Bad training leads to bad trainers

[Scoutfish]

Tonight was a very interesting RT.

 

We broke into our seperate groups. I went with the cub scouts since I am CM of my pack.

 

Well, tonight, our topic was training and leader's knots.

 

We had a council commissioner as a guest for their award knot presentation, and one of my fellow district committee members was running the training side of things.

 

She's a great asset to scouting. She's the CC of her pack and does an very awesome job. She also promotes camping enthusiaticaklly within her pack.

 

 

 

So, the problem started when she started taling about particular trainings. BALOO to be exact.

 

" We don't push BALOO anymore since Outdoor Leader trumps BALOO and the leaders like it better anyways. "

 

A few minutes later :

 

" With Outdoor Leader training, even the Tiger den leader can take just his den camping and doesn't have to involve the whole pack to do it. "

 

 

I kid you not!

 

So, I kinda break into her presentation and ( in a very nice way - mind you) explain that she is completely wrong. We discuss how what she said is completely oposite of what the real rules are and she explains that this was what she was taught at the BALOO class that she and 5 of her leaders took at the next council over.

 

She then brought out the literature from THAT class that the class instructor printed up and showed us.

 

I told her that the literature was wrong. At this point, the council com told her she was wrong.

 

About that time, the DE walked into the room after doing whatever he was doing with the boy scout side. We went back over it again and he also agreed with what I said.

 

Now, the woman wasn't arguing with us. She was shocked, and understandibly so. I whipped out my Cub Scout Leaders handbook and showed her wher it was written about everything we discussed. Told her I wasn't trying to upstage her or anything, but that a bunch of wrong info was about to be spread farther.

 

So, has something like this ever happened at your RT?

 

From going out of council to take a class?

 

A well meaning individual spread the wrong info due to themselves being trained wronmg?

 

One more thing...my DE said that I am now on his next BALOO training staff.

 

Should I feel complimented, or be kicking myself, or both?

 

 

Edited because I did knot spell very well.(This message has been edited by scoutfish)

[Scouter.]

Sounds like you all covered the "knots" and the "nots".

 

Sorry...I could not resist.

 

Honestly...you had to do it though. My hat is off to you...I'm not sure I would have known how to handle that one.

 

That's all the more reason I (and others) appreciate you sharing your postings and experience.

 

Peace...S.

[Scoutfish]

I am knot ammused!

 

[Eagle92]

my answers

 

So, has something like this ever happened at your RT?

 

Yes, but on the BS side. Had folks telling how the advancement process works, especially at the Eagle BOR stages. problem was A) they had been doing things wrong for a long time, B) they misinterpreted the old Advancement policies, and C) Didn't read the new GtA, despite having a copy on them.

 

Thing is he should know better as he was a trainer!

 

A well meaning individual spread the wrong info due to themselves being trained wrong?

 

KINDA, not necessarily trained wrong, just given the wrong info. One RT staffer said the OA was no longer using lodge numbers at all, but instead only uses council numbers. That's partially true. National only uses council numbers as it's too confusing to them. So all paperwork has the council number instead of the lodge number. HOWEVER local lodges are still given a number and can use it locally.

 

We had a "conversation." I tried to be polite and explain the actual policy since A) I was the chapter adviser and wasn't in the OA at the time and B)I was at the lodge executive meeting when all this came out. But he told me: "NO, YOU'RE WRONG." so i dropped it.

 

Should I feel complimented, or be kicking myself, or both?

 

BOTH

[Basementdweller]

What you have is leaders that know it all....

 

You would have thought that she would have at least reviewed the information.

 

Makes you wonder how she runs her Pack as CC????

 

 

 

[Eamonn]

One bad thing about a title is that some people think that you know everything.

In the real world I have a few titles.

I'm an Executive Chef. But I know next to nothing about Mexican Food or how to cook Chinese.

I'm a Registered Dietitian, I have never read the South Beach Diet and without an order from a MD I'm not writing you a diet.

I served as Council Training Chair. I couldn't tell anyone what the requirements for a specific knot is or was.

I found that saying "I'm not sure about this, but I will look it up and get back to you." Worked well for me. Or sometimes I just had to just say "I'm sorry I don't know."

Of course these weren't the answers that people wanted to hear, but I'd rather not give someone any information over giving them the wrong information.

Some people seem to really want to add a lot of stuff that just isn't there into YP Training. - I'm glad that it's on line. The other areas where people seem to want to go off half cocked are liability and insurance.

I'm not sure why?

Ea.

[Crew21_Adv]

Scoutfish and Fellow Scouters,

 

What frustrates me more is when extra rules are applied by well meaning trainers. Quoting something they heard, from someone else, that claimed it was factual and also the newest "secret limited release" from National. But don't tell anyone else, because only their secret source has the truthful information directly from Texas.

 

"You must take YPT annually"

"Where does is say that?"

"It's in the manual!!"

 

Or

 

"Boy Scouts cannot use axes anymore!! Are there any questions?"

"Really, are they doing away with the Paul Bunyan Award too?"

"You ask to many Questions!!"

 

Scouting seems to frequently changes the rules regarding safety. So it may take some time to see what is currently true and what is a recent Scouting myth.

 

Currently, I'm trying to find the "recently published three year expiration" for Trainers EDGE. I have been told EDGE must be renewed every three years, to maintain currency! But I'm not finding any Trainers EDGE expiration written on the National website (I have found it on another councils webpage, but haven't found it yet on the National site). I'm also waiting for the "semi-annual" and then "monthly" YPT training renewal to be announced soon.

 

Scouting Forever and Venture On!

Crew21 Adv

[Crew21_Adv]

Fellow Scouters,

 

I must admit.

 

After hours of searching, I finally found it on the Scouting website. EDGE is good for three years.

(Dangit) Maybe National should put it in the Trainer's EDGE syllabus.

 

Scouting Forever and Venture On!

Crew21 Adv

[DLChris71]

I was in that RT with Scoutfish, me being the biggun DL from Pack 732 at the end of the table. I'm glad you spoke up about the issues you brought up and I was glad to second you on them. In fact I think I was the person that brought up the question (BALOO v. IOLS) in the first place because I just didn't know for sure. But I was glad everyone got the matter settled straight before we all left. I knew the IOLS - Tiger connection was out as I was "requested" to go through the G2SS to see if we could use canoes at a Pack event (nope).

 

 

 

[Scoutfish]

How about that! You were sitting on my right at the end of the table?

 

WEll, like I said, Michelle is a great scouter as well as a great CC. Been working with/ around her for some time now.

 

What she did was present to us - info that was taught to her directly at a training offered by another council. The reason she went to the other council was because the date of the BALOO training was offered in the early fall instead of late winter , which is when our council offers it.

 

And if you think about it, that make s sense:

 

Most packs recruit new scouts and parents and leaders in the late summer/ early fall. Most pack have at least one pack campout in the fall . Why does our council offer the class in February when the scout year is about half over?

 

The other council offered it around the time you have recruited new leaders and committee and are ready to go camping. It does make sense to go to the other copuncil for that training.

 

Plus milage wise, it was actually an hour closer.

 

 

So, back to Michelle. She went to a class where a council trainer instructed everybody in the class trhe misinformation listed above. If you never had BALOO before, you wouldn't know to think this info was skewered. Any student really wouldn't have any reason to not trust the instructor...especially since BSA does change things up every now and again.

 

Matter of fact, Michelle brought up Tour Permits. I told her vthat they were now Tour Plans.

 

Going over the award knots, the council commissioner mentioned that some required your unit to earn the quality Unit award, at which time one of us said: "You mean the JTE?"

 

So, my point is, Michelle - and all of us really - are not exempt from an instructor or councils ( our first line of training and info ) giving us bad info.

 

Remember the red and white numbers versus green and tan? ?)

 

[qwazse]

Yet one more cluster of victims of EDGE without "reference." Because the instructor (or whoever taught) him/her was trained to formulate materials that explained source material RATHER THAN READING THE SOURCE MATERIAL ITSELF.

 

How hard would it have been to read G2SS and other materials out loud on the subject? Perhaps during training, have everyone take turns reading through theG2SS tour plan material. Then the competent CC would know to present trustworthy sources at round table.

 

For the love of all that makes us human folks:

 

Reference

Reference

REFERENCE

 

[Basementdweller]

How can this possibly degrade into a cub scout vs boy scout leader thing?????

 

Simply stupid if ya ask me.....

 

Simply put she didnt do the research before her presentation.

 

Dont candy coat it......italics

[CalicoPenn]

Hold the phone here - No one should be faulting this trainer at all since she was given the wrong information in the first place, and was able to produce the handouts she received from her instructor to prove it.

 

Repeating bad information received from another trainer doesn't make one a bad trainer, it just means the information is bad. What would make a bad trainer is if, when discovering the information they were provided is wrong, the trainer keeps using it. That's just not the sense I'm getting from Scoutfish. There is a lot more to training than just information - despite the bad information, was she engaging? Keeping folks interested? She may very well be a perfectly fine trainer who was handed bum information.

 

 

[Twocubdad]

Okay, related question (I've had this one in my back pocket for awhile, this seems as good a spot as any.)

 

Newly crossed-over Webelos DL dad tells me he doesn't need Boy Scout OLS because he took the Webelos version. Just knodded and moved on beause I wasn't sure. Remember reading here there was a plan to combine the two, but never saw anything official.

 

Can anyone provide a cite? (site/sight/whatever works for you, 'fish.)

[moosetracker]

They never combined them. Still no changes, but last I heard, the plan was not to combine them but to put them into parts that once taken the same parts do not need to be repeated.. So you take cooking & campfire for OWLS no need to retake those parts for IOLS, just the parts that are different..

 

But.. That is still a future possibility also. Currently they are both separate..