What is program and what is not?

[hopalong]

Try as I might, I can't seem to condense this post. I am looking for advice on how other Packs discriminate between what is program and what is not program, particularly in the case of activities that are not Den or Pack meetings. Our current situation is that the Committee has planned and been responsible for everything that is not Den meeting, by default. This discrimination would relieve the Committee of many responsibilities that seem to be program.

 

I've taken on the PC role this year (have six years in the Pack and 2.5 on the Committee as secretary) and wish to bring our Committee and program people more in line with a BSA model. I don't expect that I can make a complete transition, as I have only one year to do this (son ages out), but we have great new leaders coming in next year (including Cubmaster and Assistant CM) and I would like to get this new direction started for them.

 

I have been to Pack Committee training and attend roundtables. I've read the position descriptions, duties, and responsibilities. I've read the Cub Leader Handbook. I speak to the DE at Council very often. I have sought advice from our COR (very supportive). What I am unable to find are concrete examples of the implementation of these position descriptions. This is particularly necessary when implementing a change. What I have found in speaking to leaders of other Packs is that it is not uncommon for the Pack Committee to run program.

 

Some concrete questions: What pieces of Pinewood Derby, Raingutter Regatta, family camping, outdoor outings that fulfill rank requirements or electives, Christmas party, Blue & Gold, and Graduation are program and should be planned by the Cubmaster/Den Leaders? What pieces are Committee? What roles do the Cubmaster/Committee play in promoting and getting Scouts to Council events such as Cuboree, Day Camps, etc? Who finds adult leaders willing to attend?

 

Right now, every detail of every activity that is not Pack meeting or Den meeting falls to the Outings Chair. (Pack Meeting has fallen to Advancements) You can imagine why no one is willing to take this on (position is vacant for five years now). As a result, it all falls to the PC and of necessity, the Committee pulls it together and hopes that the Den Leaders and Cubmaster attend. PC members arrange and lead all activities during the event.

 

We have monthly Pack Committee meetings. The Cubmaster has attended 2 of 7. There are no meetings of Cubmaster and Den Leaders. I assume the Cubmaster would schedule routine meetings with his Den Leaders so that they can plan program pieces for these activities.

 

My goal is to set parameters for the Cubmaster and Committee to work effectively together by clearly identifying some Pack level specific areas of responsibility, as it relates to traditional non-Den meeting activities, for each. As we currently are, the Committee doesn't have time to deal with Committee issues such as fundraisers because we spend so much time on program.

 

 

Any suggestions are appreciated.

[Bob White]

That is a lot to ask to be explained in a forum setting. And I have to admit that it is surprising to hear these kinds of quetions after you say you have attended basic training.

 

To answer you first question of "what is program", it is ANY activity sactioned by the pack that involves its members (either youth or adult) that are not prohibited by the policies of the BSA.

 

So a Den meeting is part of the pack program, so is a Den meeting, so is a pack outing, so is a committee meeting, so is a committee bar-b-que, so is Day Camp, or the Blue and Gold banqet. All of these are part of your Pack Program.

 

I am unfamilar with a position called PC. CC is a Committee Chair. MC is a committee member.

 

In a condensed version the pack is a team effort. The program leader, Cubmaster (CM), assistan Cubmasters (CA), Den Leaders (DL), assistant Den Leaders (DA), Webelos Leaders (WL), and assistant Webelos Leaders (WA), are responsible for delivering the hands-on program to the youth, and to assist the committee in the planning of the Pack's program.

 

The Dens work both independently with theor members at their specific program level, and as part of the pack in cooperating on portions of Pack meetings and other pack events.

 

The Committee assists the program leaders in the planning of the program, and alos is responsiblr for the administartive support of the pack, such as paper work, record keeping, communications recognition, fundraising,etc.

 

The place to start is for EVERYONE to get trained in their role.

 

Once we know what your actual position in the pack is we will be able to give you better information on how you can steer things back onto the path that better reflects the methods of the Cub Scouting program.

 

 

I hope this helps,

BW

 

 

 

(This message has been edited by Bob White)

[SctDad]

I would say that what you need to do is sit down with all of the leaders and try to set forth a plan for three months. That is what we are going to do during the Christmas Break.

 

Come up with a plan that includes Den Meetings, Pack meetings, Monthly pack outing/event, and anything else that you may do on a regular basis.

 

We are going to be having a planning meeting for our pack soon. It will include plans for January, Feburary, and March. Then in March we will plan the next three months. We are going to be doing this because we are all busy, so if we do it right, we can have things already planned. Just a few things that we will be doing are, Planning our den meetings using program helps, planning the last few Go-see-its for the Tigers, Blue and gold banquet, pinewood derby, and starting the planns for the Spring Campout and Webelos Family Campout.

 

We will also discuss our upcoming fundraiser, and start the committee for the Summer Camp.

 

PM me if you need any other help.

[CubPack28]

Some concrete questions: What pieces of Pinewood Derby, Raingutter Regatta, family camping, outdoor outings that fulfill rank requirements or electives, Christmas party, Blue & Gold, and Graduation are program and should be planned by the Cubmaster/Den Leaders? What pieces are Committee? What roles do the Cubmaster/Committee play in promoting and getting Scouts to Council events such as Cuboree, Day Camps, etc? Who finds adult leaders willing to attend? -asked Hopalong

 

Hi Hopalong,

In our Pack, and I am the Committee Chair in the Pack, what falls as our /my responsibilities of the things that you listed are the following-securing a location for those events you listed, ordering kits for the PWD cars and boats for the regatta, approving locations for the campouts and overnights, payment of fees ( treasurer with committee approval of the expense). Blue and Gold is the B&G Committee's responsibility, but absent them, it is mine ultimately to locate a place to hold it, and to secure any caterers or vendors etc.

I also secure the trophies for the Regatta and the PWD races, and secure payment by the treasurer to the vendor.

We ( the Committee) approve expenses, develop and approve the budget for the Pack, and work on securing the funding to make that budget work for the pack, chair fundraisers, etc..my job as the CC is to make sure that the Program is being done by both the Den Leaders and the Cub Master/Asst. CM's as well.

But Program and the actual running of it is all theirs, as long as they are following the Guide to Safe Scouting, and the camp site is approved by Council, and we have the money, it is theirs to organize, plan, and carry out.

We also have an Awards and Recognitions person, and that person is the one responsible for securing the boys awards and rank advancements as needed. The Den Leaders report to her what things the boys have completed each month.

Since we have a newsletter, the Council program offerings are included in that to let the parents know about them, but it is the parent's responsibility to get them to them, or the Den Leader's to arrange transportation if they are going to something like a Haunted Harvest festival together as a Den....

Our Overnights out of town are usually arranged by the Committee only as far as payment of the reservations goes and confirming the # of boys and adults attending, but transport is the problem of the CM or DL...

Your CM should attend your Committee meetings to let you know what plans he has for the Pack Meetings for the coming months, to let you know what the Pack /Dens are doing, in need of, and to make suggestions for any upcoming items. He does not however get a vote on approval or not.

Program is his/her department and that includes making sure that the Dens are operating as they should, making sure that the Pack meetings are held monthyl according to the theme of the month, giving out awards and rank advancements are his to take care of unless he is not there, then the Asst. CM fills in for him, Pack Camping overnights are his to plan and carry out, therefore he must take care of having the right amount of adults and provide us with a list of those attending that particular outing.

End of the Year? - we are a year round program, although we do have a welcome to Summer Time Program barbeque at the end of June to kick off our Summer activities....

I hope this helps some......

Cub Pack 28 CC

[ScoutNut]

Like Bob, I am a bit confused over your role in the Pack. You stated that you have taken on the role of "PC". According to the most current Adult Application PC is the code for ScoutParent Unit Coordinator. However, it is not a part of a ScoutParent Unit Coordinator's duties to "fix" everything they perceive as being done incorrectly by a BSA unit.

 

I am also confused by the fact that you state that you have been with this Pack for 6-8.5 years (not sure based on your description), have taken training, attended Roundtable, talked to your DE, and read the Cub Scout Leader Book (Cub Leader Handbook?), and yet you still do not understand how a Pack works.

 

Packs do NOT "discriminate" on what is, and is not, program. Just about everything associated with a Pack, and what it does, should address some aspect of the Purposes of Cub Scouting. Fulfilling the Purposes of Cub Scouting IS program.

 

In the Cub Scout Leader Book, BSA goes into detail on how a Pack's leaders (ALL of them) work TOGETHER to provide a great program to the Pack's youth. There is no such thing in Cub Scouting as separate Pack Committee and Pack Den Leader meetings. Pack's should hold a monthly Pack LEADERS meeting. This meeting would include all den leaders, CM, Asst CM, Committee Chair, Charter Org Rep, Committee members, and misc heads of any specific Pack committees.

 

At the monthly Pack Leaders meeting they discuss, TOGETHER, what the dens are up to in the next month or 2, if the dens need anything from the Pack, how the last Pack meeting went, what worked, what didn't work, what if any changes should be made for next time, what is needed for the current month's Pack meeting, who is doing what for it, when the den leaders need to get their list of awards to the Pack Advancement Chair, planning is started for the next month (or 2's) Pack meetings, upcoming events are discussed, the Event Chair hands out fliers to all den leaders and keeps everyone updated on responses/problems, Treasurer gives a report on status of Pack bank account, Fundraising Chair goes over results/planning of Pack fundraisers, etc, etc. Den Leaders take back all information to their dens and pass it along to their den families.

 

Your Committee Chair (CC) should assign a parent or Committee Member as the Pinewood Derby Chair who is responsible for putting together the event. They should gather a group of parents/leaders to help, and as the Pinewood Derby Committee they should make sure the track is in good condition, make sure they have any and all supplies needed for the evening (scale, tools, graphite, etc), acquire decorations, make sure any software used is available and accurate, essentially plan, and pull together the evening. The evenings schedule should include time for award ceremonies and other Pack related items. As you can see, there is no program vs non-program thing going on. It is simply everyone pulling together to provide a great event.

 

This same sub-committee type of thing is used for Raingutter, Camping (BALOO trained adult should be the Chair), misc Pack outings, Summer Camp, Day Camp, Christmas Party, B&G, Graduation, and many other Pack events.

 

Your Outings Chair is really in charge of many other outing related Chairs (BALOO, Summer Camp, Day Camp, District Cub Fun Day, etc), who usually are parents/leaders who are going to attend the specific outing activity. The Outing Chair provides coordination, Tour Permits, and any other help where needed.

 

The Pack Advancement Chair is in charge of collecting the monthly list of awards that need to be given out at the Pack meeting from every den, purchasing them, and sorting them by den. The Advancement Chair works WITH the CM to plan and deliver fun ceremonies for the boys to receive their awards.

 

It sounds like what your Pack needs is to get ALL leadership trained. Then your CC needs to do some recruiting of new Committee Members (get them trained as well) and work on getting the entire Pack leadership to work together as a TEAM.

 

Because I am not clear on what position you fill, I can not be much help in advising you on what you can do to help implement this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bob White]

Thanks CubPack28, I completely forgot about the new position of ScoutParent Coordinator. If that is the position that hopalong is refering to then their job is really about coordinating the parnets who are not registered leaders to participate and staff events and activities for the Pack.

 

 

[hopalong]

Sorry for the confusion. My role is CC. I have been in the Pack a total of six years, with 2.5 as secretary and since May 08 as CC. We do have a mess. I am considering having the Commissioner staff come in to help us sort this out, but not sure if it will be beneficial.

 

Our Pack has a history of doing things its own way, as opposed to the BSA way. For ex., training wasn't considered necessary. I served as Secretary for 2.5 years without ever registering as a Committee member because I was told it wasn't necessary to register. Den Leaders were told they could go ahead and serve for a year without training and so most did. Den Leaders were not allowed to attend Committee meetings when I first joined the Committee. Our Chartered Org serves in name only. We even provide our own space.

 

When asked to take on the CC role (there wasn't anyone else), I knew I had to register and then figured there must be training for the role, so I sought it out by contacting the Council. Our Pack was circling the drain when I took the role. I have not pulled it back alone. Committee members have become excited about having a more active Pack. We recruited more boys and parents and we're trying to turn it around.

 

Bob White, I understand we need a team effort and that is my goal. We have just now gotten all direct contact leaders trained to position and have two new committee members who need to attend training. You list program leader separate from Cubmaster, etc. Who would this be?

 

We are turning our entire paradigm around here. Training is a good, desirable thing. Quality Unit is something we hope to earn and we're talking about it to Leaders. We have people stepping forward to help. We haven't really participated in Council events for several years until this year. We have been jumpstarting a dying Pack. A legacy of our Pack history is that our Cubmaster doesn't believe it is necessary to attend Committee meetings or for the Den Leaders to meet. They've never had to before, right?

 

SctDad, you are having a planning meeting. I would like to see our Pack do this. Is it led by your CC? Do your other Committee members attend? Do your committee members deal with issues such as advancements and budget at a separate meeting?

 

CubPack 28, thank you for examples you provide. What you describe is what I believe we need to move toward for these activities.

 

ScoutNut, thank you for the description of the monthly leaders meetings. Alone, this would go a long way toward solving many of our issues. I assume you cover all Pack related issues in this monthly planning meeting, as opposed to separating out budget or other issues for the committee members to deal with separately? Your description of all of the leaders pulling together is where we want to be by May.

 

In May, we have a new set of committee members taking over. We will have a new Cubmaster who has already been to training and wants to do the job well, as opposed to scraping by. We hope to have Den Leaders pulled into the team effort.

 

Thank you all for your feedback. Further suggestions on how to get to where we need to be is also appreciated. Getting our Cubmaster to buy into the change to Leader meetings and getting Den Leaders to attend an additional montly meeting will be my first challenge, although the Den Leaders may welcome a format for support and planning. I can't help but think they feel like they've been set off alone.

[Bob White]

Program folks are the Cubmaster and assistant cubmasters, the den leaders and their assistants.

 

Administrative would be the Committee Chair and the committee members including the PC and the pack Trainer.

 

Mnay packs do their program planning with the the committee members and Program folks all together. With smaller packs this works especially well. With larger packs it is much more difficut to get things done this way. As an example as a Cubmaster we had 14 dens.

 

We had 28 den leaders and assistant den leaders 4 assistant cubmasters, plus a committee of about 14. We could rarely find space for a full staff meeting let alone hope to get anything accomplished in a reasonable meeting time.

 

Because of that I met with the Den Leaders to plan the program. I then met with the Committee chair and she and I worked out the details. We then presented the plan to the committee for their review and recommendations. The committee chair then gave assignments to the committee members on administrative work to support the program needs. I then gave the final instructions to the assistant Cubmasters and to the Den Leaders for their roles.

 

Here's how it would work for a pack meeting. The program theme was Nature. A Den leader new of a local nature preserve that had a hands on animal program that was going out to schools to do program. I had the assistant Cubmaster for program track down the details. Got back to me an at the committee meeting a coupe months oin advance of the theme I shared this with the committee. The Treasurer made sure we hade the money for the event and cut a check for the preserve. The secratary mailed the check with the details of the pack meeting and gave the contact number of the assist cubmaster for program to be called for confirmation and to answer any questions.

 

The den leaders and I already had a annual duty roster made up as to which den had set up with the assistant cubmaster for physical arrangements, and who had clean up. Another den had opening ceremony, another den had closing ceremony, and another den had a skit, and finally one den had a game.

 

The den leaders had to have advancement to be presented at the pack meeting written down on the den advancement form and delivered to the advancement chairperson's home no later than 1 week before the pack meeting. She filled out the pack advancement report for the council and picked up the awards. She then notified the treasurer who would then put more mony into the council account for next month.

 

The advancement chair brought the awards to the meeting and laid them out with the help of the Asst cubmaster for ceremonies, who had developed the advancement ceremony for that month.

 

The committee scribe set up the mail box at the front door so that as the den leaders entered they could pick up the folder that had all the announcements in writing to share with each of the scouts parents.

 

My job as scoutmaster was to be master of ceremonies at the pack meetings, keep things fun, well paced, and on time. We had our opening ceremonies, recognitions, a song, a skit, our featured presentation (in this case the animals), played a game, I did a cub version of a scoutmaster's minute, closing ceremony. clean up and go home.

 

Many hands made for light work. But every hand had a specific job each month and they were all trained on how to do it.

 

The main things that the committee chair and I provided was...the big picture vision, we workeed closely together to know where we wanted to see the pack go and how we would work to get it there, she leading the administrative support and me leading the program side. She recruited her team and I recruited mine, and then or big job was keeping people happy and productive and registered in their role.

 

So that's how everybody had a role and every program event was a team effort.