Eloisefig

Do they plan during a meeting, or a separate gathering-before/after the meeting? These “planning sessions” are taking nearly an entire meeting, and serve no purpose for the scouts that aren’t going. How far in advance are they planning food? We meet Monday, so I feel that attendance for the campout should be finalized 2 Mondays before the campout, so that the person cooking can have their meal plan options itemized, priced, and ready to present to their patrol the Monday before campout.

We are part of a medium sized troop, maybe 25 scouts. Our campouts average 12 people. The entire troop spends around 45minutes the Monday before the campout voting on/planning a menu, which to me, is ridiculous, as it’s too many cooks in the kitchen, especially when less than half the troop is going. How do you all plan campouts? How far in advance do your scouts plan? Do all scouts plan, or just the ones going? Just looking for ideas to make improvements. thanks

Awesome!!! Thank you!

Hi, I’m leading ILST training for our troop next weekend. In reading the syllabus, in Module 2, I’d like to show the troop meeting and PLC videos, but when I go to the revamped site, I don’t see them. Can anyone post links to these? Thanks

Yup, I considered(and offered up) different options for plc meetings. They just weren’t happening before bc SM and SPL didn’t even call them. One good change that is bringing better attendance, is having them after the meeting rather than before. Still had no patrol leaders 😕 , but had some enthusiastic younger scouts. That was really my first step- just trying to get them to have plcs, and actually get something decided at them. Occasionally they do stuff in patrols, but that is rare. There are rarely breakout groups to discuss what rank requirements people need help with. I truly understand that it is a convoluted system that is hard for one scout to stay on top of for themselves, much less one scout helping others. I did see an idea on YouTube. It was someone’s woodbadge ticket(or one of them), where they basically made a syllabus that would come full circle every 2 years with all the requirements to first class. I thought that was neat, but I couldn’t figure out how to find him.

All good points. I’m just not feeling enough parental presence to even gather them to have a discussion. Mine are hoping to do NYLT in the winter, so I’ll need to get them ILST. I just feel like I’ve been sticking it out forever. I’m definitely not a quitter, but I’m just getting a vibe. Our cubscout pack is completely opposite in terms of our adult leaders putting time in and working together. (Answering texts even!)

Not really. The parents just sit in the other room. Scouting is the main topic of discussion but I either get the sense that they don’t think there’s a problem, or if they see it, they don’t want to help. CC(on his way out) and SM can say they welcome change as much as they want, but if they don’t support/back me up, the others just think I’m trying to take over.

Have been a den leader and a cubmaster. Woodbadge trained. My son joined a troop, and has been in it ~2yrs. It's supervised neglect in my opinion. There is no ILST, PLC meetings are few an far between, with no guidance, agenda, etc. It's like lord of the flies. I offered to help. Scoutmaster(new to the position last year), said sure, and we talked about ideas, baby steps, while still allowing the scout led process. Had a 1.5hr sit down with SPL and ASLP(2 deep leadership of course- myself and SPL dad/leader), to go over how to structure PLC, things they can do, how to structure meetings, how to delegate, how to let patrol leaders plan patrol activities, how to have patrol times set aside during meetings. Can't get patrol leaders to show up to PLCs. No agenda made(I didn't say anything). Offered to have a sit down with scoutmaster and patrol leaders, to go over their positions, what they can do/plan in their positions, until we can really get a dedicated time for ilst(you know how summer is). Got no response. Scoutmaster hasn't even been there 2 of the last 3 meetings. I also don't feel they are thorough enough in their merit badge requirements. So much is just planned by adults. I'm just over it, ready to leave, and find a troop that follows the patrol method more, and will help my son develop the leadership skills that scouting is known for.