Emergency Prep

[NJCubScouter]

It's an award, it's not advancement and it is available to more than just those at the boy scout level.   I guess you could assume that the boy scout program does include emergency prep, but have no idea what the rest of your point is trying to be.    

 

Don't want a pin, don't have to do the award.     

 

I think it is one of several non-advancement awards that are not very well known, and even to those who know them, it is probably under-utilized because for most Scouts and Scouters, other things take higher priority.  To my knowledge, nobody in my troop has ever earned this award, or any of the National Outdoor awards, or Nova awards, or most of the others.  I just looked at a long list of BSA awards, and I would say that the only ones that are really well known in my "neighborhood" are the ones that have adult knots connected with them (including Silver Beaver and DAM), the religious awards, the veteran's awards and the 50-miler award.

 

That is not to say that the award should not exist.  And I agree with RichardB, if one thinks the award overlaps too much with other things, the answer is not to apply for the award.

[qwazse]

It's an award, it's not advancement and it is available to more than just those at the boy scout level.   I guess you could assume that the boy scout program does include emergency prep, but have no idea what the rest of your point is trying to be.    

 

Don't want a pin, don't have to do the award.     

You're the one who asked "Why not?" 

 

My point: there is an overall institutional cost to the profusion of awards.

 

We have boy scouts' attention for one hour a week ... venturers, less. They can only focus on so much.

I invest that time in telling them who to contact for EMT certification, the local VFD, JROTC, BSA or RC lifeguard, or the Law Enforcement or Medical Exploring ... or whatever organization will help them find their specific path. I then encourage them to do their best to draw their buddies in.

 

The E-prep award is just more noise unless we become convinced that first responders are looking for anything more than the helping hands that stosh describes.

Edited October 20, 2016 by qwazse

[walk in the woods]

In fairness, the flooding in Louisiana was right at the beginning of the school year and Matthew hit during the school year.  It would be pretty tough for kids (and their parents) from outside the area to get extended time-off to travel to either to volunteer.  Additionally, there's almost no way to know how many scouts and/or units did local food drives or clothing drives or fundraisers in an attempt to help.  As for the local youth, did you query every football player and helper to see if they were also scouts?  How many scouts and scouters were so impacted that they were busy evacuating or dealing with the issue directly?  In Louisiana the authorities were trying to shutdown the "Cajun Navy" why would they have wanted a bunch of teenagers around?  It feels like you are using a fairly narrow perspective to paint with a really broad brush.

 

FWIW, when the tornado hit central Illinois a few years ago there were several scout teams that went down to help with the recovery operations over a number of months, and several more that I'm aware of that ran food/clothing drives and fundraisers to help..  Same thing happened when the tornadoes went through the local council territory a couple of years later.  

[NJCubScouter]

My point: there is an overall institutional cost to the profusion of awards.

 

We have boy scouts' attention for one hour a week ... venturers, less. They can only focus on so much.

I invest that time in telling them who to contact for EMT certification, the local VFD, JROTC, BSA or RC lifeguard, or the Law Enforcement or Medical Exploring ... or whatever organization will help them find their specific path. I then encourage them to do their best to draw their buddies in.

 

The E-prep award is just more noise unless we become convinced that first responders are looking for anything more than the helping hands that stosh describes.

 

This is what I have called the "Good Idea Syndrome".  The BSA is overwhelmed with good ideas, but rather than be selective about which ones to implement, they seem to try to implement all of them.  Each award is a good idea, or even a great idea, in and of itself, but when you add up all the awards, they lose their individual "shine" and just become part of the background noise, and that's the best-case scenario.  The worst-case scenario is that units, or individual Scouts, try to do too many of these things and lose their focus on the "core" Scouting activities and advancement requirements.  It is the same thing with Eagle-required merit badges.  Each individual merit badge is a good candidate to be Eagle required, and yet the current result of adding badges over the years is that there are now 13 required MB's as compared with 8 non-required, whereas the balance used to be even (or almost even).  I suspect that when Cooking became required again, there was some discussion at National of de-requiring (I just made up a word) another MB - in fact there was speculation about it in this forum before the change was officially announced - but that was never done.  And it's not surprising, because having Cit in the World (for example) be required is a "Good Idea", same for Family Life, same for... name your favorite borderline-required MB here.  I think another manifestation of the Good Idea Syndrome is in some of the long lists of requirements for some of the MB's (both required and non-required) and the lower ranks themselves.  Each requirement is a Good Idea, but add it all up and it's a lot.

 

At least with the Emergency Prep Award and the Nova Award and This Award and That Award, they are optional.  Well, technically I guess advancement is optional too, but you know what I mean.

Edited October 20, 2016 by NJCubScouter

[Stosh]

In fairness, the flooding in Louisiana was right at the beginning of the school year and Matthew hit during the school year.  It would be pretty tough for kids (and their parents) from outside the area to get extended time-off to travel to either to volunteer.  Additionally, there's almost no way to know how many scouts and/or units did local food drives or clothing drives or fundraisers in an attempt to help.  As for the local youth, did you query every football player and helper to see if they were also scouts?  How many scouts and scouters were so impacted that they were busy evacuating or dealing with the issue directly?  In Louisiana the authorities were trying to shutdown the "Cajun Navy" why would they have wanted a bunch of teenagers around?  It feels like you are using a fairly narrow perspective to paint with a really broad brush.

 

FWIW, when the tornado hit central Illinois a few years ago there were several scout teams that went down to help with the recovery operations over a number of months, and several more that I'm aware of that ran food/clothing drives and fundraisers to help..  Same thing happened when the tornadoes went through the local council territory a couple of years later.  

 

I was in a shelter that was the local high school.  I can assure everyone that school was not in session at the first announcement of evacuation so the kids had the time.  I'm not talking about traveling half way across the country to help out, I'm talking about the local residents that know the area and are a 5 minute walk away in some circumstances.  If a disaster hit one's own town, what would the scouts be able to do?  That's the point.

 

I'm retired so I have the time to take off and go halfway across the country.  I'm not a local.  I don't know the local area.  Without Good Maps, I never would have even been able to know what direction out of town I needed to drive to get to my assignment.  Yet local volunteers do step up and provide unbelievable help in that they know the area, they know the people, they know the low spots that might flood, etc.  Even if the boys couldn't provide hands on help, they would be excellent people to have available to know where the flooding areas were, where the damage was, where the relief supplies are needed the most, etc., etc. etc.  One kid shows up and says I have a map all marked where help is needed and hands it to a Red Cross worker is solid gold!