NCAP

[BartHumphries]

Some of the things that immediately struck me as different from the previous standards:

 

Scouts can rappel on a single rope, with a fireman's belay.

 

Pretty much everyone who's anyone has to have attended National Camping School for their job or have "equivalent skills". However, this "equivalent skills" is a real grey area. In some cases, it just means that you had to have been a Scoutmaster, or even just earned a merit badge once upon a time in that area.

 

COPE/Climbing Directors are being grandfathered into the new system as the people that they were instructing (Level 2 instructors who only manage COPE or Climbing at a single camp). If you want to manage COPE/Climbing at multiple camps (such as both at a summer camp and at a camporee) then you need to be a COPE/Climbing Program Manager, which is going to necessitate yet another trip to National Camping School. Also, even though the only difference between COPE and Climbing once the transition to ACCT is complete is that COPE will have more training with fun games and Climbing will have more training with placing anchors in natural rock formations, and so the current COPE Director and the current Climbing Director at a camp will end up with the exact same ACCT level 2 instructor certification, apparently designing a program where someone is belayed up an element then lowered back down is different enough when that element is a wood pole (COPE course) than a flat board (climbing wall) that COPE/Climbing Program Manager are still completely separate five-day courses for a total of 10 days (instead of a single six or eight day or whatever course).

 

HS-03.A seems to say that every person must present their own medical form individually. In the past, a unit leader would generally come up with a stack of medical forms and a box/bag of medication (if any). I don't really see why each person needs to present their medical form themselves, most people who work at a Scout camp aren't trained to a high enough standard to be able to do anything other than take a physical at face value unless the person being checked in has a medical complaint -- without a complaint, they are technically not a patient and in some areas examining this person without then passing the person on to a higher medical authority could be considered patient abandonment, especially if that person is a youth who cannot make medical decisions for themselves. Yes, they aren't a patient without a complaint so how could it be considered patient abandonment, but that's a sticky point just between San Bernardino and Riverside counties out here -- I'm sure that other states in the US have different viewpoints on this. Suffice it to say, I would much rather get a stack of medical forms from a unit leader and discuss potential medical problem for each person in a unit with that unit leader than to have each person present a physical themselves. It's also going to make check-in take a whole lot longer.

 

HS-07 says that medication "administered" must be recorded in the First Aid Log book, which to me means that I'm only listing medication that I administer after calling the ambulance to come pick a person up, since (as an EMT) I have a short list of medication that I'm allowed to legally administer and I don't want to risk losing my license by making it appear that I have administered medication which I am not allowed to administer. Let me make it more clear -- when a person has Adderall locked up in the Health Lodge and they come get it, I am not administering that to them, I am simply the key holder. They are taking their own medication themselves. So, helping a person self-administer their EpiPen or aspirin for a heart attack would be listed in the First Aid Log book, but not a daily regimen of Wellbutrin or whatever for a person, as I do not administer those medications.

[Second Class]

Bart,

Please expand on HS-03.

 

To what program areas does this apply? To what events? Summer camp?

 

Dealing with masses of medical forms is a time consuming pain. If I could wave a wand and tell parents their kid had to be responsible for holding onto and delivering his medical form on demand would make my life easier. It would cost me half the troop, too, I expect.

 

Then there is the minor point of not having access to the scouts medical form while in transit, accident, etc.

Need some more info.