Ad hoc patrols

[qwazse]

One more clarification. The patrols are not put together randomly. The senior patrol leader usually works with the camping group to combine existing controls. So each ad hoc patrol usually consists of members of two regular patrols

In this case, I would always give credit to the patrol that provides the largest contribution of members. E.g. They are not the Fox/Bear patrol on the campout.If there are 4 Foxes or 3 Bears they are the Foxes for the weekend. The Bears only get credit for participation if they represent as a distinct patrol. (If numbers are even they can decide among themselves or the SPL can call whose patrol they represent.)

 

I'm not saying you have to build a whole system of awards or whatever to make this work. You just recognize the patrols by the flags the boys choose to fly under.

[qwazse]

Regarding advancement, since the bulk of advancement happens on campouts, boys who cannot attend do not advance as fast and that is visible to the other boys. Regarding the Quality of program, if capping out at a 75% participation rate is not good, I'm not quite sure what we would do. The boys are the ones choosing and planning the outings. I guess we can ask the patrol leaders Council to think about why they don't get higher participation, but I also suspect that they believe the participation is fairly good as it is.

I'm not concerned about advancement as I am about accountability. Son #2 has been ASPL, SPL started evening classes on meeting night, and let us know in advance to let Son #2 prepare. He had soccer events on the first couple of nights (one event was optional IMO), I strongly suggested he call SM and his buddies to arrange coverage. (And keep calling until he was sure everything was arranged.) He didn't. Last meeting was SPL elections. Two other boys got the post until January.

 

That's kind of what I expect from members at every level.

[Eagledad]

There is a myth a lot of adults hold to that Boy Scouts is the boys program; it is not. Boy Scouts is an adult program designed to develop boys into men who make ethical decisions. What are the expectations of your adults for your troop? That being said, I know how hard it is to change a culture, but the adults have to decide if they are satisfied with the status quo. My son and his wife are both high school teachers in to different high risk schools, but with basically the same student demographic. Ninety Seven percent of last years graduating class of one school went on to college. The other school had far less than 50 percent. When I asked him what was different between the two schools, he said "expectation". Your troop can do better if the adults want it. Barry

[Brewmeister]

There is a myth a lot of adults hold to that Boy Scouts is the boys program; it is not. Boy Scouts is an adult program designed to develop boys into men who make ethical decisions. What are the expectations of your adults for your troop? That being said, I know how hard it is to change a culture, but the adults have to decide if they are satisfied with the status quo. My son and his wife are both high school teachers in to different high risk schools, but with basically the same student demographic. Ninety Seven percent of last years graduating class of one school went on to college. The other school had far less than 50 percent. When I asked him what was different between the two schools, he said "expectation". Your troop can do better if the adults want it. Barry

That unfortunately is where this troop falls short. But we must work with the cards we're given.

[Brewmeister]

I understand what you're saying. Unfortunately, society being what it is today, sports and school extracurriculars can require attendance in order to participate. So To tell a boy that he must choose between an outing or an evening concert that is required for his grade is not a decision we are going to ask him to make. The consensus seems to be that ad hoc patrols are not a good idea because of the lack of continuity, and I understand. However, the patrol of one seems equally a bad idea and certainly doesn't promote any intra-patrol development and interaction either.

By "patrol of one" I meant the "one-boy patrol" mentioned earlier; not one bad patrol.

[Basementdweller]

There is a myth a lot of adults hold to that Boy Scouts is the boys program; it is not. Boy Scouts is an adult program designed to develop boys into men who make ethical decisions. What are the expectations of your adults for your troop? That being said, I know how hard it is to change a culture, but the adults have to decide if they are satisfied with the status quo. My son and his wife are both high school teachers in to different high risk schools, but with basically the same student demographic. Ninety Seven percent of last years graduating class of one school went on to college. The other school had far less than 50 percent. When I asked him what was different between the two schools, he said "expectation". Your troop can do better if the adults want it. Barry

Sure it's the boys program.......

 

While adults designed the program.....But I expect the boys to plan and execute to the best of their ability. Really struggling with the current SPL.

 

Visiting yosemite, Glacier national park, alaska, outer banks is all well and good.......But generally isn't the boys plannng those trips.

[Venividi]

There is a myth a lot of adults hold to that Boy Scouts is the boys program; it is not. Boy Scouts is an adult program designed to develop boys into men who make ethical decisions. What are the expectations of your adults for your troop? That being said, I know how hard it is to change a culture, but the adults have to decide if they are satisfied with the status quo. My son and his wife are both high school teachers in to different high risk schools, but with basically the same student demographic. Ninety Seven percent of last years graduating class of one school went on to college. The other school had far less than 50 percent. When I asked him what was different between the two schools, he said "expectation". Your troop can do better if the adults want it. Barry

"But we must work with the cards we're given."

if you are not getting the results that you want, (or if you find that some method isn't implemented correctly), it is possible to re-deal the cards.

 

I am a bit confused over the intent of your original post. In it you expressed that you felt things weren't quite right. Once several people validated that your feelings were correct and offered suggestions, it appears that instead you were looking for validation that what your troop is doing is the best that can be expected. If you have the program that you want and are happy with your results, that is fine. No one is insistent that you must do it differently; hopefully just explaining some alternatives for consideration.

[Stosh]

BP had the right idea when he said patrols needed to be 6-8 boys. Even if half don't show up for an event, one never has less than 3 to 4 boys in a patrol. If 7 boys bail on an event so as to have only one boy attending, I would reconsider the activity in the first place. If only one boy wants to go, is it enough to even call it a patrol outing let alone a troop outing? Having activities for the sake of having activities isn't enough justification, especially if the vast majority of boys are taking a pass on it.

 

Stosh

[Brewmeister]

There is a myth a lot of adults hold to that Boy Scouts is the boys program; it is not. Boy Scouts is an adult program designed to develop boys into men who make ethical decisions. What are the expectations of your adults for your troop? That being said, I know how hard it is to change a culture, but the adults have to decide if they are satisfied with the status quo. My son and his wife are both high school teachers in to different high risk schools, but with basically the same student demographic. Ninety Seven percent of last years graduating class of one school went on to college. The other school had far less than 50 percent. When I asked him what was different between the two schools, he said "expectation". Your troop can do better if the adults want it. Barry

The intent of my post was to ask troops that use ad hoc patrols--which I know are there--how it is done successfully, because of the problems I see with our troop as stated in the original post. I do not see the team building that we should have from regular patrols. So far from looking for validation that we are doing the best that can be expected, I am assuming that there must be a better way to do things.

 

The cards that we are given--because I'm not a member of the key 3--is that ad hoc patrols are most likely a fact in this troop because of its history and culture.

 

It may well be that the best answer is to re-deal the cards--to change the culture--but that is another discussion. Right now I am looking for insight into how to improve the situation with the stated constraints based on the experience of troops that run a similar program.

[Brewmeister]

BP had the right idea when he said patrols needed to be 6-8 boys. Even if half don't show up for an event, one never has less than 3 to 4 boys in a patrol. If 7 boys bail on an event so as to have only one boy attending, I would reconsider the activity in the first place. If only one boy wants to go, is it enough to even call it a patrol outing let alone a troop outing? Having activities for the sake of having activities isn't enough justification, especially if the vast majority of boys are taking a pass on it.

 

Stosh

You and I are on the same page because that is exactly what I was thinking about this afternoon. I think part of the reason we have ad hoc patrols is our patrols have become too small due to attrition, particularly at the older levels (because they are age based). So...stay tuned.

[Basementdweller]

BP had the right idea when he said patrols needed to be 6-8 boys. Even if half don't show up for an event, one never has less than 3 to 4 boys in a patrol. If 7 boys bail on an event so as to have only one boy attending, I would reconsider the activity in the first place. If only one boy wants to go, is it enough to even call it a patrol outing let alone a troop outing? Having activities for the sake of having activities isn't enough justification, especially if the vast majority of boys are taking a pass on it.

 

Stosh

Another reason not to have age based patrols....

 

What I envision is the older guys joining the green bar or leadership patrol of SPL aspl and quartermaster, then the JASM. Allowing a constant flow thru the Patrols.....never ending up with a patrol of 2 15 year olds.

[Twocubdad]

I tried the Leadership patrol thing for several years. It never really worked until we got to a point where the leaders were all buddies and would have been in a patrol together regardless. That group is aging out this year with about half already 18. The current group of leaders are scattered over a couple patrols with their buddies and I don't really see the leadership patrol idea working. My experience is that friendship trumps job titles every time.

[MattR]

I don't have aged based patrols. I require either the PL or APL at every patrol activity (camping is one of them). For non leadership positions I require scouts to go on half the campouts and half the service projects if they want to be in a patrol. Exceptions are only made for acts of God. Homework is not an act of God. Band practice is not. Divorced parents are. Scouts have time to be in sports and other activities, they just need to think ahead a bit. We've had these expectations for about a year now and attendance is up and attrition is no different. More kids are having fun. Teamwork is much better. The problem scouts left or are no longer a problem. I will only allow combined patrols if there is only one in a patrol going.

[Brewmeister]

Ok, so in reviewing the roster, some things became clear. When you discount boys who will probably fall off the roster this year because they have not been around, we have 24 active boys. So thinking back, our typical campout attendance is usually between 15-18. So we are actually pushing 75% which seems pretty typical--the problem is that we have 6 patrols as follows:

 

6 6th grade

6 7th grade

5 8th grade

3 9th grade

4 11th grade

 

Therefore, the reason we usually end up with 3 ad hoc patrols is that it reflects the natural breakdown of what the troop should be; i.e., 3 patrols.

 

I had a discussion with the SM and he agreed that having 3 patrols would be optimal and that we should let the boys self-organize into those patrols. Now this is a huge step for us--normally the troop plunks boys into a NSP and they stay together until the end.

 

Ideally we'd see 3 patrols of 8, but...who knows what will happen.

 

Reading the threads here, there seems to be as many ways of having boys organize their patrols as there are troops. I can't remember how we did it when I was a scout and if it was covered in leader training I either missed it or have forgotten it. I do believe that giving the scouts a parameter for the number of patrols desired (3) is the way to go. Yes, I've read the discussions in other threads about letting boys make as many as they want and learn from their mistakes but that's not what we're going to do.

 

So with that backdrop, what are the ideas for having the boys reorganize into 3 patrols?

[Stosh]

BP had the right idea when he said patrols needed to be 6-8 boys. Even if half don't show up for an event, one never has less than 3 to 4 boys in a patrol. If 7 boys bail on an event so as to have only one boy attending, I would reconsider the activity in the first place. If only one boy wants to go, is it enough to even call it a patrol outing let alone a troop outing? Having activities for the sake of having activities isn't enough justification, especially if the vast majority of boys are taking a pass on it.

 

Stosh

I guess I don't adhere much to either the age-based or the mixed patrol concerns. As long as the boys are buddies, they are more apt to hang out together than patrols that are designed by adults. If the patrol happens to end up mixed, great, if age-based, great. Not a problem either way in my book.

 

For me the patrol structure of who's in and who's not is based solely on friendships. If boys are looking for an excuse to hang out together, why not at a Scout activity of their choice? If all my buddies are going on an outing and I have a choice of hanging out with my pards or doing something else, I'm thinking the draw to hang out with friends holds a slight edge. It also resolves the issues of choosing between hanging out with friends who are not scouts vs. hanging out with some of the guys at Scouts that I hardly know and never come into contact with except at scouts.

 

6-8 boys, pick your own leadership however you want and let me know what your patrol name and yell is. We're done, move on to more important issues.

 

Stosh