CalicoPenn

We live in a sound bite world - say "Free Tuition" and you can get yourself lots of votes amongst a certain crowd. The media, because they're essentially stupid, ask just one question - how will it be paid for - and think they've done there job. Bandy about some transaction tax scheme (and basically stealing the idea from folks proposing it to pay for universal health care) and everyone moves along - fixated on free tuition and a new tax to pay for it. No one ever applies any critical thinking skills to it. No one stops to wonder why we should transfer the State's responsibility to fund their own schools to the taxpayers of all states. No one ever asks "How will it work?" So I ask - how will it work, just on a fundamental level? In my state, tuition rates aren't the same across the board at public colleges. The tuition rates at Northern Illinois University are different from the tuition rates at University of Illinois which are in turn different from the rates at Illinois State University which are in turn different from the rates at Eastern Illinois University, etc. etc. etc. So is the federal government just going to pay for a student's tuition at different rates in the same state? For neighboring states? Or is the federal government going to require that states set a single tuition rate for all schools, never mind that the cost of living in Chicago is higher than the cost of living in Macomb so the public colleges in Chicago pay their faculty and staff more than the university in Macomb does? What's to prevent a state from jacking up the tuition rates to collect more federal tax dollars? Is the federal government going to try to set the tuition rates for the state's schools? Seems to me there is some constitutional issues there regarding the sovreignity of states. Or is the answer that the federal government sets a number that is the tuition reimbursement which may be higher or lower than a schools tution rate - and if that's the case, so much for free tuition to the students who attend a public school where tution is $4,500 a semester and the reimbursement rate is $4,100 a semester. Ultimately, as we're led down this path, does it means that the federal government is going to have to nationalize state public schools and get the states out of that business altogether? Seems to me that would mean the University of Alabama would then become the US University of some southern state. Frankly, I think a better idea would be to put together some kind of infrastructure block grant program where the US Government will provide a state with x amount of infrastructure funds to fix roads, schools, bridges, public buildings with the requirement that the states that accept the funding budget an equal amount, above their current budgeting levels, to higher education, and start reducing the costs of tuition and other fees.

A cure for Alzheimer's? (Sorry - couldn't resist). To answer the question seriously - I had a hard time wrapping my head around the question - I thought it was backwards. I've always thought it is the old that owe the young when it comes to remembering - to tell and/or write down our stories, to save important pieces of the family history, to pass it down when it became too much, to encourage the young to be interested in history, if even just family or local history. When my family went on trips, my father pulled over for every historical marker - if we passed it by, he made it a point to turn around. Even if we saw the same marker every year, we stopped at it and read it again. We visited a lot of local historical society museums, and historic sites. It was never overwhelming (we never did the 20 civil war battlefields in 9 days kind of trip) but it was always part of it. To this day, I stop at every historical marker I see - not only do I stop at them, I now make a deliberate effort to find them (many states have nice lists that show what and where their historical markers are - the search has taken me to small towns that I never would have gone to, where I have seen some really interesting things). Then I thought more about the question and I can answer it with one word: Curiosity.

Just to clarify something - JASM is a youth POR - once you son turns 18, it's ASM or nothing if he remains in the Troop - he would no longer be eligible to be a JASM.

If this were at summer camp, chances are fair to good that the nature lodge wold have just the right tool for that - a soil boring tool. But it's not so what is the work around - do you have any homes or buildings being built near you where the basement has just been dug? You might be able to get a look before they poor the slab and foundation walls. Do you have any active quaries near you? Give them a call - I find that if you're polite to them they're often more than happy to show off to a Scout. Do you have a community college or a university with geology classes? Get in touch with them. Know someone with a post hole digger? Borrow it and every chunk of earth taken out, line it up - one after another - not in a pli - that way you can create a horizontal strata. Just some thoughts off the top of my head.

A Venturing Crew (as a youth) is a good idea, if you have one in the area and he's interested. Is he in the OA? OA members are youth members until they're 21 - at least in OA (in a Troop, he would still be an adult). Transitioning to ASM can be difficult, especially if the Troop is boy-led. Going on campouts can be especially difficult at first - unless the other adult leaders participate when the football (either one) or the frisbee is pulled out, if the Scouts decide to spend some time kicking the football around for a bit, he sits out - he's no longer part of those reindeer games and is now part of the old bear games. When capture the flag time comes around, he's not part of any team - he sits out. That can be a hard thing for an active young man to deal with. Yet he still has a lot to offer - if he's in the OA and wants to get active there, makes him ASM and let hom work with the Troop OA Representative to help generate enthusiasm (or maintain momentum) for the OA. Find a Venturing Crew that is heavy in to High Adventure and try that out. Another, perhaps more radical idea, is to contact the District Commissioner and see if there are any Troops out there working (and/or struggling) to become more Boy led with a good Scoutmaster who could use some help and see if it makes sense to him to become an ASM in that Troop - he might do a lot more good as an ASM for that kind of Troop than for his current home Troop.

He's leaving the Troop in a month - Have a final SMC about the Scout Oath and Law IF you were clear from the get go that parents don't sign off on ranks - if that was not made clear to the Scout and the Mom, lesson learned. Either way, treat it as a lesson learned and just move on - don't waste any more brain power of youth power on this.

Comparing NGO's for their effectiveness to the government, while tempting, isn't really all that helpful because not only does the government operate under different constraints and rules, agencies within government operate under different rules and constraints than other agencies within the government. What we need to figure out is which governmental agency more closely corresponds to which NGO and then compare them. For instance, you make a good point about organizations that can raise funds with little cost to them using only 7%-10% of the funds raised for administration - and this is a great stat - but it implies that the government can't be as efficient - and while it's quite true that there are a lot of places where the government isn't very efficient, there are places where it is incredibly efficient. Private insurance companies provide health insurance with a 20-30% overhead (administrative) cost - Medicare, because it's not out to make a profit, manages to deliver their services with an approximately 3% overhead cost. Love or hate the government and things like Medicare, but flaws and all, a 3% administrative cost is pretty darn good for a government bureaucracy of that size. For those familiar with the Federal Duck Stamp, 98% of the money raised by the stamp goes directly to purchasing/leasing lands and protecting wetlands. That means the overhead cost for everything from running the program, marketing the stamps, printing the stamps, running the contests to choose the next stamp is 2% of the funds raised - again, not a bad percentage at all. But yes, there are times that NGO's can do better than the government and providing relief supplies is certainly one of those - and a big reason for that is NGO's aren't as hamstrung by diplomatic and sovereignty concerns - and yes, from our view in the cheap seats, it seems so obvious to just put US relief supplies on the trucks and get on with it but if we think it through, if we're already hamstrung by diplomacy that our supplies are spending time on the tarmac until we can get the diplomatic issues worked out, how well do you think these regimes will take it if they catch Lutheran World Relief or Catholic Charities vehicles with US Supplies heading out to camps without permission? I sure wouldn't want to have to explain to the family members of a crew of relief workers taken prisoner because they're "sneaking" aid in illegally. So really, just like there is a range of efficiencies in the NGO world, there is a range of efficiencies in Government - some that can be controlled, and some that can't be controlled. I'm not a big fan of broad brush approaches to criticizing the government - and at the same time, delving in to minutiae can be a bit counter-productive too and can just get downright silly sometimes.

How about subtle bluntness - wear a t-shirt under your uniform shirt with a special phrase - when a parent crosses the line - flash them with the shirt. The message on the shirt? Keep Out Of It and Let Them Carry On

Can you imagine a minutes long introduction to all the main characters in a television show these days? Quite a dedicated single father to be Scoutmaster of the local Troop before his son is in it - I'm guessing those 3 years was the Scoutmaster of the Troop. Rather convenient to move the meeting place to the ranch after the son is eligible to join. Peter Graves was a Boy Scout but not an Eagle Scout as far as I can tell - his character wears an Eagle Scout badge in the show. I don't think that was a used uniform - that looked brand new, with all the patches sewed on from supply (if it was a used uniform from the Troop's closet, why would it come by package delivery?). It seems the Troop's special program is to buy the uniform and let the Scouts pay for it on time - not a bad idea actually. So is it just me, or did anyone else notice that all the other Scouts in uniform looked kind of grumpy. I wonder how many people remember practicing their semaphore at recess? I thought the premise is that Fury is a WILD horse - what kind of wild horse has a stall and a corral? Thought it was a cute show but I couldn't help but thinking that some studio exec somewhere thought "I'll see your tall, handsome single dad on the ranch with his fancy rifle and your hero collie on the farm and raise you with an even better looking tall single dad on a ranch with a hero wild horse"

Just curious as you dont mention where you're from - did he discuss this with his counselor before he set out a bird house? I ask because for most of the country, setting out a bird house a month ago is just a little early for birds to start using it and a good counselor would have been able to explain that. In the Chicago area, the birds most likely to use bird houses - wrens, tree swallows, bluebirds - have only just started showing up in the last few days and are still setting up their territories. Starlings have just recently dispersed from winter flocking and are only just setting up territories. The other thing about birdhouses is it often takes a couple of years before birds will actually start using them which is why that particular activity in the requirement can be frustrating - I wish they would eliminate bird houses from the list altogether and just stick with bird baths and bird feeders.

I think folks already know I'm not a politically conservative creature - run more towards centrism and moderate though since classical conservatism seems to have given way to far right conservatism, I'm probably considered a liberal leftist (though I prefer Moderate Socialist Libertarian Conservative Progressive Communist Liberal Centrist myself). So just getting that out of the way. Let's remember that when it comes to that list of big ticket items - the two largest - Social Security and Medicare also have their own separate taxes to fund them so if we cut them, we also cut those taxes, and we'll certainly cut the debt by a few trillion (about 4 1/2 trillion of our debt is actually our Social Security and Medicare savings - they're in the form of non-tradable government securities - both programs are funded out a couple of decades give or take a few years - and the US Government doesn't open up savings accounts) But it doesn't really affect the budget. So cutting those programs doesn't really affect the deficit (except by cutting interest payments which are currently about 2.3% for a 30-year security). So that leads to cutting elsewhere - so where would I cut? I would start by cutting the US Marine Corps (I'll wait a sec while you all catch your breath after that big gasp, or clean your screen and keyboard from the liquid you just spit up). No don't get me wrong - I have nothing against the US Marine Corps. They're a fine organization - they're historical - they've been a great part of the history of the US. They are also redundant. We have a ground force - the US Army. Do we really need a second one? We have an Air Force - and there are also pilots in the Army, Navy and Coast Guard. Do we need Marine Corps pilots too? We have special operations units in the Army and Navy. I know a lot of folks like to say all Marines are special forces but even the Marine Corps has a special operation force. This is not about disliking the Marine Corps - it's about removing an unnecessary redundancy. Don't want it to be the Marine Corps? Fine - make it the US Army. Either one will do. Next, I would cut most of the TSA. It's security theater and most of the functions should be privatized, the way it used to be. I would, however, keep a much smaller Inspector General type group for TSA - the private sector can do all the actual work (paid for by the airports and airlines) but regulated by a TSA group that works a bit like the FAA or the FCC. The TSA makes the regs and creates the requirements - the private companies have to follow them - or lose their licenses to work in airports, etc. As part of that, though - I would require all commercial planes to be re-fitted with heavy duty security doors for the flight deck. Next, I'm cutting the Bureau of Indian Affairs - it's time we grew up and started accepting that Indian Tribes are sovereign, that Reservations are sovereign, and that they don't need to be overseen by BIA agents. Most functions of the BIA can be handled by other agencies that are already set up to provide those functions. Any function that can't be transferred probably isn't needed. My last initial action would be to change the Department of Energy to the Department of Science and Technology. Moved to this new department would be NASA, the CDC, the National Institute for Science, NOAA, - anything to do with Science and Technology would be moved here - with a mandate that they share resources to reduce costs. That is how I at least would get started.

This sounds like a lot of fun - and a great solution to a funding dilemma. I'd suggest that you choose either milk jugs or two-liter bottles so everyone starts from the same point - if folks create "open deck" boats (cut out a portion of the side of a bottle), they might sink instead of float if dropped from a bridge and land wrong - something to keep in mind as you talk about designs. I'd be really interested to see if anyone comes up with a Winnie the Pooh design - this sounds like a big version of "Pooh Sticks" to me (know anyone in the area that has a Winnie the Pooh costume?). You could also add a service project component - clean up the creek between bridges perhaps? Please do this race - and let us know how it went!!!

Looks like a great project But let's not try to use it to prod adults to put even more roadblocks on the path to Eagle because they're challenging their Scouts to think creatively and big. I've seen small projects that had just as big of an impact on the community that other Scouters complain about.

I've realized that what's really sad is that we're all (me included) lamenting that the Scout took the reward for doing a good turn but aren't mentioning that returning the wallet was the Scout-like thing to do. Have we all grown cynical over time?

I agree on checking with the Council - just based on your description, the young man certainly sounds like he qualifies for the special needs exemptions to participate in Scouts. I'd forgive him the "forgery" and the lying - I don't think that's really important here. What is important is how much you can help in this situation - if he's already "graduated" High School, then Scouts could give him some much needed activity. You and your unit may not be capable of working with this lad and that's quite alright - but don't just turn your back on him - contact you DE as suggested - there is a very good chance that somewhere in the council is a Troop that is just right for him and the folks at Council should be pretty familiar with that.

Yeah - our Troop doesn't allow Crocs - and I won't be caught dead being seen with anyone wearing Crocs - not because they're bad for hiking (and they are that) but because they are the ugliest dang things anyone can ever put on their feet - and that includes those 5-toed running things.

Thor gave the lad the cash that was in the wallet and the $10K from Shutterfly appears to be in the form of a College Scholarship. I agree with the sentiments here - it would have been better had the Scout handed the cash back to Hemsworth and told him to donate it to the charity of Hemsworth's choice (while slyly suggesting his local Scout Council) and had he asked Ellen to give that Shutterfly college money to someone else. But the age of Chivalry has been dead for, well, ages - even for Boy Scouts. It doesn't help that too many Troops have adult leaders who use Scout Spirit as some kind of activity measurement when it's supposed to measure whether a Scout lives the Scout Oath and Scout Law in their daily lives. I can't recall the last time anyone brought up the Scout Slogan (until Stosh's mention of it in this thread) - Do a Good Turn Daily. This is something that should be emphasized a lot more. For all those folks wondering how to measure "Duty to God" - what better way than to ask how the Scout has being doing good turns daily. Perhaps we need to reconsider our answers when asked about Scout Spirit - "Live your daily life by the Scout Oath and Scout Law" is good but not very pithy - perhaps we need to emphasis a shorter sound bite - what's the best way to show Scout Spirit? DO A GOOD TURN DAILY. All that being said, Ellen, if you happen to be lurking - I'm an Eagle Scout who found a wallet with a man's last $100 in it about 40 years ago and made it a point to track him down and hand deliver it to his home - and didn't take a dime of reward. Where's my invitation to your show??

Yeah - been there - don't make me demonstrate one of the 76 ways I know to inflict serious damage to someone with a drinking straw...

Is that what passes for a fine young man these days?

Stosh is where I'm at as well - though chances are pretty good that I'm going to make my way to the end of the line at some point rather quickly - and quite deliberately (though I'd still expect the last Scout to be the sweeper) - it's just the position I've always put myself in on hikes, or birdwatching walks, or etc. - comes from my time leading day camp, summer camp, elderhostel, etc. nature hikes - I always led from behind to let the participants make the discoveries. It seems to me that the question should really be about dealing with those "fast" scouts - what's the point of racing down the trail? When I did the AT, I tried to hike at least 10 hours a day - I figured a mile every 30 minutes was a good pace and that worked out to about 20 miles a day - but how far are you folks planning on going in a day? The Boy Scouts has a 50-miler award that requires a minimum of 5 days on the trail - that seems to suggest that a good pace for Scouts is 10 miles a day. That's a good solid 5 Hours at 30 minutes per mile and that seems like a reasonable amount of time to be on the trail - it leaves plenty of time for other pursuits as well. So why rush it? However, the question is what to do about the slower Scouts - I think you learned that pairing the up with faster Scouts to help "motivate" them dosesn't work - it annoys the faster Scouts and makes it worse for the Scouts with slower paces. If I wasn's following Stosh's plan, I would be splitting the group up into a faster and a slower group - but I would also require the faster group to stop on the hour and rest until the slower group got there.

I don't know about that - REI and Erewhon sells all kinds of "trendy" shoes in their "Hiking Department" including Teva Sandals and water shoes. I like your first thought better - if you can see skin (and please - no socks - never wear socks with sandals - and the real answer should be leave the sandals to women unless you're a "granola-head" (aka "hippie") (and no, I don't consider flip-flops to be sandals), you're wearing a sandal.

I think to begin, my answer would be to contact the council that runs the camp you're headed to and ask them - I don't know if there is someone you can e-mail what you've put here, but I'd hate to think you'd be sent out to go buy new boots if you got to camp and they said no based on the advice given here. Saying that, I'm not 100% convinced that the reason for the ban is no open toe (and frankly, I would ban all men from wearing open-toed anything - no one wants to see our gnarly toes). I like the look of those sneaks but unless it's a steel toe, its not going to provide all that much more protection that an open-toed sandal if you were to drop something heavy on it - about the only thing it might do is hold the blood in the toe of the shoe a little longer. My hunch would be that they are wanting full foot protection - not just toe-protection - and with the sides having open spaces on it, you really aren't protecting yourself for sticks (especially sticks) or stones or anything else that can jab in there between the strips. I've been wearing full coverage lightweight hiking shoes since 1985 - they're quick drying, and the ones I buy support my ankles as well - they dry as quickly as the shoes you're looking at, and probably aren't that much heavier. I use old pairs to walk in creeks and rivers and marshes and never worry about getting the side of my foot sliced by something unseen. They make great shoes for canoeing in, and I don't have to change shoes anytime I need to portage.

Here's something I think would be an interesting experiment. Run a couple of Kim's Game. Lay out a table with about 12 or 15 items on it and cover it with a sheet - Remove the cover for 30 seconds and then cover it up and have the Scouts list all of the items they could identify. Here's how to make it interesting. Do it with two sets of objects. For the first one, include modern gadgets you know the Scouts will be able to identify like cell phones, ear buds, a remote control, a CD (or DVD), a thumb (or flash) drive, etc. For the second set, include things that may be outdated - a non-electric soldering iron, a transistor radio, a slide rule, etc. Then compare the scores. We do still run Kim's games as patrol competitions - we recommend they be tied to upcoming or recently past activities. If working on knots, the table might contain tied examples of knots that need to be identified. It might contain examples of tree leaves, or first aid gear, etc.

And this is frankly why "zero tolerance" or as you put it elsewhere, "primary jurisdiction" policies are amongst the dumbest policies any school district can come up with, and is frankly quite insulting to the professional staff of school districts - the Superintendents, Principles and Teachers at the schools. When a kid brings a squirt gun to school, is there any good reason why the teacher and/or principle should not be allowed to deal with it instead of automatically sending it on to the School Board? Ever looked at the comments when stories like a 5 year old boy is suspended and has to have a hearing at the school board because mom packed a table knife, or a ten year old girl is suspended and has to have a hearing at the school board because she had a roll of tums in her pocket, or a 16 year- old Eagle Scout is suspended and has to have a hearing at the school board because he has an axe in the trunk of his car? They are not supportive of zero tolerance policies and especially of schools and school boards that have these kinds of policies. We elect school boards to deal with the big picture - we expect them to hire professionals to be able to take care of the day to day issues and to keep our kids safe for drugs and real guns. We don't hire them to keep our kids safe from nerf guns and plastic sporks. Now maybe you truly believe that the primary jurisdiction stuff is a good check and balance but most of us have seen far too many reports of school board rubber stamping the decisions of their Superintendents at these expulsion hearings because of "Zero Tolerance".

Really? A parent trying to "be prepared" is an idiot? Is that the kind of things they teach School Board members? To think of parents as being idiots? And for what - a standard table knife? You know the ones - the ones that look like a knife and are good mostly for spreading butter or cutting soft food items like cake but aren't usually sharp enough to cut meat? Frankly, the idiots are the school board members that demand this kind of foolishness.