New Sm Challenges

[Stosh]

Do we have any new SM's out there that can give us old goats a perspective on how they see the challenges they are facing as they take over the troops?  It's been a long time since I set foot on the stage that the view of the world has to be different now for the new guys,  What say ye?

[Gone]

Do we have any new SM's out there that can give us old goats a perspective on how they see the challenges they are facing as they take over the troops?  It's been a long time since I set foot on the stage that the view of the world has to be different now for the new guys,  What say ye?

@@Stosh, we just had our SM meeting last night and this was the exact topic.

 

Our SM said his biggest challenges were:

 

- Getting parents to step up and staff troop events and roles.

- Getting adults to step up and be ASMs and help coach the boys properly (read: advise and walk away, let the boys lead).

- Getting the right support from district/council for membership growth (e.g., the demographics councils are given from national, real programs that work for growing membership).

- Working with the PLC to develop an engaging program that would have the boys dying to be at the meeting rather than be home on the game console.

 

There were others but those were the most common.

[revdmv]

How to integrate everything I've been reading, and listening to about the patrol method without any first hand experience.

 

I did all the training along the way to becoming an ASM, and it was only through helping advise on two high adventure outings that I started to see my sons troop wasn't doing what I was seeing in action from other troops.

 

Now with all my reading and studying I see how far off it is.

 

 

 

[Stosh]

How to integrate everything I've been reading, and listening to about the patrol method without any first hand experience. I did all the training along the way to becoming an ASM, and it was only through helping advise on two high adventure outings that I started to see my sons troop wasn't doing what I was seeing in action from other troops. Now with all my reading and studying I see how far off it is.

 

@

 

Does the SM see it as well or is he/she a bit entrenched in the troop-method?  Do you discuss any of this with your son?

[RememberSchiff]

How to integrate everything I've been reading, and listening to about the patrol method without any first hand experience. I did all the training along the way to becoming an ASM, and it was only through helping advise on two high adventure outings that I started to see my sons troop wasn't doing what I was seeing in action from other troops. Now with all my reading and studying I see how far off it is.

If you can find another troop(s) clearly using the patrol method. Observe their meetings, campouts, as much as you can.

[revdmv]

I'm taking over as SM come Aug, I decided I wanted my son to have at least some time in Scout lead environment.

 

I wanted to start before summer camp, so as to get the Patrol Method kick started there, but the current SM wants to stay through it.

 

Having looked around I don't know any troops that qualify in the immediate area, they are mostly adult oriented.

[Stosh]

My apologies for not properly welcoming you to the forum.  Welcome and thanks for taking on the job of SM.  Hopefully some of what gets discussed here on the forum will help you with getting your troop oriented to boy-led, patrol-method.  I'm thinking the archives of the forum is loaded with a ton of material.  In the meantime, make sure you post your status and any questions you might have on the subject specific to your situation,  Well, it doesn't have to be related to anything other than scouting if you want to start up another thread, that's great too.

[blw2]

Not sure if it applies exactly to your question.... but from the Cubmaster perspective

I agree with @ in that getting parent and leader help is right on up there as my top problem

I might add;

coming into a dynamic with lots of positive energy against other scouters that are not so energetic and burned out even...

 

Feeling like we have to re-invent the wheel in some areas, because things aren't passed along

 

but in other areas fighting the attitude, "well it's always been done this way"

 

oh, and a big frustration I had early on was wanting to get in-person training for the group discussion, but only having it offered during the school year when I would be busiest with the pack activities and meetings.

[PA Scoutmaster]

I will be stepping down at the end of the calendar year with my replacement waiting in the wings. I agree with Bad Wolf and blw2 that getting new parents to help is the biggest challenge. We have always had a good group of adult leaders, but we have nobody at all with a boy under 14. Not sure why new parents don't seem to have interest in helping, but it seems universal. I hear the same thing from leaders from other troops in my area. 

[Gone]

We have always had a good group of adult leaders, but we have nobody at all with a boy under 14. Not sure why new parents don't seem to have interest in helping, but it seems universal. I hear the same thing from leaders from other troops in my area. 

 

Other unit leaders I talk to in both CS and BS say that the 20- and 30-something parents are simply looking for a place to drop their kids; can't be bothered to step in to any role that would conflict with their girls night out or golf game. It would be interesting to see a survey of those parental age groups to see what they want. Might explain the decline in both CB/BS rolls as well as leader decline.

[SSScout]

Bad wolf:  Herebouts, we call that the "soccer syndrome", as in drop the kid off, let the coach do his thing to make him/her a strong, skillful, fairplaying (at all cost) youngster; then come back in 2 hours.

 

Convincing them of the idea that if they don't have a connection with their boy/girl by the time they are 13, they won't have a connection when they turn 18 is hard.

Convincing them that even the couch potatoe dad can have a role in Scouting is equally hard. 

 

It gets easier if the Troop/crew is "Boy Led" and has an adventurous program.  The boy/girl will convince the dad.  Or become aware of the problem and YOU will become aware of those family dynamics, unfortunately.

[pargolf44067]

When I was SM for my troop before, I had a great group of parents that volunteered without being badgered.  We had more than enough parents that would be willing to go on campouts.  Since I have stepped back in I have noticed it is harder to find people to volunteer.  We get a lot that volunteer for the background things, COH refreshments, committee secretary, etc, but for the last two campouts it has been the same three leaders going and two of us didn't have boys on the campout.

 

I can see that this might be my biggest challenge going forward. There are some things that haven't been done since I left that I think helped recruit parents better, so maybe that will help, but I'm not sure.

[Eagledad]

I'm taking over as SM come Aug, I decided I wanted my son to have at least some time in Scout lead environment.

 

I wanted to start before summer camp, so as to get the Patrol Method kick started there, but the current SM wants to stay through it.

I was a pretty strong SM with a pretty good boy run reputation at the district/counsel levels. Two weeks before the official handoff, the next soon to be SM took me out for coffee to request I give him two months of meetings and camp outs before I came back to the troop. He said he needed a clear break from Barry Scouts (said it just like that) because he could never live up to my style of Scoutmastering. It kind of hurt at first, but I also experienced a SM who hung around to long because he couldn't let go. The two months was perfect to get both of us use to our new roles. I think you need to invite the SM for coffee because you won't get anything done at summer camp otherwise. I'm sure he is a good man, but few are that good and you will be doing him a favor. I know it took our new SM a lot of courage to make that request of me, but it was the right thing to do.

 

Barry

[Gone]

@@Eagledad, when we change the guard our out-going SM does the same thing. It's hard to be the figure head when the last figure head is still around....even in a boy-led troop. Our out-going SPLs usually become JASMs. Interestingly enough, the SPL does not have the same problem as the SM.

[Stosh]

@@Eagledad @

 

In the church I served it was required that the out-going pastor leave the congregation, the community and when he would come back to visit, would notify the in-coming pastor of his presence in the area.  I know the emotional bonds are a lot stronger for pastors than for SM's but the dynamics are pretty much the same.  Even if there is a 2-3 month break, the out-going SM must remember his new position in the troop and work VERY hard to stay out of the way.

 

My first parish had a founding pastor stay his entire career in that church.  When he retired he became the chaplain of the local hospital (Town population 1200 people)  He lived to be 104 years of age.  Needless to say when I served in that parish, it was like he was the previous pastor and he had been dead for 25 years.  I really felt sorry for all those pastors who served between him and me.

 

I think the rapid turnover with the scouts there isn't enough time to establish the long term bonds that get established with a SM tenure.

 

It took a lot of chutzpah to say what he did at coffee with Barry, but it is extremely important that it be done.