Venturing and NYLT/WB

[BDPT00]

I saw a promo recently for another council's NYLT. It was aimed at 13-20 year olds. Should not 18 year old Venturers take Wood Badge? I don't see any point in having a 2nd year college woman taking the same course as a junior high school boy.

Do other councils (national) do it the same?

BDPT00

[emb021]

Its recommended that 18 and older Venturers take WB. I know of no rule that bars them from going to NYLT, but I bet that council has people who don't like the idea of youth taking WB.

 

 

[Eagle92]

Concur, doesn't make sense, and some folks probably don't like the "youth" attending.

 

 

Besides if you are going to do a course, might as well be WB21C. They are essentially the same course, with a ticket for the adults to do. Why waste the 18-20 year old's time and money taking NYLT, when they will eventual need to take WB21C and do the course all over again.

[qwazse]

Some youth may feel more comfortable taking NYLT with their peers. Although unlikely, a 20 y.o., may have just spent the year on prepping for high adventure with the 13 y.o. who just joined his/her crew.

 

IMHO, there's no reason to rush a 20 y.o. into WB21C. There may be tons of reasons to encourage it, but few of them are scouting related. (E.g., the youth is advancing in his/her job or growing a new business and could use a little management training "outside the box". A youth is spinning gears in college and needs a "safe" environment where he or she could do a little goal setting.)

 

Anyway, those older venturers (or younger ASM's) should probably get some guidance from adult leaders to sort out which leadership training experience is best for them. Within scouting, their council may be offering three viable options: NYLT, WB, or Kodiak.

 

Personally, I've been trying to steer my youth towards Kodiak, but they aren't biting. So if the other options are available and interest them, I'd encourage it.

[bacchus]

"Personally, I've been trying to steer my youth towards Kodiak, but they aren't biting."

 

Great idea! By the way, you can attend Kodiak CDC and turn your next crew Trek into a Kodiak It isn't as difficult as it sounds, and is very rewarding.

[SR540Beaver]

I'm an NYLT back up course director for our summer course and the course director for our fall course. I attended the Course Director's Conference back in November. The basic rule of thumb was that those over 18 needed to take WB instead of NYLT. Within NYLT, the rule of thumb is you don't put 16 or 17 year olds in tents with 13 year olds. My personal belief is that while I think it is fine to mix and match programs with one adult WB course, they should have left NYLT strictly as a Boy Scout specific course instead of including Venturing. I understand the idea that it is more efficient, but the target audiences between the adults and youth are different enough that I think they should have left it as is. But they didn't and it is what it is. We ran our first coed coursr last fall and there actually were some parents who didn't like the idea of their youth participant and/or youth staff being in a coed week long experience. It worked out fine as you just youth Venturing YP policies for NYLT.

 

Now, all that being said......I wish (I posted this in another thread a few months back) BSA would address the age issue. Here is what I'm talking about. A Boy Scout is considered an adult at 18 and therefore can't do NYLT but would need to take WB. However, a Ventuerer is considered a youth until 21, so should they be attending WB and tenting with adults or should they attend NYLT? The rule of thumb is already that an 18 year old should go to WB, but it creates YP issues. Then you throw OA into the mix where they are considered youth to 21 and it gets just as confusing. On a campout with his troop, an 18 year old is an adult ASM and tents with the adults. On an OA outing, he is considered a youth and has to tent with the youth....who he is forbidden to tent with on a troop campout.

 

Does BSA not see the conflicts here? Not to highjack the thread, but should we adopt the British Scouting model to address all of these gender and age related issues? BTW, that was what the thread from a few years ago was addressing, so you can go find that one if you want to continue that discussion.

[Eagle92]

SR,

 

 

Here's how I've seen things done OA wise.

 

OA Youth 17 and under

OA Youth 18-20

OA Adult Males 21+

OA Adult Females 21+