David CO

Unless the student's dad has a key to your classroom, the door locks should be sufficient to keep him out. As a male teacher, I would not want to carry a door stop. Suspiciously minded people might speculate that I have it for the purpose of keeping other staff members and administrators from entering my classroom unannounced with their door keys. It's an idea I wouldn't want to put into anyone's head.

I wouldn't want to give a misbehaving student an opportunity to lock me out of my classroom with a door stop. The teacher should always be able to unlock and open the classroom door with a key. The administrators should have a master key. A door stop is simply not a good idea. There are plenty of better ways to safely secure a classroom. Most of them require professional installation. Besides that, classroom doors usually open outward towards the hallway. This prevents students from piling up at the door in an emergency (making it impossible to open). This actually happened once at a movie theater.

Deadbolts would be a violation of the school fire codes. The odds of a fire are much greater than a school shooting.

I can relate to them. Scouting has never been my first priority activity. There is nothing wrong with a boy choosing to participate in a scout unit as his second or third favorite activity. We should be glad that the scout has a variety of activities and lots of friends to enjoy.

Nudist.

I think it is ridiculous.

We required it.

I've never heard a father say that having boys take group showers is creepy, but I sometimes hear it from the mothers. I've heard something like it from elementary school age boys, but they weren't complaining about using the guys locker room. They were complaining about their mothers forcing them to use the women's washrooms and locker rooms. That is creepy. As we get more girls and women involved in scouting, I think we will be seeing some dramatic changes. Boys won't be allowed to act like boys anymore.

I think it has always been the case that girls were less comfortable with group showers than the boys.

No, you can't know for sure. The world is an imperfect place. It is not heaven, and we are not angels.

You don't really need to give them a compass and map. Just make the destination a video game arcade and let their instincts take over.

They do not have the authority to say no to a Chartered Organization's fundraiser.

Use common sense when deciding what to wear at a CO event. You certainly wouldn't wear any sort of scout apparel at a beer tent. I wouldn't wear a scout uniform if going door-to-door selling a product. It would make it too easy to confuse the customer into thinking the CO fundraiser is a scout sanctioned fundraiser. Honesty is the key issue here. My unit manned the concession stand at our school's athletic events. There was no possibility of anyone becoming confused. It was a school fundraiser at a school event on school property. There was no need to prohibit the wearing of scout uniforms.

That seems like a lot of bother when there is a much simpler solution. Have your Chartered Organization do your fundraiser, under its own umbrella, and donate the proceeds to the unit. Takes the council out of the equation entirely.

This is very typical of council behavior. Don't let yourself get upset by it. The more you try to cooperate with council, the more unreasonable they will become. You need to set limits. Once you make them understand that there is only so much nonsense you are willing to take from them, they will settle down and let you run your program with a minimal amount of interference.

I think, sometimes, the beneficiary isn't really so keen on the project, but gives the scout the OK so that he can earn his eagle. They see themselves as helping out the scout rather than being the beneficiary of the scout's project.

Realistically, we can't have that sort of relationship with the boys anymore. The YP rules prohibit it.

This doesn't appear to be true at schools that continue to use group showers rather than individual stalls. Boys don't seem to mind the group showers so long as everyone else is using them. I agree that scout camps will all be switching to individual stalls. It isn't necessary, but it is the way things are going.

Boys often have the same concerns as you about the possibility of appearing a bit creepy. When given a choice between individual shower stalls and group showers, many boys will choose to wait for the individual showers, even if they are not embarrassed to use the group showers. They are concerned that other people might see it as suspicious or creepy that they choose to use the group showers.

Yes, and it still makes a Giant Sucking Sound.

This happens all the time. In most cases, it is the insurance company who is actually doing the suing. The insurance company files the suit on behalf of the customer, in the customer's name, in an attempt to recoup some of the money they paid out for hospital bills. The customer is often required, under the terms of the policy, to cooperate with the insurance company's suit. If the customer refuses to cooperate with the suit, the customer could be liable to repay the insurance company. Some insurance companies are becoming very aggressive in their attempts to recover their losses. We had one insurance company go after our church after an elderly parishioner slipped on some ice in the parking lot. The pastor was somewhat saddened and dismayed that a long-time parishioner would sue the church, until someone explained to him that it is actually the insurance company that is doing the suing. The insurance company lost the suit. The irony in that case was in the judge's ruling that the church wasn't responsible because snow and ice are "an act of God". One might suppose that His church would be responsible for "an act of God".

At my school, it would be illegal to bring them all to the table. There are laws and regulations which govern disciplinary procedures at a school. I am not saying that scout unit should be required to follow all the complex procedures of a school disciplinary hearing, but I do think a certain amount of privacy should be expected. I am not surprised that the parent did not show up to this meeting. It was too public. In the OP, the parent was very willing to engage in a conversation with the scoutmaster, even to the point of volunteering information about the family doing home drug testing on the son. I doubt that the parent would have done so at an open meeting that might more resemble a public pillory than an honest and caring conversation amongst friends.

I am surprised that no one is stating the obvious. The scout should have been searched. It would seem strange to me if people were to feel that the unit leaders didn't have enough cause to conduct a search (back when the incidents were first reported), but that they do have enough to go ahead and suspend the boy.

This is not the only embarrassing nocturnal event that can occur at overnight scouting activities. I am sometimes surprised at how well (and maturely) many of our boys deal with these events.

My nephew had this problem, but he chose to not try to keep it a secret. He didn't like the idea of making up stories and explanations. It is sometimes easier for a boy to just deal with the truth than to try to keep it a secret.