Appointed Senior Patrol Leaders?

[Bob White]

WBE,

OUCH! I'm sorry if you felt jumped on. You posted the circumstances and asked for feedback. I did not say that what you were doing broke the rules. I said what you were doing did not follow the methods and purpose of the program. There are a lot of ways to get more scouts to advance and to teach MBs that are far more efficient that the scout method, but they are not scouting.

 

The purpose of scouting is not good attendance. If a troop served free pizza every week and played ddge ball the rest of the meeting you could have great attendance, but it wouldn't be scouting.

 

You could have a MB couselor lecture the scouts for 6 hrs a month and they would learn alot, but that's not scouting.

 

It's following the 8 methods of scouting, and achieving the 3 Aims of the program that makes the BSA unique. There is a difference betwen doing things in a scout uniform, and scouting.

 

As I said in the other post you refered to, I was impressed with how much of the patrol method you used and how well you used it, but that I felt the problems you said you were having stemmed from two areas were you strayed from the program.

 

Believe me I don't know all the rules, but I do know the resources where to find them. As a member of the commissioners service I 've had a lot of experience being invited into to units to help solve problems. The solution always involves returning to a scouting method or methods that they have strayed from or didn't understand.

 

There is no harm in not knowing, it takes a while to really know the program. The harm comes in knowing and ignoring.

 

YIS,

Bob White(This message has been edited by Bob White)

[WoodBadgeEagle]

Bob-

 

I didn't feel "jumped on" at all- I simply suggested that I'd rather keep things in the forum in case someone (like you) saw something I posted as not in keeping with the Scouting program, then they could "jump in".

 

It was a real eye-opener for me about the way we do MB's in our Troop not following the methods and purpose of the program.

 

We have been doing MB work at Troop meetings since WAY before I became SM. We were also a completely adult-run operation. We changed to a Scout-run program over the past 4 years, but we kept (in fact, refined) the doing MB's at Troop meetings, largely because I was not aware that this was not the way things should be done.

 

The hardest thing for us when (note- not IF) we change this starting in the fall will be the fact that it works so well. MB work is only a part of the Troop meeting time, and the Scouts who choose to work on a badge (we do two required MB's at a time for a total of 4 throughout the year) get the MB books from the ligrary, request additional resouces from the MB counselors, recruit guest speakers and parents to come in or help organize an outing (town hall meeting, etc.) and then work together on a requirement or two each week at Troop meetings.

 

I can (and have) seen the downside of this (some Scouts who have little interest in the badge just tag along and don't make it a decision to do the work). But, it's not really a cookie-cutter thing, either. Nobody tells any Scout to work on a MB, and even if they choose to work on the ones at Troop meetings, not everyone finishes the badge with the group (about 50% do finish it).

 

I have looked through what used to be called Woods Wisdom (I forget the new name of the 3-volume set) and I always wanted to try it "by the book", but we focused on changing other things to get our program to more closely match what the BSA says (we were a long ways off at the start).

 

We'll discuss how to go about this at our Annual Planning PLC later next month, and next year will be another new beginning for us.