AKdenldr

It seems to me you need to get out of this drama and pass this old troop on to another District Commissioner. Reason is, key 3 is not taking your very reasonable advice. It may be that you are too familiar to them and they need someone else. It may be that they are crazy and love drama. Your volunteer time and time away from family is wasted here. 5 parent meetings is beyond crazy. I can't image how many conversations, emails, and phone calls you have been involved in.

Hello, I am looking for a scoutmaster minute that had to do with the contribution of others. It went something like this: "Today at this court of honor we are recognizing the achievements of the scouts here, you have made significant achievements in ..... but remember you haven't done this alone, just like a piano there are xxx keys, all the people who have helped you along your scouting journey are playing the other keys, the base line, the high notes, the ....." the Assistant scout masters, the merit badge counselors, the drivers for the camp outs, ..... your parents and family members. So remember as you meet milestones and goals in your life, look back and see who's been playing the other keys. Does anyone have this? I would love to use it (or parts of it) in another setting.

Oh and this troop doesn't trust their oldest scouts to hike alone together. No wonder the 17 year old Philmont, Chilkoot hiker scout thinks scouts is boring. The adults make it so.

Lordy, it's not just my son's troop? The reason everyone remembers cubs as being fun is that we ended every meeting with a game. Boy led does not mean without mentoring or a vision of what the scouting program is supposed to deliver. For years I have tried different efforts to get scouting games or the program guide in the planning. Wanted one night a month for patrol meetings so we could get something done, but we were shot down. When we have one night of games everyone loves them.... then it is back to the same boring planning for the next event (or not). Dodge ball. Yikes, My scout is done with the meetings unless there is something he needs. (And he needs a bit due to the lack of programming....) This attitude doesn't fit our family values (or scouting values) but after years of the troop meetings wasting his and our time we are allowing it. He can spend scout nights on those last few merit badges. I'm probably going back to cubs when he eagles out.

Although a MB counselor can not add requirements As a cooking merit badge counselor I encourage the young scouts to work on their cooking requirements for rank FIRST. There is no double counting between the rank requirements and the merit badge. So I have one young scout in my group, but the rest have more than a few campouts under their belts. If that young scout uses his campouts right now to focus on cooking requirements for the cooking merit badge he will be slowing down his rank advancement. In addition, I like to limit the number of scouts in a group (8 being a good number for me), so I will tend to want the older scouts to have an opportunity to take those slots first. (Not uncommon for our troop.) In our troop, sometimes new scout parents get all excited about what they think their new scout is missing out on (merit badges in particular). I like to encourage the new boys to bond with their patrol and work on scout craft requirements. Summer camp is a great first time to work on merit badges as a new cross over. If your son really enjoys cooking, look at the T-F rank requirements for that and work towards those items. Then he should reconnect with the MB counselor. Enjoy the journey.....

I think there are quite a few things the pack could do. 1) Do you have a social media policy? I'll bet custodial parent doesn't want pictures of her tiger in his uniform posted to facebook, anyone's facebook. 2) Explain the 2 deep leadership policy to Tiger mom and how your pack and den events are supervised. 3) Doesn't the medical part a and b form have a space that tells who can take a child from scouting events? In our pack all uniformed adults knew the allergies and medical issues. Why not this also? 4) Pack events aren't really open to the public. They are open to those in the pack and their guests. 5) Have a greeter table at the entrance to pack meetings where everyone signs in and gets a name tag. This helps with community building BTW. Have the scouts all introduce their guests. ('I'm Tommy and these are my Grandparents from Florida', or "This is my friend from second grade", whatever.) (Greeter table is a great place to collect checks for dues or day camp also!) 6) Keep the info about Dad's illness limited to those in positions of authority in the pack. Lovely that you all are providing scouting for this boy. Please help mom feel comfortable with the program.

yup and Den Chief. This often is a position that boys go and find themselves.

File a tour permit for every meeting outside our meeting place, heard this repeatedly at council trainings and DID it for YEARS. Our troop is under the mistaken impression that 2 adults are required for 2 scouts to sell popcorn in a grocery store (2 hour shift btw)... This is why my scout never sells anymore. Adults on hike need to hike with the patrol, every darn step of the way. I've seen a pack at day camp making everyone go to the bathroom at the same time because little timmy had to go and two adults had to go with him. Since they only had two adults .... yep, whole pack misses out on the activity. Saw two cubs attending day camp not with their home pack. They needed two adults to escort them for the week -- grown cousin and auntie. Let alone that they were grouped in with other packs (who had adult leaders) and that the whole place is crawling with adults all week.

Welcome to scouting and thanks for being a willing volunteer! I took a den from tigers to boy scouts and they are now high school sophomores, most of them active in scouting. (I still get to work with them on occasion.) I agree that 3/4's of the cub scout experience is in the den. A lot of the tiger year is really about making and keeping friends in a small group. If you are not intending for your son to change schools next year, these friendships are very valuable to your son's development. If the den is working for your son, work on improving that experience. You started that by getting trained. Enroll your other parents into volunteering in the den, and perhaps for the pack tasks. Make your den the strongest in the pack! Continue to use your district and council resources, training for you and events for your den. Encourage the other leaders to get trained. In most packs the pack leadership turns over every 3 years, if not more often than that -- and some newly recruited volunteers might be disinterested, or not have the skills. Our cubmaster was always kinda a figurehead, and the den leaders were the actual leaders of the pack. I would move packs immediately if I saw adults bullying the boys, or not following the BSA rules. Disorganization and weak leaders at the top....well, that can be endured (deep breath). Our pack always had a lot of issues with paperwork, that's not the main issue. Ask a lot of questions about the pack schedule. Remember to enjoy your tigers. Watch for those smiles....

I suspect it is related to the FSLA change in this way: many Hr advisors to the non-profit sector are recommending that all titles, job duties, and payroll procedures be reviewed at this point and time. A full HR audit, so to say. A District Executive is really executive of nothing (no full time direct reports to supervise, no budgetary authority of any magnitude, for example.) Program Associate (or District Associate in this case) makes more sense.

The GSA used to publish a subscription based magazine called 'The American Girl' latter named "American Girl". (No relation to the "American Girl" currently published.) Much like BL of today it focused on interesting "I want to do that" and "You can do it" stuff with a bit of common culture (lip gloss, etc) thrown in. Much like the video game articles in BL. Really who ever is publishing BL for the BSA should make a proposal.

Well based on the scout's sound bite, I think he was working on Citz in Com. 'Do the following: a. Attend a meeting of your city, town, or county council or school board; OR attend a municipal, county, or state court session. b. Choose one of the issues discussed at the meeting where a difference of opinions was expressed, and explain to your counselor why you agree with one opinion more than you do another one.' or Communications: 'Attend a public meeting (city council, school board, debate) approved by your counselor where several points of view are given on a single issue. Practice active listening skills and take careful notes of each point of view. Prepare an objective report that includes all points of view that were expressed, and share this with your counselor.' In our community scouts get a lot of attention (lead the pledge usually) in uniform. I might be less jaded, I think the uniform gives the elective officials an opportunity to engage with a youth, without being the 'stranger' all the kids have been taught to fear. But yes, we all understand your point about politic-ing in uniform.

Don't take any $ from the Webelo families. Tell them to recruit a couple more boys to form a nice group. 4th grade boys are really good at recruiting. Leadership (even shared rotating leadership) should come from within that set of 12 parents, or someone they recruit from outside the organization. Take the money and applications at that point. I'd love to come lead Webelos again... Everyone in the entire pack has to lead -- weither on the committee, as a special event organizer, or as a den leader / assistant den leader.

After the meeting, Boy Scout Mark Nitkiewicz told the Ann Arbor News it was his first public meeting. "It was very interesting, there were a lot of good points," Nitkiewicz said. "I thought everybody had some fair points." Good Citz in Comm public meeting. I'm sure I'll the scouts I counsel on this badge would have been interested and attentive.

I agree with all the advice here. Except a den of 12 tigers is too big. You need 3 dens. Boys do not feel necessary to the club in a large group. (For Tigers this is their first 'club'.) Full participation will suffer. Part of the advantage of scouts is working on social skills in small group settings. You don't get that in a room full of 24 people (plus younger siblings.) If some families drop out and dens are as small as 5 that is a-okay and very good. (My eldest's tiger den was 5 and they all bridged into boy scouts together.) I always capped my dens at 8 because that was what I could handle with the mix of boys I had. I kept a waiting list of boys who wanted on. One resource we provided in our pack was an every so often (roughtly monthly) den leader lunch where we talked through planning for the dens. This mostly was mentoring the younger leaders. Your growth is a good problem to have.