Scouting: Now vs then (MoE alert)

[Vort]

8 hours ago, MarginOfError said:

8 hours ago, Vort said:

Fwiw, my 15-year-old's Scout troop is almost entirely LDS kids, i.e. refugees from old LDS troops. I'm on the board, and I've never seen a Scouting organization run as well as this (no thanks to me). It's night and day.

I would actually be interested in hearing what you think makes such a functional difference.  I have my own opinions, but a broader and more diverse perspective would undoubtedly help me see areas I could improve my own troop and potentially ways to improve how my ward's youth program runs.  If you're willing to share your thoughts, I'd appreciate it (PM me if you don't want to distract from the calling in this discussion)

How about I just start a new thread? I'm guessing others might be interested. (Plus my PM says you can't receive messages.)

In the old troop that I was scoutmaster for 8 or 9 years ago, our committee was actually staffed with good-hearted, willing people who were good scouters. To be bluntly honest, our problems were two-fold: (1) An old, out-of-shape scoutmaster (Yours Truly) and (2) a severe lack of funding. But I'm probably misspeaking; the main problem was really a lack of senior scouts. Scouting was basically restricted to the 12- and 13-year-olds of the deacons quorum. No senior scout leadership at all. I tried hard to implement a boy-led program, but without senior scout support and examples, that more or less meant that, left to their own devices, the scouts wouldn't do anything. Which meant that the adults had to provide all the leadership. Naturally I complained to the bishop, who had been the scoutmaster a few years before. He basically told me that that's how scouting operated in the Church troops, and that things would not get any better. And he was right. I'm glad I had some really good assistants to help me. Between the lot of us, we managed to do some really fun things and have a halfway decent, if anemic, scouting program.

In the current troop (which, fun fact, managed to keep the same troop number as my old troop), the folks on the board are charged up, not simply willing to serve and put in the time, but motivated. Our scoutmasters are not in their 50s; they are young guys in their 30s, in one case possibly early 40s, who really enjoy scouting and are dedicated to helping the boys have a good experience. And it's HELPING the boys, not doing everything for them. My 15-year-old is currently the assistant senior PL, and since the SPL is sort of, let's say, not exactly dedicated to the position, my son is the functional SPL. Just as an example, last court of honor, my son planned and then ran everything. (And he did a fantastic job, btw. I had several people comment on how nicely—and quickly—the court of honor was run.) He got information he needed from the scoutmasters, but other than that, he ran the show. Same at the weekly meetings; the PLs (we actually have two patrols, and it makes sense to have them, which is awesome) run their specific shows, the SPL and ASPL handle training or otherwise help out, campouts get planned, duties get assigned, and it's all by the boys themselves.

I have four sons and three Eagle Scouts plus a Life who plans to get his Eagle rank six months after the aforementioned court of honor. But only the Life scout has really known a top-notch program. All of my sons have benefited from engaged, caring men (and women) who taught them scouting skills and helped them move forward. But only my youngest has seen and been a part of a honest-to-goodness boy-led program. As I wrote before, the whole experience is night and day.

Edited February 10, 2022 by Vort

[Ironhold]

I live next door to a major military base. 

Someone, somewhere, got the idea that "having active-duty military service members as scoutmasters" was a good idea, both because they had survival training and because they could get supplies from the base as part of a long-standing arrangement the Army had with the BSA.

What these people forgot, however, is that most of the units here at Fort Hood, the base in question, are front-line combat units and units that support the front-line fighters. As such, it was depressingly common to learn at the last minute that the current scout master was either in the field doing a training exercise, on alert status, or just plain gone, having either been deployed or re-assigned to another base. 

I tried to work on the genealogy merit badge, hit a brick wall because the one relative on my mom's side who was doing all of the family history wasn't sharing any information with anyone aside from her kids, tried to see if I could get someone to sign off on the "find a new family member" requirement as a waiver, and that was the end of it. I think we went through three scout masters in a single year, and after that I was done. I was just too frustrated. 

Unfortunately for me, my dad was both hard-core into scouting *and* spent most of my preteen and teen years being bounced around the world thanks to the Army. When I tried to explain to him why I never really went for scouting, he just presumed I was "making up an excuse" and generally being lazy. After all, he and my older brothers had all made Eagle, so why wasn't I trying? 

It took a *very* long time for him to realize what was going on and how bad things were. Once he retired from the Army and had a regular civilian job, he was quickly "volunteered" and actually got our scouting program back on track. 

[Backroads]

Golly, I miss Scouting. I should probably get off my keister and go see if a troop in the area wants me. The Methodist church 'round the corner are the loveliest people and I think they have a troop...

My favorite troop from my Scout Camp days was not an LDS troop (and LDS troop were the majority in our council). I think they had been sponsered by a fire station, and they were DEVOTED to Scouting. 

Sadly, we would sometimes roll our eyes (behind closed doors) at a lot of Latter-Day Saint troops that came to camp. So many of them seemed to have a grudge at actually being there.

Don't get me wrong, there were plenty of great ones. I got like five dates during those days from Scoutmasters setting me up with their RM sons.

[LDSGator]

20 hours ago, Backroads said:

Golly, I miss Scouting. I should probably get off my keister and go see if a troop in the area wants me. The Methodist church 'round the corner are the loveliest people and I think they have a troop...

My favorite troop from my Scout Camp days was not an LDS troop (and LDS troop were the majority in our council). I think they had been sponsered by a fire station, and they were DEVOTED to Scouting. 

Sadly, we would sometimes roll our eyes (behind closed doors) at a lot of Latter-Day Saint troops that came to camp. So many of them seemed to have a grudge at actually being there.

Don't get me wrong, there were plenty of great ones. I got like five dates during those days from Scoutmasters setting me up with their RM sons.

I was a Scout leader or something for my first calling. I felt bad for the kids because I had no clue what I was doing! Lol. 

[MarginOfError]

On 2/9/2022 at 8:52 PM, Vort said:

How about I just start a new thread? I'm guessing others might be interested. (Plus my PM says you can't receive messages.)

In the old troop that I was scoutmaster for 8 or 9 years ago, our committee was actually staffed with good-hearted, willing people who were good scouters. To be bluntly honest, our problems were two-fold: (1) An old, out-of-shape scoutmaster (Yours Truly) and (2) a severe lack of funding. But I'm probably misspeaking; the main problem was really a lack of senior scouts. Scouting was basically restricted to the 12- and 13-year-olds of the deacons quorum. No senior scout leadership at all. I tried hard to implement a boy-led program, but without senior scout support and examples, that more or less meant that, left to their own devices, the scouts wouldn't do anything. Which meant that the adults had to provide all the leadership. Naturally I complained to the bishop, who had been the scoutmaster a few years before. He basically told me that that's how scouting operated in the Church troops, and that things would not get any better. And he was right. I'm glad I had some really good assistants to help me. Between the lot of us, we managed to do some really fun things and have a halfway decent, if anemic, scouting program.

In the current troop (which, fun fact, managed to keep the same troop number as my old troop), the folks on the board are charged up, not simply willing to serve and put in the time, but motivated. Our scoutmasters are not in their 50s; they are young guys in their 30s, in one case possibly early 40s, who really enjoy scouting and are dedicated to helping the boys have a good experience. And it's HELPING the boys, not doing everything for them. My 15-year-old is currently the assistant senior PL, and since the SPL is sort of, let's say, not exactly dedicated to the position, my son is the functional SPL. Just as an example, last court of honor, my son planned and then ran everything. (And he did a fantastic job, btw. I had several people comment on how nicely—and quickly—the court of honor was run.) He got information he needed from the scoutmasters, but other than that, he ran the show. Same at the weekly meetings; the PLs (we actually have two patrols, and it makes sense to have them, which is awesome) run their specific shows, the SPL and ASPL handle training or otherwise help out, campouts get planned, duties get assigned, and it's all by the boys themselves.

I have four sons and three Eagle Scouts plus a Life who plans to get his Eagle rank six months after the aforementioned court of honor. But only the Life scout has really known a top-notch program. All of my sons have benefited from engaged, caring men (and women) who taught them scouting skills and helped them move forward. But only my youngest has seen and been a part of a honest-to-goodness boy-led program. As I wrote before, the whole experience is night and day.

This tracks pretty well with my experience.  The back breaker was the insistence that LDS patrols be based on quorums. The entire mentorship and teaching aspect of the scouting program was lost. And the complete segregation of 11 year old scouts from the rest of the troop struck me as odd (or maybe insane). 

The other big deal breaker for me was the lack of elections in LDS troops. 

I'm glad you're son is having a great experience and wish him well in wrapping up his Eagle. My older child just finished her First Class board of review last night and has made a goal to be Life by the end of the year (ish).  My younger daughter still has a year in Cub Scouts left, but some of her best friends are in her den, so I'm expecting to have a good crowd of scouts feeding up to my troop with her.  

[Just_A_Guy]

2 hours ago, MarginOfError said:

This tracks pretty well with my experience.  The back breaker was the insistence that LDS patrols be based on quorums. The entire mentorship and teaching aspect of the scouting program was lost. And the complete segregation of 11 year old scouts from the rest of the troop struck me as odd (or maybe insane). 

The other big deal breaker for me was the lack of elections in LDS troops. 

I'm glad you're son is having a great experience and wish him well in wrapping up his Eagle. My older child just finished her First Class board of review last night and has made a goal to be Life by the end of the year (ish).  My younger daughter still has a year in Cub Scouts left, but some of her best friends are in her den, so I'm expecting to have a good crowd of scouts feeding up to my troop with her.  

(Tangent) So, my understanding is that the BSA’s safety/ compliance guy just recently quit his job and fired some public broadsides against the BSA, claiming (among other things) that they aren’t doing enough to prevent youth-on-youth sexual abuse.  Can the BSA implement a program that effectively addresses this risk, while also maintaining a traditional youth-to-youth mentorship model?

[Vort]

3 hours ago, MarginOfError said:

My older child just finished her First Class board of review last night and has made a goal to be Life by the end of the year (ish).  My younger daughter still has a year in Cub Scouts left, but some of her best friends are in her den, so I'm expecting to have a good crowd of scouts feeding up to my troop with her.  

 Has your troop received any sort of push back from GSA?

[MarginOfError]

2 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

(Tangent) So, my understanding is that the BSA’s safety/ compliance guy just recently quit his job and fired some public broadsides against the BSA, claiming (among other things) that they aren’t doing enough to prevent youth-on-youth sexual abuse.  Can the BSA implement a program that effectively addresses this risk, while also maintaining a traditional youth-to-youth mentorship model?

I can kind of see where he's coming from, but the articles I could find didn't really indicate what else he would want us to be doing.  We are already prohibited from letting youth that are more than two years apart share sleeping quarters. The youth protection guidelines are fairly strict and robust. If you follow them and promote a culture of following them within the unit, it's hard for problems to come about (and I mean really follow them). 

The thing about youth protection is it is kind of like security measures. Top notch security is extremely onerous and inconvenient. And a fully secure entity (be it physical or virtual) is very hard to access, even for those you want to access it.  So there are inherent negotiations that have to happen between keeping kids safe but keeping the program accessible and enjoyable.  If we were to add much more to the youth protection policies, I think you'd end up motivating people to ignore policy. And that creates more risk.

The big thing that has happened that should be changing a lot of minds is the BSA pulled its blanket indemnity clause this year. If we don't follow Youth  Protection and Guide to Safe Scouting guidelines to the letter and an incident occurs, the chartering organization and the individual leaders can be personally liable and taken to court. You better believe I've beefed up my first aid kits, filled out more paperwork, and reviewed the relevant documents and requirements. 

Under the current rules, can we provide the youth-to-youth mentorship model safely?  Yes. We can. But it will require strict discipline and supervision to do so. The worst thing you can possibly here is "I trust [so-and-so], so I don't mind ignoring the rule this time."  Don't ever let adherence slip that far even once, and I think you'll be looking at one in ten million level risks.

[MarginOfError]

1 hour ago, Vort said:

 Has your troop received any sort of push back from GSA?

I assume you mean GSUSA (Girls Scouts)? No, we haven't. In fact, one of our committee members is the cookie leader in our GSUSA service unit. Her son is in the boys troop associated with my girls troop.  She frequently comes on outings with us as our adult female leader (yeah, our boys and girls do pretty much everything together). They are different programs with similar ideals, and appeal to different people. Scouts BSA is a better fit for some, and GSUSA is a better fit for others. It's great that there are options.

[Vort]

3 hours ago, MarginOfError said:

The big thing that has happened that should be changing a lot of minds is the BSA pulled its blanket indemnity clause this year. If we don't follow Youth  Protection and Guide to Safe Scouting guidelines to the letter and an incident occurs, the chartering organization and the individual leaders can be personally liable and taken to court.

This is frankly terrifying. I have not heard about this; I haven't attended a board meeting in over two months, mainly because I've been struggling with some pretty severe health challenges. I'm not sure I trust myself to follow all the guidelines perfectly in every case. I need to look into this much more thoroughly. I might officially withdraw from leadership, depending on how my look-into goes.

[MarginOfError]

4 hours ago, Vort said:

This is frankly terrifying. I have not heard about this; I haven't attended a board meeting in over two months, mainly because I've been struggling with some pretty severe health challenges. I'm not sure I trust myself to follow all the guidelines perfectly in every case. I need to look into this much more thoroughly. I might officially withdraw from leadership, depending on how my look-into goes.

I agree it is alarming. The big points as I understand them are

Properly trained leaders with up to date training (CPR, first aid, WFA, hazardous weather, safety afloat, safe swim)

Up to date medical forms for participants

Age appropriate activities

Youth protection guidelines

Documentation for vehicles (current license, registration, insurance)

 

The things I would expect to cause the most trouble would be shooting sports (not having a properly certified range officer), swimming (not setting up a proper swim area), and not keeping current with those trainings. The requirements aren't onerous, but any troops that operated under "what council doesn't know won't hurt them" will get a rude awakening when something goes south.