Older Scout Summer Camp Attendance

[ScouterPaul]

Do the older boys in your Troop attend summer camp? If not at what age do they generally stop attending? Do you have high adventure trips for the older boys and summer camp for the younger?

[Eamonn]

OJ, will be 16 soon. Our Council Scout Reservation is in a state park. The Cub Scout Camp is about a mile from the Boy Scout Camp. Up until this year the Cub Scouts used the same swimming pool and trading post as the Boy Scouts and all of the Cub Scout Parent and Son camps are held at the Boy Scout camp. OJ, has been going to camp there since he was eight. He goes there for OA weekends, JLTC and has over the years been dragged up there by me for all sorts of meetings and whatever.

While I think he has a love of the Camp, there is no excitement in going there.

Sad to say the Scoutmasters in our District are not a very adventurous bunch. Summer Camp, at good old Camp Conestoga is just about the highlight and the highpoint of their Scouting year. While I wouldn't be as rude as to say that they are lazy, I think that most of them are going because that's where they went as Scouts and that's where they always go!!

The camp has tried to cater for the older Scouts by offering activities more age appropriate?? However these were all away from the camp site and were way overpriced. The Council took the price of a week at camp and added on the "Extras". The final price tag was over $300.00. This seemed a little much for a week away, when away was only 30 minutes from home. There has been no real effort to improve the facilities at the site to make it more "Older Scout Friendly." Everything is geared to Merit Badges, but after about the third summer, most of the Scouts have done the merit badges that they are interested in or want and most of the staff are the same age as the older Scouts.

While there is no policy, it does seem that the Council expects units to camp at the Council camp year after year. In fact most troops sign up for the same site and the same week next year before they leave. So much for the PLC?? A pal of mine who lives at the other end of the Council, used to camp at the Camp that belongs to Greater Pittsburgh. (Their site is in our Council) Another pal of mine who is on the camping committee was very upset when this chap received the Silver Beaver, to his way of thinking camping away from the council was not supporting the council.

OJ, has attended the National Jamboree and been a family member at Philmont. He has just out grown our camp. He is going on staff at the next National Jamboree and wants to do the OA Trail thing at Philmont. Depending on how things work out he also wants to be a staff member at the World Jamboree in 2007.

I'm not sure if this ties into this thread or not. - But.

A few months back I wrote to every Venturer in the District offering to help organize a Super Activity for 2006. In my letter I suggested Sea base, Kandersteg, Gilwell Park and Philmont. I only received one reply. The president of one Crew said that there were two Lads that were interested in going to Philmont.

I'm not sure what the answer is or if I'm asking the right questions. It could be that I was aiming a little too high. I know almost all of these older Scouts / Venturers. I think the only thing keeping them in Scouting is the OA. My big fear is that one day I will wake up to find them as Leaders not going anywhere for summer camp other then the Council Camp - Because that's where they always went.

Eamonn

[eagle90]

Our troop does really well with "older" scouts attending Summer Camp. Last year we had 6 high schoolers at camp, and this year we have 4. We also have a High Adventure activity every year, and many times we have our senior scouts attending both activities.

[evmori]

This has never been a problem with us. Our older Scouts love attending summer camp. They get to do the "fun" stuff!

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

i Peter 4:10

[CubsRgr8]

Older scouts in my son's troop don't go to summer camp because, after three summers, it's the same old stuff - same merit badges, same canoe trip, same routine. Older scouts in my son's troop who do go to summer camp go because they enjoy the same old stuff. Some kids love routine and others love new experiences. It's difficult for a summer camp to please everybody.

 

Ed, please provide the name of your camp and/or a couple of examples of the programming it offers that is attractive to older scouts. Thanks.

 

 

[evmori]

CubsRgr8,

 

We attend Heritage Reservation in Farmington, PA. The merit badges aimed at the older Scouts are motorboating, water skiing, climbing and shotgun shooting. The activities for the older Scouts are Mountain Boarding, Discovery, Outpost, White Water Rafting, Horseback Riding and Caving. Some of these are off the reservation. C.O.P.E. is also offered along with a full slate of over 30 merit badges, Trail to Eagle and Trail to First Class. I think that covers it!

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

 

[buffalo2]

Ed - Check out Camp Powhatan's New River Adventure and High Knoll for your older guys in Blue Ridge Council - Western Va. Both are excellent programs and our older Scouts rave about them

[ScouterPaul]

buffalo2

Thanks for the info. Are they as good as the website shows them to be?

[packsaddle]

Not so much age as the number of times they've been already. I expect some loss of interest after the 3rd time. High Adventure helps a lot, though.

[SR540Beaver]

This might be a little off topic, but I don't think so. Do the older boys who find summer camp boring belong to troops that go to the same camp year after year? I know of some troops that alternate between in council one year and different out of council camps every other year. I visited one troop that told me they didn't go to our council camp because their boys found it boring. Each year they would go to a different camp out of state. I asked how long they had been doing that and was told 10 years. I didn't ask, but wondered how they could know the council camp was boring if they had not attended in 10 years?

[boleta]

My son went to the New River at Powhatan last year and really enjoyed it even though it rained every day.

 

There are other programs there,

They have a website at

http://www.bsa-brmc.org/camp/k

 

[KoreaScouter]

Oddly enough, my problem isn't getting older Scouts to go, it's getting my younger ones. The middle school that most of my lads attend is on a year-round schedule, and they start back on July 7th. Our on-island council camp runs four weeks, all in July, so their parents have to make a tough choice: miss a few days of school, or miss summer camp. Most, appropriately I think, opt for school. Out of 23 I have going to camp this year, only three are first-year campers.

 

Our council is offering a HA Trek for the first time this year. Participants check in with us, then peel off the next day and we don't see them until the afternoon before we go home. Again, this is the first year they've done it, so there'll probably be growing pains, but it does offer an option. I have two who wanted to do that. Plus, two of my older Scouts are on camp staff...I didn't count them. The dilemma I have with separate old-guy tracks at camp is that it's almost always the Green Bars who want to do it, and I need their experience/leadership in camp, too. Can't have it both ways I guess.

 

One of our ADCs was telling me recently that council is considering a big late spring event focusing on new Scout advancement, a traditional summer camp, and an autumn HA opportunity for older Scouts. I like the sound of that; eliminates school conflicts, and older Scouts don't have to choose between two programs.

 

KS

[Eamonn]

I never gave any thought to the idea that not everyone in the USA, didn't have the same vacation time as our kids do.

Back in the Dark Ages when I was a Scout, we only had six weeks in the summer. When I first joined the troop as a Scout this caused a problem. Most Troop Summer Camps were two weeks and from about the age of 7 or 8, my parents used to put me on the train to spend the summer in Ireland. Looking back I must have seemed a bit like Paddington Bear.

I think that we spend about the same amount of days in School as American kids do. But we had all sorts of time off during the year. Three weeks at Easter, two or three days off for half term. A week off for Full Term,a long time off for Christmas.

I am not sure why Summer Camp was two weeks. I think it had a lot to do with families not taking family vacations. (They couldn't afford it?)Or if they went away they went at the same time as the troop did leaving their son with the troop. There was no such thing as organized council camps. We normally took the PLC away at Easter and checked out where we would spent the summer. This might be in the field of a friendly farmer or at a camp site. Still the feeding and program were down to the troop.

I remember (Please don't tell anyone) smuggling a side of Danish bacon and two frozen New Zealand lambs into Holland. I hid them in with the tents. Talk about setting the example!! Another year we gave each Scout a suit case full of the worst tasting dehydrated meals, which I'm sure were mostly textured vegetable protein. Along with his kit he had this case strapped with bungee cords to a set of wheels. Worked fine till the case started to slip off.

The best part of all that was that we were camping in Switzerland and there was a BSA troop from a military unit stationed in Germany. They took pity on us and fed us in this big army kitchen. They also had Leaders that were specialists in doing stuff in the snow. They took our older scouts out to climb glaciers and up into the high Alps. This was my first taste of American Scouting. It was then that I decided that I wanted to find out more about American Scouting. One year later I came over here for a summer.

I think it is fair to say that these American Scouter's really showed us what this World Brotherhood is all about and that it does work.

I am still in contact with a good number of the Lads who spent that summer in Switzerland. They still pull my leg about the suitcases and the dehydrated food. But nearly everyone of them say it was and still is the best summer that they have ever spent - Anywhere.

Eamonn.

[Beth]

We just returned today. Have never really had any trouble getting the older guys to go. Took 17 youth to camp. 5 were high school age. The aquatics program always keeps them busy with water skiing, motorboating, small boat sailing, life guarding, and new this year was sail boarding. (In addition to the traditional aquatics classes) One boy took SCUBA. A couple took the 'Eagle Trail' program. Most of them already have the climbing MB. The BMX track was used alot during free time. The guys enjoy the staff/camper competitions. We also took 3 of our college age ASMs. They came home just to go to camp. They too kept busy at the waterfront, working with the camp commissioner doing campsite inspections and at shooting sports. Where were we? Flaming Arrow SR in Lake Wales Florida. I'm not sure who had more fun this year, youth or adults.

[Eamonn]

Hi Beth,

Welcome to the forums.

Sounds like a super time was had by all and the Camp Site is outstanding.

With OJ being away at camp this week, Her That Must Be Obeyed and self had more time to chat with each other. Heck we even done the washing up by hand and talked like we used to when we were first married. I'm still try to work out if Kids or dishwashers have killed the art of conversation?

Anyhow,next year he is off to the Jamboree. He will be 17. While he will still be a Boy Scout,thinking about it he hasn't had a bad run and Scouts and Scouting has held his attention. He still has plans for other stuff that he wants to do and intends to do.In fact I can't wait to see where this ride takes him /us.

 

Eamonn.(This message has been edited by Eamonn)