Changes

[Eagledad]

Very good points and ones that I have thought on as well. It was the Girls Scouts that showed me a lot of this. Like I said, they are very successful at this age. First the burnout part which is the most important part to me. The Tiger program struggles because the boys don't fit in the maturity of the rest of the pack. The Tiger program needs to be at a much simpler activities. I've seen some very successful Tiger programs where they only met once or twice a month. The plannning was done by families where each family took on one month. In fact no family planned more than two meeting in the tiger year in our Pack. In the Girl Scout model there is no Pack meetings so that takes pressure off the Cub Master.

 

The Girls Scouts don't have the burnout problem we have because they switch programs every three years like the BSA use to do until the 80's. The program change encourages leadership changes, kind of like what we see between the Pack and the Troop.

 

I don't know your reason for not going before first grade, but the reason I suggest that is because the maturity is the same for both age groups and there are some families that want a program for the family at that age.

 

In my dream world, Tigers would just go away. It hasn't worked easily into the program because of the difference in maturity. The only reason Tigers was created was to compete against Campfire Kids who started recruiting boys in the first grade to get boys before cubs. But their program is doing worse than the BSA.

 

I have a friend who got some numbers that was a real surprise to me. He said Nationaly only one scout out of eleven makes it from Tigers to Webelos II. I've been told the highest loss of Cubs scouts accures at the Tiger age. I don't know if that is true Nationally. It is true in my area.

 

Good response NJ. How do you feel about Tigers?

 

Barry

[KoreaScouter]

I'd make the following changes to BSA's IT architecture:

 

- Web sites: All councils will operate a server. All units in the council get web space on the council server (plus the OA Lodge, council camp, District staffs, etc). Not huge, maybe 5MB, so no pictures, video, animations, or any of that junk. Contact info, announcements, where/when they meet, unit calendar jazz, etc. Free would be great, but I'd also pay a few bucks a month. Imagine how easy it would be to find out this basic info about any unit in any council without having to data mine in Google for it. While we're at it, the council web site has a geo map of the council area on the home page, move your cursor over the map, and the district name pops up, each dot is a unit link. Go look at the Fox News Election results map, and you'll see what I mean.

 

- E-mail: Give registered Scouters a bsamail account on the ScoutNet server, and put them in an address book so I can find any registered Scouter in my District, or Council (or other unit-level guys in other councils). Go ahead and put the Region/National staff behind a firewall if they don't want us pestering them, but there's no reason why I should have to decipher a chicken-scratch sign-in sheet to get an e-mail address for the guy who's putting together our camporee. And, many of those e-mail addresses are not intuitive -- when I want to find Joe Putz, the address book will show me all the Joe Putz's, and I click on which one I want -- much better than trying to remember that Joe's personal e-mail is "rabidpackerfan1996@whatever.com". Log in, open the address book, search, and "Bob's your uncle". Again, it's ambitious, so you could start with CCs, SMs, CMs, and optional for other leaders. But, let's start somewhere. Free would be great here, too, but I'd pony up a few bucks a month for this one as well. What I'd get back in time and frustration would be worth it. Ever had a transfer Scout who didn't have all his records? Tried to get in touch with his last unit? How'd that work out for you? (Sorry, Dr. Phil.)

 

- Online fillable forms: Every piece of paper I fill out and schlep up to council should be online on the council web site, fillable with a password, and click-to-submit. Tour permits, money-earning applications, event registration, advancement reports, MB counselor apps, you name it. When it's done/approved/whatever, e-mailed back to CC/SM/CM's bsamail account.

 

- MB Counselor data base: Should be on the council web site, available to SMs with a password. With their bsamail account info, I can do a much better job linking Scouts with counselors.

 

- ScoutNet data base: Give CCs, SMs, CMs, and Advancement chairs view-only rights (for now) to individual Scout records for their unit. Record checks for Life Scouts, transfer paperwork, etc., all easier if this could happen. As a follow-on effort, create unit modules in which we could perform unit management tasks in ScoutNet, through the council server. Think about it: no more stand-alone software that doesn't interface easily with ScoutNet. No more e-mailing text reports around. You could access your unit management files from any computer with internet connectivity

 

I think we're moving in this direction. We ordered popcorn on line this year, and we're rechartering online, too. So, they trust us gentle unwashed volunteers to penetrate the system for some things.

 

Take a step back and think about it. This entire huge organization succeeds (or fails) on the backs of volunteers in direct service to the members. Doing our jobs requires massive amounts of communication and coordination within units, between units, and between levels of the organization. Yet, we have absolutely no organizational connectivity, and our tools are almost completely manually manipulated. Does this make sense? Consider how effective we are in spite of this. Now consider how much more effective we could be if we were all connected and our processes were automated...

 

Food for thought.

 

KS

[Backpacker]

I agree with Barry about Venture patrols in a troop, it really becomes more like two troops. Thats one reason we use mixed age patrols, it encourages troop unity, and we do have special events for the older scouts every so often.

 

Ed, our council has the webelos particpate in camporees in their similiar but seperate events run by the Venture crews. They receive their awards at the same campfire as the boy scouts. The webelos between competitions are adopted by the troops they will be going into and teach them to help with meal prep, etc. All the scouts really seem to enjoy the event. BTW, don't let BW get you down.

 

I agree with Korea Scouter that in our computer driven society more of our clerical form work should be able to be done on line, rather than driving to the council office.

[NJCubScouter]

Barry, I went back and found my old post on this, it turned out to be from November of 2002 in a thread on the Cub Scout forum entitled "Program Below Tigers." It is still there, though you have to scroll down to January of 2003 (the date of the last post) to find it.

 

Here is what I said then, and what I still think:

 

I personally do NOT think Cubs should start in kindergarten. I think many of the boys in Tigers now are really too young to get a lot out of the program, at least in the fall of first grade. I do see the benefit in starting them a bit before they are really ready, so that when they ARE ready, they are already signed up and don't have to decide whether to join. They are already there. But that's for Tigers -- in my school district those are boys who are between 5 years 11 months and 6 years 11 months old when they get started in September. Roll that back a year -- as early as 4 years 11 months old! -- and I really don't think more than a few of them would be anywhere close to ready. It's really too soon, in my opinion.

 

Also, there is the burnout factor. Right now boys are in Tigers-Cubs-Webelos for a bit more than 4.5 years before they cross over, and that is enough time for a lot of kids to decide they have had enough. Do we really want to increase that to 5.5 years?

 

As for Daisies, I don't know if that provides any support for Cubs starting younger. One of my daughters was a Daisy, and this is 10 years ago now so I don't remember it with precise clarity, but I do seem to recall wondering at the time what she was really getting out of it. On the other hand, the average 5-year-old girl is better at sitting down for a meeting than the average 5-year-old boy, and specifically is more interested in the artsy-craftsy stuff, so I don't know how valid the comparison is.

 

It seems to me that I also wrote a post at one point about seeing several of the Tigers over the years "staring blankly" and really not seeming to understand what was going on. That would usually improve as the school year went on and they got to know their den-mates better (though sometimes the result of that was more horseplay than participating correctly in the pack meeting.) I just think that the younger you go, the more of that you are going to find. And as I suggest in the quoted portion above, I don't expect a first-grader to necessarily "get it" right at the beginning, but I think admitting kindergartners could very well add a whole year of "not getting it," and I don't think that's going to help the retention rate.

 

One more point about Girl Scouts that I did not make previously. To my recollection, each "troop" (roughly the size of a Boy Scout patrol or Cub Scout den) was of a single grade in school. For example, when my daughters were in second grade (which I believe corresponds to second-year Brownies), all the other girls in the troop also were second-year Brownies. So in other words, any issues resulting from "age-mixing" do not come up; the program for each troop is completely age-focused because the girls are not attending meetings with higher or lower grade-levels. (I don't know if this holds once the girls are in high school, because neither of my daughters made it that far, but it's more of an "issue" in the lower grades anyway.)

 

Barry, you ask how I "feel about Tigers." I have mixed feelings about the program. I think some of the boys are too young for the program, but I'd rather the BSA have a program for them than not. You have to balance the rewards against the challenges. At the first-grade level I think it is a net positive, any younger than that I think the challenges tip the scale.

 

I don't think my son's pack had the same retention issues you are talking about. When boys quit, they did so at all levels. If there was one point at which more boys dropped out than any other, it was in moving from the pack to a troop. I'd say roughly one-third of each Webelos den would attend one or two troop meetings, or none, and never be seen again despite follow-up phone calls. (The calls have brought the boy back in a few cases.)

[NJCubScouter]

Oh Barry, one more thing. You mention Tiger-age boys not being able to read. I realize part of this may be in how you define being able to read. But in my area, almost all boys in first grade are at least beginning readers -- they aren't reading War and Peace, but they "can read" as I would define it. My school district has a special program for those children who, by the beginning of first grade, still cannot read. It is an intensive program to get them to be readers as quickly as possible. It is separate and more intensive than what (in my day) was called "remedial reading" (now called "literacy support.") But the idea is that by that age level, children should be able to read.

 

That aside, I think the BSA has addressed the issue of limited reading ability among first graders. When I first saw the "new" Tiger handbook (now 2 or 3 years ago) I noticed something interesting. It is the only handbook in the "Scouting family" that seems to be designed primarily to be read TO the boy, not BY the boy. In other words, the Bear book is written at roughly a third-grade reading level and the Wolf book is written at roughly a second-grade reading level, but the Tiger book is written at an adult level. (Actually it is written at what I would call a "basic adult" level, meaning a high school reading level.) I picked up on this when I did "Tiger parent orientation" that year; I told the parents that when they get the book, they need to be reading it "with" their son, and not just giving it to their son to read, even if the boy is a good reader. I don't think that's an accident either, everything about the Tiger program is designed to be done by the parent (or other adult partner) and boy together.

[NJCubScouter]

KS, I think those are great ideas, and I suspect that somewhere in the BSA, all or most of them are seen as "goals" for the future. I think at least two things may be delaying that day, one being security. Firewalls and all of the other security measures are great, but they are not foolproof. Every month seems to bring another example in the news. Security has gotten better and better (with some hiccups along the way like the original release of Windows XP), but I am not sure it is "there" yet, to the point where everybody is going to feel "safe" with the level of access and connectedness you are talking about. Second, there are still a lot of adult volunteers who are not "online" or who have e-mail access at home but never use it or check it. My son's Scoutmaster has an e-mail address but won't give it out, and says he never checks it anyway. Our camping/activities coordinator is not online at home at all; it is not a money issue, they have a computer, but the impression I get is that they view the "bad side" of the Internet as outweighing the benefits. Rather than take steps as most families do to protect their children and themselves from that aspect of the Internet, they simply don't let it in the door. I can respect that choice, but it doesn't advance the day when all Scouters can communicate by computer. (You mention tour permits and, ironically, this particular person is the one in the troop who does all of the tour permits, so I don't think our troop will be fully joining the technological age anytime soon.)

 

But I hope what you propose does come to pass before too long.

[evmori]

Backpacker,

We do the same. However, we use to have the 2nd year Webelos participate in the Boy Scout camporee. Great recruiting tool. The Webelos loved it!

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[fotoscout]

Although I had a great time doing Tigers, I too have reservations about the Tiger program. First off, we give what is arguably the toughest job in Scouting to the newest, least experienced, untrained, and naive members of our Pack. This makes no sense at all. The program should be recruited for in September, with a start date of January. The months in between should be used for training leaders and parents. OR, national has to come up with very detailed den meeting kits for the Tiger Dens, kind of like a Den meeting in a bag (or box). Program helps isnt enough for these people.

 

Second, the concept of having weekly den meetings in a meeting place for Tigers should be scraped. It should be not more than one den meeting in a meeting place per month, and maybe pack night. The rest of the time should be spent on go-see-its.

 

These kids and their parents are exploring absolutely every activity out there. Its no wonder why retention is low, especially at that age. And to top it off we need to have the parents present at the meetings. To a great extent the Tiger program is a recipe for failure.

 

Having said that, weve done pretty well. The year I did Tigers we started with 17, 12 of those boys are still with us a Webelos.

 

[acco40]

I would like to see the whole BSA program bumped up to what it use to be age wise. Don't let boys join Cub Scouts until the second grade or age seven and do not let the boys join Boy Scouts until age 12 or the completion of the sixth grade.

 

And I would like to see a big change in training. When children and adults attend academic "training", alias school, they are not considered trained just because they attended - they are required to show some level of comprehension. Not so in Scouting. Why do so many of the adults who have been trained show a complete lack of knowledge of the program? Bad trainers? Stubborn Scouters? Thick skulls? Who knows but if the Scouter can't demonstrate a rudimentary knowledge of his/her position, via a written test, oral test, or whatever, don't consider them as trained.

[EagleInKY]

Acco - I believe you hit on why Woodbadge is truly the pinnacle of scout training. In order to complete the course, you have to complete your ticket. You don't get credit for just showing up. Great point!

[OldGreyEagle]

Hey Stapler Guy, your post gave me a great idea. I come from a medical background, and all you who work in hospitals know your hospital has to be accredited every three years. Post secondary education institutions have to receive and keep accreditation as well. Why not have a "certified" troop, it could be done on the lines of a Quality Unit, only more in depth. Is your SPL elected, what percentage of your adults are trained, what percentage of youth leaders have been to youth leader training? Can you document a boy lead annual calender? Do you have a first year program/ Those kind of things, participation would be voluntary, but the ones that pass could have a pin that says they are an "accredited troop" while others are just troops. What you think?

[EagleInKY]

Hey OGE - I have been thinking about the same thing. Only I was thining about it as an enhancement to the Quality Unit program. I'm afraid, however, that the QU program is so watered down that it doesn't have the prestige it once had. I like the concept, only I see administration of it being a nightmare. I've know of units to fudge info on the QU app. This would lead to the same, I'm afraid.(This message has been edited by EagleInKY)

[Eagledad]

I've seen Councils that gave out special Council shoulder patches for Troops that did extra requirements added to the Quality Unit award.

 

Barry

[OldGreyEagle]

Not so fast my old Kentucky Home Guy, If a troop wished to pursue "certified" status, one of the requirements would be to have three "site" visitors trained to review other programs. The site visitors would attend troop meetings, go on events and review the doumentation and conduct interviews with the Committee, the Scoutmasters, the PLC and the patrols. No additional professional staff would be needed, its all done by the volunteers and by volunteers from other troops seeking the same status. I see certification as like a 3 month process or more renewable every 3 years, somehting like that. Any how its a thought

[EagleInKY]

OGE - Now that's thinking out of the box! No wonder they pay you so well!