Klondike Derby - Senior Patrol participation

[wbne1-250-eagle]

I'm in charge of our district Klondike Derby. In recent years, there has been a clamor to allow the Senior patrols to run a sled. They would run the same course as the normal patrols, but would be scored seperately to avoid the obvious advantage.

 

I'm not keen on this, as it would distract the troop leadership toward preparing themselves for the event, as opposed to helping the patrols.

 

Your thoughts and experiences, please?

[FScouter]

What is a senior patrol? Why would any patrol be not permitted to participate?

[scoutingagain]

Our District run's basically three separate "divisions".

 

1 A "Leadership Patrol" Division - defined as any patrol with more than one Life and/or Eagle Scout

 

2 A Regular Patol Division - Limited to One Life Scout in the Patrol

 

3 A New Scout Patrol Division - Patrols made up of 1st year scouts. Not allowed to have any scout 1st class or above.

 

 

I'm not saying this is right or wrong. This is what they do. I believe this was done because some units would "stack" specific patrols with their senior scouts to make them more competitive.

 

Ran into one "Leadership Patrol" from outside the distict. Made up of all high school aged boys that had made it a goal to win every Klondike Derby they entered and they spent the better part their winter weekends travelling New England, camping out at the scout camps or other venues and participating in Klondike Derbies. I think they entered 8 - 10. I don't know if they won all of them but they did finish first in our Leadership Division. They were serious Klondike Competitors and very impressive scouts. They knew their skills, worked together as a team and had a lot of fun.

 

For boys like these it would be nice to really give them a challenge and have a regional or national Klondike Derby Competition. Offer some scholarship $$$. Get some corporate Sponsorship. Anyone from Coleman, EMS, REI want to sponsor a National Klondike Derby Invitational? I bet we could get it on ESPN2 or the Outdoor Network! Get one of those survival gurus to do color commentary. 50 sleds from 50 states plus a few from overseas. Heck make it an Olympic Event. Get it on the X Games!

 

Just a thought.

 

Sorry got carried away. Now back to your thread on Senior Patrol Klondike sleds.

 

SA

 

 

 

 

[Beavah]

Yah, Scoutingagain's solution is fairly well-reasoned, eh?

 

Problem is with age-based patrols the older boy patrols are always goin' to have a big advantage over the younger kid patrols. PLC/Senior Patrol/Leadership Corps etc. even more, because they're likely to be both old and high-ranked/skilled/active. Sorta like playing the middle school soccer team against the high school JV or varsity. (yah, yah, sure, sometimes a strong and lucky middle school team will beat a weaker high school team, but those are the exceptions that prove the rule).

 

If yeh really want patrol competition to work, yeh have to do something to make things roughly fair.

 

That's why I'm an old-fashioned codger who believes in mixed-age patrols. But that won't help at a council event against another troop's all-high-school ringers

 

Beavah

 

[epalmer84]

We hold the Iditarod in conjunction with, but separate from Klondike Derby. Iditarod is for Venturers and senior Scouts. They build and sleep in survival shelters on Friday night and participate in an advanced program on Saturday.

 

Ed

[Gags]

I believe my former District began running into the problem of "stacked" patrols some time ago. (I think my troop may have contributed slightly to that perception, but we were definitely not alone in that regard).

 

The simplest solution is to average the scores across the whole troop. It's possible the same "senior" patrol may win first place in 3 out of 8 events, but if the troops other patrols are not up to the task, than the best overall troop will be given to someone else. If you have at least 10-15 troops participating, I would be surprised if one patrol can consistently dominate each event.

 

For the sled race - I've seen a district run two divisions - an "upper" and a "lower". I would break it down by age (no more than 1 scout over the age of 15 per lower division patrol, or something to that effect). Scout rank doesn't matter as much in a sled race. As long as both divisions count equally towards overall standings (if you're tracking that at the troop level), it may become more about bragging rights (aka Scout Spirit) than optimizing points in the standings.

 

My .02 worth,

 

Gags

[moxieman]

Like some others have stated, our district has three age categories:

 

Webelos

11-13 year olds

14-17 year olds

 

Yes, Webelos are welcome to participate in our district. They usually borrow a sled from the troop their pack is a feeder to. All patrols are given their 'map' at the beginning of the day that leads them from town (station) to town. Some towns are Webelos-only, some older scout-only, etc. Some are for all age groups.

 

Points are awarded at each town/station in the form of gold nuggets (painted beads).

 

For those that are for all age groups, the judges usually have a specific task/set of criteria for each age group. My station is a wandering station. I am the Claim Jumper--but not your normal claim jumper. I'm Yukon Moxie and I've been cooped up in a log cabin most of the winter with only the Boy Scout Handbook to read over and over and over. So, I give the scouts a fair chance to keep their gold nuggets. I ask them three questions that they should be able to answer based on the highest rank earned in that patrol (IE if highest rank is 2nd Class, I can ask q's based on joining requirements, tenderfoot or Second Class only. If they have an Eagle Scout, ANYTHING from the book is fair game, bwahahahaha ). They may work as a team to come up with that answer, but they can't look in their handbook (unless they're Webelos). If they get the answers right, I give them nuggets. If they get them wrong, I take nuggets. Usually, the younger scouts do better then the older ones. Probably because it's fresher material for the young'ons.

 

But I'm starting to digress.

 

Webelos may participate in the day-only Klondike. Scouts are welcome to participate in either the day Klondike or the overnight-Klondike. If they do the overnight, they have a couple less towns to hit during the day. They are then also judged on a couple of night-only events and on participation in the evening campfire and Sunday morning meal --done up for all participants at the school on whose grounds we hold the event--do they sit/eat as a patrol? Did they say grace? Scout spirit? Did they clean-up any messes they made, etc.

 

We also have a timed race at the beginning. This timed race is used only in the event that we need to break a tie-score among the patrols in that category. We have had to do this three times in the past five years.

 

Prizes: Camp Gear instead of trophies. First place in each division gets first pick. Second place is next, etc. We usually have 5 places in each division.

[moxieman]

I forgot to mention that older scouts who don't want to participate as a patrol are also welcome to run a station.

[wbne1-250-eagle]

Thanks for the input. I've considered the averaging of all patrols in the troop. That is something that the entire troop leadership, including the senior boys can really take pride in having accomplished.

 

I also like the idea of different classes of patrol based on composition of highest ranking Scouts. That could work.

 

Thanks again, Scouters!

[scoutingagain]

" ask them three questions that they should be able to answer "

 

I have to ask, do they start with something like "What's your favorite color?"

 

SA

[FScouter]

The patrol method can really come to life in a camporee setting. I suggest that whatever you do to make things "fair", don't encourage or force troop patrols to break apart and abandon the patrol method to fit into a camporee "patrol" model. No benefit to camporee administration justifies destroying the cohesiveness of a patrol.

 

My son still has a lingering distaste for camporees after one year the "system" pulled him out of his patrol and into another one, to make things "fair". It wasn't fair to him or to his patrol. And it really wasn't fair to the patrol he was put into because their performance was skewed from what they were really capable of as their own patrol. The supposed benefits to camporee patrol manipulations is trivial compared to the lasting disruption to patrol spirit and teamwork that results.