Can Someone Explain Woodbadge to Me

[Basementdweller]

Yet another example why my woodbadge experience/staff was horrible beyond words.......

 

 

 

[juggerwubba]

So I realised something frightening last night.

 

I have taken Fast start, NLE, Scoutmaster specific, OLS, woodbadge, several additional trainings (safety afloat....) attended TLT, staffed NYLT, read Boys Life and Scouting magazine, joined forums such as this one, but it was only last night as I was reading the new eagle scout documentation(which I stumbled on by accident) that I realised that a vital part of the scoutmasters role had NEVER been mentioned to me.

 

No one ever showed me a Troop record book, or a advancement wall chart, or mentioned that I would ever need to record any information at all.

 

Can someone tell me where this kind of basic paperwork, like budget planning, advancement tracking, recording dates that scouts are elected or selected for positions, is taught?

[Basementdweller]

I would get a software package like troopmaster or trooptrack to track your records.

 

 

Just create your own budget, I use google docs pretty easy. The wall chart is available from the scout shop but is pretty worthless as ours gets vandalized by the church youth group regularly.

 

 

If you want to PM me I will share ours from google docs

[Kudu]

jrush writes:

 

G2SS and YP are just guidelines rather than "rules". A 3-day backpacking trip is really just an "extended patrol day hike". I suppose a coed venture crew could do an unsupervised overnight campouts an call them "extended crew meetings".

 

Really, jrush? You are going to keep pounding the YP drum even though unsupervised Patrol Hikes are permitted?

 

The simple truth is that once you teach Patrol Leaders how to conduct Patrol Hikes without adult supervision and camp their Patrols 300 feet apart while backpacking, they will hold Patrol Overnights elsewhere with their friends outside of Scouting. That's what we did in the 1960s, and that's what some of my own Scouts have always done (see Scouter Magazine's Winter 1997 issue).

 

jrush writes:

 

Maybe I also don't understand the ire because our course did have the patrols about 100 yards apart, we did do our "backpacking trip" without the TG, and I figured all courses did the same thing, since it is a standardized syllabus, and your poor experience with WB is a local, rather than national issue.

 

OK, the logical fallacy first: Characterizing my objections to Wood Badge as "ire" dates back to 1965 when Wood Badge attacked Bill Hillcourt personally because he objected to the program destruction that would cause two million Boy Scouts to leave the BSA.

 

As for the Wood Badge standby that "your poor experience with WB is a local, rather than national issue," if you looked at the outcomes of Wood Badge objectively you would see that the problem is that "leadership skills" theory does not work for Real Patrols:

 

How many Wood Badge participants return from a Wood Badge course (in which the Wood Badge Patrols are 100 yards apart) and then teach their Patrol Leaders to space the Patrols Baden-Powell's 100 yards apart? 1 in 1,000? 1 in 10,000?

 

How many proud Wood Badgers return from the course and teach their Patrol Leaders to conduct Patrol Hikes without adult supervision (if only in the context of Troop campouts)? 1 in 1,000? 1 in 10,000?

 

For that matter, how many Wood Badge STAFFERS actually conduct unsupervised Patrol Hikes in their home units?

 

If any Wood Badgers actually used the Patrol Method, then you would see resulting questions in forums like this: "I just got back from Wood Badge and I'm looking forward to sending my Troop's Patrols out on unsupervised Patrol Hikes like we did in the course. Before I do, does anyone have any practical suggestions for me?"

 

In the entire history of the Internet, how many Wood Badgers have ever discussed a problem on an unsupervised Patrol Hike? 1 in 10,000? Seems like there would be more glitches than that.

 

Wood Badge could be fixed by explicitly saying: "Take these practices home to your own units."

 

Better yet, require all Boy Scout Program participants to add Patrol Hiking and B-P's 100 yards to their Tickets.

 

The reason that nobody uses Real Patrols?

 

Wood Badge has taken Patrol Leader Training away from the Patrol Leaders and replaced it with generic POR theory.

 

Wood Badge replaces Patrol Adventure with the goal of "understanding" leadership skills formulas.

 

That is why the "Real" Patrol Method seems reckless to you and everyone else.

 

jrush writes:

 

I was looking at it from the point of view of a person who has had extensive military training and professional development,

 

Wood Badge has nothing in common with military training or professional development. If only 1 out of every 1,000 military personal implemented what they practiced in training, we would be speaking Pushto now.

 

Wood Badge is a cult because "leadership skills" are an end in themselves:

 

The aim of the military is to win wars, not to "understand" leadership. The aim of corporations is to make a profit, not to "understand" leadership.

 

To apply the destructive force of Wood Badge to these institutions, you would need POR election cycles in which enlisted men vote for new commanding officers twice a year, and mail room workers vote for a new CEO every six months.

 

jrush writes:

 

the stuff I thought was silly was entirely appropriate for Cub leaders, and the "chuck 'em out there on their own" isn't going to fly with coed crews, posts, or ships. So, should WB return to be a "Troop-centric" course, and tell the Cubs and coed leaders that the course they're going to attend will have little to no applicability to their programs?

 

This is the "Program Neutered" excuse: Cut the balls off the Boy Scout Program to make Wood Badge acceptable to Den Leaders.

 

It is just an excuse. The original 1972 excuse for neutering the Boy Scout Program was that "Urban Youth" would flock to the BSA if we gave away indoor Eagle badges.

 

jrush writes:

 

Kudu, I agree with the concept you're proposing, but the way units could let their patrols operate in 1955 isn't the way the BSA will let units allow patrols to operate in 2015.

 

You may agree, but you don't look at Wood Badge objectively. If Leadership Development did to BSA Lifeguards what it did BSA Patrol Leaders (take away their position-specific training, replace it with generic POR theory, and run six-month popularity contests to give everyone a chance to learn "leadership skills" through "Controlled Failure"), then you would now be using against me the very same Wood Badge Logic:

 

jrush would write:

 

Kudu, I agree with the concept you're proposing, but the way waterfronts let Scouts swim in 1955 isn't the way the BSA will let Scouts swim in 2015. I STILL don't blame WB. No, sir! The Real Swimming Method of allowing boys to get wet in water over their knees was a victim to the CYA mentality in G2SS, YP, etc. Wood Badge taking position-specific training away from BSA Lifeguards had nothing to do with it!

 

jrush writes:

 

As I said in post #2 of this thread, WB is a "reflection of how national thinks" or something along those lines.

 

I agreed with that post, but I see all government-imposed monopoly corporations as inherently evil.

 

jrush writes:

 

WB isn't going to shift back to the GBB concept, because the Scouting HQ doesn't embrace the GBB concept.

 

I agree with that too, but HQ believes that racial minorities, Den Leaders, and indoor Committee Members hate camping as much as BSA millionaires do.

 

Yes they may be correct, but replacing camping with soccer is NOT Scouting.

 

See:

 

http://inquiry.net/leadership/sitting_side_by_side_with_adults.htm

 

jrush writes:

 

I agree with your ire at scouting getting away from GBB's ideals, but it's not just a WB issue.

 

Wrong. The BSA millionaires' cruel and intentional destruction of Green Bar Bill's life's work (and the subsequent loss of two million Boy Scouts) was implemented through Wood Badge in 1965.

 

Yours at 300 feet,

 

Kudu

http://kudu.net

[Eagle92]

JW,

 

A few comments.

 

1) RECORDS ARE VERY IMPORTANT AND KEEP THEM FOR A LONG TIME, LIKE 8+ YEARS. (caps for emphasis, not shouting). I've seen folks denied their Eagle b/c the council records were messed up. had to go back through records, and handbooks for some missing records, to correct the council records. Heck I had to go and update my den's records b/c they were showing folks had not earned their ranks, when thy did.

 

2) the troop record book is available via supply, and should be the responibility of the troop scribe. They also use to make a smaller version for PLs to keep track of things. Both are good for 12 calander months if memory serves.

 

3) As for the advancement poster, some folks use them, others don't. My troop didn't. I know of units with their own hut,or own room that have come up with other, more creative ways, or recording who is what.

 

4) best resource I recommend for you and your SPL is the Troop Program Features, Vols 1-3, and Troop resource book. TPF will allow your PLC to pick from 36 monthly programs that they can modify to suit their needs.

 

Good luck.

[jrush]

Kudu, my whole point is, the BSA used WB as the tool to basically "de-Green Bar Bill" scouting. Blaming WB for the motivations and actions of the BSA is no more logical than blaming handguns for the murder rate in Washington DC.

 

Blasting WB won't put the "real" patrol method back into scouting any more than banning handguns in DC will make people feel safe walking down unlit streets at night.

 

If you want to blast something, blast the BSA millionaires. Propose a movement to gut scouting above the council level. Leave the national office in charge of rank advancement and the national jamboree and nothing more. Put the councils in charge of their own WB program, their own YP, their own G2SS.

 

Instead of insisting the WB institute a syllabus change that national would outright not allow, how about insisting that Councils be placed in charge of their own WB programs. After all, councils determine whether or not some lad has met the requirements to be awarded the rank of Eagle.

 

Get WB put down at the council, then you, Kudu, can be annointed the council training chair, and then you develop and guide the WB curriculum to best suit the needs of your council.

[Basementdweller]

Back to the original posters question

 

Explain woodbadge to me........

 

 

It is a Council fundraising opportunity in which council representatives extract money from Scouters in the most painful manner possible. The side result is slave labor for many meaningless feel good projects for a 50 cent necklace.

[juggerwubba]

My point is no-one even MENTIONED record keeping.

 

I know how to keep records because of my real world training. I use spreadsheets, databases, even pencil and paper occasionally, but I have never been shown the tools that BSA produce for this.

 

 

 

[moosetracker]

Except for something on a 360 assement, and the ticket worksheet themselves, paperwork is not what Woodbadge is about.. Especially considering you have got CS, BS, and ventureing Leaders and all the paperwork is different..

 

Paperwork is in your Specifics training.. I should know I have 508 pages of paperwork out in my car ready to be passed out tomorrow for specifics training BS one set, Cubmaster another set, Tiger leader and different set.. Different for each & every breakout.. Den leader, Webelos leader, Committee & Pack Trainer..

 

[Basementdweller]

the BSA tools for this are miserable or non exisistant......have you tried the online advancement program yet????? it is terrible slow and very cumbersome.

 

Try Troopmaster, much more user friendly, will track for world conservation and a multitude of other awards without any extra work on your part.

[Jay K]

Advancement records. Troop Committee Challenge, Advancement chair module. I've seen the notebooks, wall charts, and such at the Scout Shop.

[Tampa Turtle]

I would recommend Troopmaster if you can afford. Really makes it a lot easier to pump out reports for meeting with boys.