a small group but to me it seemed very boring for them. This year I want to give them some different ideas since we have a lively bunch. Keeping them still listening to us talk isn't going to cut it. We have 39 scouts and this is our first big group since 2018. I'm looking for some hands on activities they may can do or other ideas.

For our March Pack meeting we will be working on Camping Preparedness. We have many new scouts and families who have never been camping. What are some ideas you would do to keep it not only informational/learning but also fun?

We are starting our planning for popcorn sales and looking ways to get more participation and fun for our scouts. Do any units set a goal and if scouts go over that goal you may do something low cost that's fun. Maybe like pie a leader or silly string a leader? What are some other ideas we could do that's free or low cost that would get our scouts more involved and excited?

Since March and after several virtual meetings before May. Emails and texts throughout summer I've only heard from about 4 scouts out of 25. Now I'm ready to get things started again. What's works? How do I get parents involved? More participation? Our scouting never ended just the participation. I had 75% of pack not complete rank for last year. I encourage parents to work with their scouts at home and even gave June, July, and August activities to do for the summer participating pin. I basically came up for a plan for each rank and gave details of how to do them. But responses were low. So my question is, What does returning to scouting look like for you and how do you plan to get more participantion? My considerations: 1. Two dens meet weekly. 2. Temp checks and required face coverings. (Younger scouts maybe more difficult.) 3. Keep scouts 6ft apart a long with adults. 4. Outside activities. 5. Sent home activities to complete and bring back to next meeting. What does this mean for Pack Meetings? 1. Maybe hold them outside. 2. Temp checks and face coverings. We still have to award our scouts for the ones who had completed their rank.

We have been doing virtual meetings for about a month now and have had very little participation. Maybe seven scouts out of twenty four. As leaders we are still trying to figure the whole virtual meetings setting out ourselves. Our first meeting was suppose to be for the parents but none wanted to show up so we only had our scouts. So we did a welcome back and talk about what everyone has been up to and check in on each scout to see if they have questions about any of their adventures. Our second meeting we had each scout choose one adventure or requirement in their handbooks they would like to share with other scouts. Last week we played a scavenger hunt. My question is how do you run your meetings? Do each of your den leaders run a meeting with just their den or do you have all scouts join together? What kind of activities do you do during your meetings? Do you give your scouts weekly activities? Any advice is greatly appreciated. A year ago we had only four scouts. To have twenty four now we are very excited to have the group we do now and don't want to see anyone loose interest due to this pandemic.

December went by quick and I lost track of time. What is a good easy to get together Pack meeting idea we could do?