Ceremony Feedback

[SctDad]

I have a ceremony that I am thinking about doing. It is a Tiger Badge award ceremony. I am thinking about it as a trust ceremony too. I have it set up so that everything is safe. Take a look and give me some feedback. What does everyone think.

 

Tiger Cub Graduation Ceremony

Equipment

Large Pot

Dry Ice

Container for dry ice

A way to separate dry ice from badges to keep Cub Scouts safe

Personnel

Tiger Cubs with adult partners

Cub Master

Tiger Leader

Set-up

Place dry ice in container and place container in pot. Make sure that they are separate from the badges so that the boys will not contact the dry ice when reaching in.

Place badges in another container

Cub Master: (Tiger Den Leader) do you have boys who have earned their Tiger Badge.

 

Tiger Den Leader: Yes I do

 

CM: Then have each of them come down by the fire with their parents behind them.

(Call out each of the boys to stand in front of the smoking pot.)

 

CM: The final test of their commitment to the Pack. Inside this pot is their Tiger Badge. They must reach in and find their badge. At that point their parent will then place their badge on their uniform.

 

When the boys reach in the pot they will find their badge with a parents pin attached. The parent can use the pin to attach the badge to the uniform temporarily

 

After the boys have each reached in and retrieved their badge, then they should move to the side and wait for the other to finish.

 

TDL: I present to you the Tiger Cubs of Pack 162. Please give them a round of applause as they have worked very hard to earn this rank.

 

What does everyone think???

[ScoutNut]

"CM: The final test of their commitment to the Pack. Inside this pot is their Tiger Badge. They must reach in and find their badge."

 

Tiger Cub Scouts do not need their commitment "tested".

 

What happens if a boy gets frightened, and will not reach into the smoking pot to get his badge? Does he then "fail" the "test" and loose his Tiger Rank badge? Since he has failed the test, and proved he is NOT committed to the Pack, will he get kicked out of the Pack?

 

This is the way a 7 year olds brain works. It does not matter if it is just for show. You could very well have some hysterical boys on your hands.

 

And, even if all of the boys cheerfully dive into the pot to get their badges, what happens if the inner container of dry ice somehow tips or leaks or whatever, and the boy gets burned?

 

None of these are good senerios.

 

Have the den leader or the CM be the one doing the reaching into the pot of dry ice to retrive the awards. It will be a better, safer ceremony all around.

 

[Karen_216]

Perhaps instead of proving their "commitment" to the pack mention they hard they have worked their way along the tiger trail and have now achieved their rank. You are honored they will be advancing to cub scouts now. The parents to show a commitment to help them along on the cub scout trail will reach in to get their son's badge and pin it on their son. We have the parents take a pledge when awarding the sons their badge so maybe his is a better way to work a similar prgram in.If you want to do this take a big pot of some sort for the outside (a Lobster pot?) and use a smaller inside for the dry ice. Instruct the adutl to only reach to the outside ring. Hopefully an adutl could get it right??

[Eagledad]

I think it is pretty cool and the boys will love it.

 

These kinds of things are why I love this scouting stuff.

 

Barry

[rjscout]

I do like the idea of using the dry ice. I also like the part where the parents reach in for their son's badge. I remember the intrique of dry ice when I was young.

[DanKroh]

SctDad,

 

For the first time in recent memory, our pack is also in the position of awarding Tiger Badges in June. We normally try to get all the boys done with rank advancement by the Blue & Gold banquet in February, so that they can receive their badge as part of a very nice ceremony.

 

However, this year, mostly because of the change requiring the boys to earn Bobcat *before* Tiger, our Tigers weren't ready in February.

 

I am planning on doing something a little special for them at the pack meeting, since they "missed out" at the B&G. I was thinking of the "Scout Spirit" ceremony, using glow stick materials, that I have read about.

 

I think the idea of dry ice is cool, boys are certainly fascinated by it (as are many adults)

 

However, I would also caution that if you are going to set up a "test", make it one that the boys are guaranteed to succeed in. Reaching into a mysterious smoking pot doesn't seem like a big deal to you or me, but it looks much different in the eyes of a 7-year-old, especially if he is the nervous, reserved type.

 

I like the idea of having the parents reach in instead, maybe give the boys/parents the option of letting the boy do it if he wants, but then you'd have to couch it in different terms from a "test of committment".

 

Good luck!

[Eagledad]

>>I like the idea of having the parents reach in instead, maybe give the boys/parents the option of letting the boy do it if he wants,

[gcan]

I think the idea is a great one!!! Maybe you could have the boy(s) most likely to balk at sticking thier hands in there help set up. let them in on the 'secret' and let them see exactly what they are sticking thier hands into.

 

An alternative- party stores and 'teenager mall stores' have cheap smoke machines- maybe $25? safer, and reusable! Unless you are going to do a demo with the dry ice, I think you might have a crowd control problem after the ceremony, when every boy and thier dad want to get up close and personal with the pot.

[DYB-Mike]

Hi Folks,

 

Neat ceremony, but I do agree that presenting it as a final test of their commitment could possibly backfire with those boys that might be afraid to reach into the pot.

 

Eagledad, it may seem like withholding adventure, but in the analogy you put forth the fearful boy can always choose to hand the stick to Dad or Mom to hold. Here, hes being told that he MUST reach into the pot to prove his commitment.

 

Id go with the parent reaching in. The Cubmaster could say something like Your Adult Partners have helped you all on your quest to earn the Tiger Cub rank. Now they will help you one final time and retrieve your badge from the boiling pot of _________ (fill in). You might even coach a couple of parents beforehand to overact in their retrieval of the badge unless you want the ceremony to be completely serious.

 

YIS

Mike

 

 

[Bob White]

hmmmm dangerous chemicals and 7 year olds in close proximity....sure sounds like a dandy idea!

 

I am sure your intentions are not to frighten small children or to possibly injure them but simply to stage a memorable ceremony.

 

While the visual effect might seem noteworthy the risk seems too high. Why not bring up the scouts and parents and YOU reach in the pot for them. The kids will still enjoy the effect and the ceremony but you take all the risks. Seems a fair compromise.

 

 

 

 

 

[DYB-Mike]

Bob, Interesting take.

 

My initial reaction to this was to propose giving the ceremony a mystical flavor and suggest another leader act as a shaman and do the reaching into the pot for all the cubs. Instead I ran with the parents.

 

Having a leader do it is probably a better approach unless all the Adult Partners understand the risk (however minimal) and are willing to do it.

 

YIS

Mike

 

[SctDad]

DYB Mike

 

I like the idea with using the parents to show how they can help the Cub just one more time. I think that will make for a great addition to the ceremony.

 

I think that I will keep the boys away from the pot for now.

 

Thanks for the advise guys. It was all good.

[Novice_Cubmaster]

Hi SctDad,

 

Instead of using the parent pin to temporarily attach the badge to the uniform, our awards person fastens a small safety pin to the badge as part of the ceremony setup. At the ceremony, the parent gets the parent pin + card & the scout gets the badge.

 

PS - ask any awards person what's the greatest invention of all time - they'll tell you it's the ziplock bag.

 

NC

[SctDad]

Novice_Cubmaster

 

I have heard about the ziplock method. But I have also heard that there is some things to be said about the baggie presentation.

 

I have some other ways that I do my presentations and prep also. But I am still learning.

 

Anyway, we had our ceremony tonight.

 

Enter preverbial monkey and football.

 

First off, my contact with our CO was not present at the building 1 hour in advance like he ALWAYS had been before. Tried calling, no answer. 15 minutes after it was all supposed to start we decided to post pone everything. Then one of the other parents made a call and got us the multipurpose room at the primary school. Only 1 mile away. Got every thing back in vehicles and moved locations. Disadvantage is that we no flags, no snacks, and had to do a lot on the fly because all of our stuff was locked up in the building. Good thing I made most of it today before the meeting.

 

No I did not do the boiling pot presentation that I had planned, wasn't able to get the right pots and dry Ice. Put that one away for now. Also no OA for crossing over, then again, no crossing over, Boy scout troop never showed.

 

We did have an OK ceremony, I tried a AOL ceremony with some candles and it was OK except I had my order of the rays wrong and was corrected by one of our recipients.

 

ANY Way very tired here, got NO sleep at work last night, so I am going to bed. If anyone else has anymore questions, just let me know.

[Lisabob]

Hey Sctdad, congratulations. Now that you've had to punt your way through a major cub event, you're "one of us...." (envision zombies marching toward you with outstretched arms)

 

Seems no matter what, sooner or later, something like this happens. And it sounds like you pulled it off admirably despite all the last minute improvisations. Good for you! And thanks for all the time you put into scouting, to make it happen for a bunch of little boys.