Scout Missing

[rkfrance]

CA,

I would make that permanently required, but unfortunately, it wouldn't teach the boy or his dad anything.

 

There still are a whole lot of unanswered questions in my book and I'll bet we'll never get those answered.

[GernBlansten]

This just scares the jeebers out of me. My heart goes out to those poor scout leaders who had to go through this. I look at our own camp outs and could easily envision one of our young scouts just walk away quietly. To tell you the truth, its made me second guess whether I want to go camping with other peoples children, especially young ones. What's so frustrating is that this child was only 1.5 miles from camp and didn't respond to rescuers calls. FOR THREE DAYS? I just don't understand that. What goes through these kids heads? Seems like he didn't want to get rescued. I've gotta go rethink if its worth all the risk.

[John-in-KC]

First, for our mods, there's a parallel thread running in Open Discussion-Program:

http://www.scouter.com/forums/viewThread.asp?threadID=153697

 

I've reviewed both. While we don't know all the facts, and never will, there's enough here that I wonder about the adult and youth leader training of this Troop. In priority, my wonderings are:

 

- Lack of the buddy system. Scouts' buddy (tentmate) should have made sure he was out of the rack!

 

- What's good for the many is good for the one (an old Star Trek line)... Where were the PL, SPL, and SM when the tentmate couldn't/wouldn't/didn't roust the Scout?

 

- The answer this Troop looks to have taken was One-on-One adult and youth contact. Why? Where's the basic discipline amongst the youth? This Scout got homesick. It sounds like he wasn't kept so busy he couldn't think about home.

 

I'm not going to bash FCFY in this case, since we think the Scout now is a Tenderfoot. I remember being a Tenderfeet; I got lost on my first stalking exercise (anyone else remember when we had to stalk as part of 2d Class requirements)?

 

Should Dad have been along? I do not have experience with medicated attention deficit children. I think this question depends on how knowledgable the leaders were to supporting special needs.

 

My two cents.(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

[CA_Scouter]

RK,

 

Regarding: "but unfortunately, it wouldn't teach the boy or his dad anything. "

 

I beg to differ. It teaches the boy that there are consequences for one's actions, it teaches him that the priviledge of attending a scout campout is earned and that the priviledge can be revoked, it teaches the Dad that his son still needs close parental support and supervision.

 

If I was SM of that troop, I would:

 

1) have a long talk with the Scout and his family regarding rules, behavior expectations, buddy system etc.

2) have a long talk with the troop and adult staff on buddy system, ypt, etc.

3) take a very long nap so that I would stop shaking in fear that I came so close to losing a boy

4) Thank God he was ok. Again. And again. And again.....

 

 

[evmori]

How does requiring having dad attend all camping trips teach there are consequences for your actions? And if mom & dad are the ones who gave this Scout a "vacation" from his meds, shouldn't they ultimately be the ones responsible for their son's behavior?

 

I'm glad he was found & is OK.

 

Ed Mori

1 Peter 4:10

 

[OldGreyEagle]

So, in the end it appears the wayward scout didnt want to be a scout anymore and decided to take off home. Apparently a pencil whipping scoutmaster in a haste to make his scouts first class is not to bame after all.

[CA_Scouter]

Ed, it goes something like this:

 

"Mr. XXXXXX, your son certainly gave us a scare last week, deliberately leaving camp without telling anyone where he was going. His actions caused a great expense to the public, and gave the rest of us mild coronaries. Unfortunately, the consequence of his action is that we are going to require that Mr. Dad or Mrs. Mom attend any scout outings for the foreseeable future. We simply cannot take another chance that he might wander away from camp, and we need your direct and constant supervision of him. Perhaps some time in the future, when he has re-established our trust, he can earn the priviledge of attending scout outings on his own."

 

And yes, the parents are ultimately responsible for his behavior, and a requirement to attend all scout outings with their son will ensure they are.

 

 

I've had a scout in my troop exhibit bad behavior, and I actually suspended him from the troop for 90 days, then required that a parent attend scout outings for the next 3 months. He returned and has shown much improved behavior and just made Life.

 

 

[Beavah]

So, in the end it appears the wayward scout didnt want to be a scout anymore and decided to take off home. Apparently a pencil whipping scoutmaster in a haste to make his scouts first class is not to bame after all.

 

Yah, I don't see any point in tryin' to place blame, nor in oversimplifyin' a complex situation. There's plenty to learn and think about from an incident we all hope never happens in our district, but which nevertheless does happen occasionally in someone's area.

 

I think we should use this case to consider things like:

 

How do we encourage parents to report to scout leaders on issues like medication "changes" or a boy "not wanting to come" on an outing? How do we communicate that "medication holidays" on scout trips might not be in a boy's best interest?

 

What strategies do our youth leaders and adults have to recognize and deal with homesickness, like a boy who says he's sick and won't get out of bed, or a patrol member who tells us his tentmate is really sad and doesn't want to be there?

 

How do we teach good "what to do when lost" procedures and ensure the boys are really proficient in them before earning Tenderfoot, so that rescue is more likely on Saturday or Sunday than the following Wednesday? A simple change in the weather on Sunday, after all, could have resulted in a much less happy outcome.

 

Doin' a better job at any of these stages would probably have been enough to avoid a scary episode, and so is worth learning from.

 

[ASM915]

John, If they still taught STALKING, and don't forget the other half, TRACKING for 2nd and 1st class requirements, maybe someone on the camp-out could have tracked and found him by nightfall. GOD forbid though, that would be to MILITARISTIC in nature. DARNED LIBERALS.

Yes I remember TRACKING and STALKING. We use to love it. Granted we had a river and large gorge at the end of our street that we could run down to after school or on weekends to practice and just have a good old time.

Why did they ever remove those requirements to begin with? Honestly, I really would like to know if anyone could fill me in on it.

[OldGreyEagle]

Beavah, you can relax, after this I am pretty much done trying to address your posts, in this thread you said

 

"Yah, yah to that. Amen. Da risk of FCFY is pencil-whippin' things to move 'em along. No retestin' or requirement addin', etc. etc., especially if that means takin' extra time to be sure the scout understands. I hope it didn't happen in this case, for the sake of those adults. I wouldn't want anyone to have to live with that."

 

and you said that before the child was found. I understand I am way too rigid for you but we will both have to live with that. You talk about not placing blame, but to my way of reading this post, you appear to want to place blame and place it on FCFY. You talk about respecting the fine volunteers of the program, but then talk how these leaders may not have taught the skills well enough. Going off the BSA program is fine for you as long as the person going off the program is pure of heart while those of us who follow the program could never have a pure heart and are thoughtless automatons. Fine, have it your way, you will spin this as you will. I wont try to rebutt anymore of your posts save when you say something patently wrong and I have the reference to back it up. I know you hate that but again, we will both have to live with it.

[evmori]

This Scout getting lost has nothing to do with the training the BSA has in place for leaders. To me, it's nothing more than poor parenting. Read the details of what happened.

 

Ed Mori

1 Peter 4:10

[Beavah]

Yah, OK, I'll take a shot at a post-mortem here, and others can play off that.

 

I certainly see Ed's point about parenting. I think Michael's parents set him up for a fall here, especially by not communicating with the troop leaders. Yah, poor parental choices are somethin' all of us parents make at some time, and certainly something all scout leaders have to deal with from time to time.

 

So while the ball started with the parents, there may have been things the troop could have done to "catch" med vacations or be aware of run-away tendencies. Similarly, there may have been things the troop could have done to address the homesickness thing better. Don't really know without knowin' the people, though.

 

I think most of us would agree that wanderin' around the woods aimlessly is not "What to do when lost." And a Tenderfoot scout has been certified to know "what to do when lost", right? So I think this is a Scoutin' issue. The requirement was signed and the rank awarded without the boy really understanding and being able to do, and that put him at risk. Michael's dad trusted Boy Scouting to teach him the things he needed to know, and in this case, we let him down.

 

I think real Youth Protection is based on knowledge. Knowin' the boy and the parents, for sure, so we can support 'em as we need to. Also making the effort to be sure kids really can do something when they need to. Both would have helped in this case.

 

Since no one-on-one came up, though, I think that's another good example. Kids knowledge of how to resist and report inappropriate adult behavior really matters, where the picayune details of "no one-on-one" really don't. But I suspect most of those who finely parse violations of "no one-on-one" never do youth-YPT thoroughly with the kids in their units.

 

When kids don't have the knowledge they should, that's a scoutin' issue, eh? As scoutldr said, boys may need to use the things we teach 'em. Their lives may depend on it.

 

[SR540Beaver]

Knowledge is a wonderful thing. What people do with knowledge is totally dependent on the individual. I've said it before and I'll say it again....you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. Take two kids OR adults, give them the same training, give them the same test and put them in the same situation. 99.9% of the time, you'll get different results. Most lost people do not believe they are lost. Heck, I walked out of camp one minute ago. Camp is just one minute back this way. Hmmm, I must have missed a turn. It has to be just past that stand of trees. Maybe over that rise. What the heck, all I did was walk a few hundred feet away. I know camp is right around here.

 

Some will stay put, others will continue to not accept they are "lost" even though they "know" what to do. You do what you "know" to do when you are LOST. I'm not lost....camp is right over there.

 

While we all teach boys what to do and test there knowledge, how many of us enforce carrying survival gear at all times on an outing? Do your boys have a whistle? Do they have the means to build a fire? Do they have a metal cup to boil water? Do they have a knife? If they do actually have all of that stuff on their car camping trip, is it on them or in their daypack back in camp?

 

The best thing for anyone to understand is to recognize that they are indeed lost and to STOP. Human nature seems to make them continue on to be found. Changing human nature is often a difficult thing to do.