When a requirement becomes tradition and leaves the boys behind.

Last April, Our pack went family camping and had a fishing derby.  The Webelos Leader at the time, had asked that the pack buy groceries for a Pancake, egg and bacon breakfast.  It was approved and was a hit.  What has been lost in the short time since  April 2008  and this past weekend is  the requirement and the boys.

Webelos Outdoorsman Activity badge has a requirement for  outdoor cooking.

8. With your accompanying adult on a campout or outdoor activity, assist in preparing, cooking, and cleanup for one of your

den's meals.

Sitting on the bottom of the what matters pryamid, I am amazed at how quickly this evolved.  It took three Family camping events  to go from where it should have been to doing it because we did it before.

From what I can gather here's how it broke down.  April 08:  The 3 or 4 Webelos made breakfast, probablly with some adult intervention and supervision. October 08: The 7-10 Webelos started  making breakfast and the parents started intervening to get breakfast moving. April 09: the leaders and parents did everything.

I am pretty confident I need to fix this because it needs to be about the boys.  After all it was boys fulfilling a requirement that started this. Yet how do I fix this? I don't want to outright stop this, if it is wanted or needed. It has been Sunday Breakfast when we are all packing out. Maybe moving the requiement to only the Webelos.  It was appreciated that they initially fed the whole pack but not required. Or changing the meal maybe  having the boys make Saturday lunch rather than breakfast.  We can deal with an abligatory  mac&chesse with hotdogs or hamburgers lunch.  Then again the boys only need to do this once a year. 

Along with Webelos Outdoorsman requirement 8, Bears  could participate with requirement 9g, or  Wolves in requirement 8e.

The thing is  we need to make sure  a den fulfilling a requirement does not become a senseless tradition that puts extra load on the parents and leaders. Let's Keep it fun.

Training Variations

I was in a chat room and the topic of training came up, it wasn’t the normal every boy deserves a trained leader vs untrained leader vs how to get people trained.  The discussion was how can we afford to get trained? This took me back a bit.  It appears that I have a very inexpensive council to train in.

As a Cub Scouter you have access to YPT, Fast Start, and “This is Scouting” for nearly free.  You can do this even before you have a BSA ID number.   You only need access to a internet connected computer for an hour or so for each course.  I say worst case scenario would be having to buy time at a FedEx/Kinko’s store for  $12 or $24 an hour in my community.  Oddly enough I hear some councils do not have broadband services to their offices, but that may be a resource to you.

The first course that requires in classroom effort would be the Position Specific courses.  Where I’m at I believe the cost is $2 council wide for about 2 dozen doughnuts and copies.  On occasion at the council sponsored courses they have given out Cub Scout leader book and the how-to book if you get trained  in a certain window. If your council or district makes it a practice to provide the Leader book and the How-To book, $20 would be a fair cost in my opinion. If your district or council has to rent facilities for the training expect that cost to also come out of your pocket.  I think you should be able to find a church or another community organization that would be willing to give you the space for free.

The course that really threw me was some people were asked for $50 for Basic Adult Leader Outdoor Orientation.  I have taken the course twice and taught it once.  I paid $7.00  for each  time I attended.  The first time I took the course, Outdoor Leader skills for Webelos Leaders wasn’t included. The  courses are very similar  and my council has opted to provide both courses at the same time. The trainers I have had  and I were very particular in stating this applies to Pack Overnighters and this applies to Den Camping. We had about 20 pages of handouts.  We have two meal plans  that our BALOO uses; Foil Packs and Wraps.  Both plans keep lunch under $5 a person.

The one exception to my cheap training experience has been  Wood Badge. I paid $160  about 1 year ago. We paid extra for WB activity uniform shirts.  All the participants were issued hats, though not BSA Supply hats.   I heard people say they paid over $200 but not over $300.

I moved on from being  just  a Cub scouter to also being a Commissioner this year. My Commissioner basic training was free.  I also attended our University of Commissioner Science for the paltry sum of $5.00.  At either of my Commissioners training sessions I was entitled to the Field book of Commissioner’s Service.  One person said their Commissioners University was $150.

Am I bragging about how cheap my training is? Yes. Do you have to pay the fees your council charges? No.   Does my council give some things up, because of the cheap training? I believe we do.  We do not have a Pow Wow or University of Scouting.  Both things that give you training in areas not generally covered in most scouting training.   I have four councils near me that I also look at for training.  They are 90, 163 or 210 miles away. Some of them a geographically large enough that it is actually closer for some of them to use my district.  I have seen people from all four of the other councils at our training sessions.  The council that is 90 miles from my home is the one I watch most often for training opportunities as the trip only adds $20 to the cost.

If you think the cost of your training is to high offer to help the district or council to be thrifty and help them find locations that you don’t need to pay for. Help them find local companies that will allow them to run off copies at cheaper rates.  Only run off copies that are useful to the training.  Above all offer to help give the training once you’re trained.  Tell them you’ll pack a lunch rather than get a catered lunch. If you look there are probably a lot of ways that you can lower the cost of training for all or volunteer to help in the offices to reduce your costs.  May be you could set out a roundtable and babysit other leader’s kids for donations to send you to training. Just remember to support those that support you.

I have a long story about how roads today are all based on the size of a Roman Hoarse’s posterior.  It all boils down to  that’s how we’ve always done it, even though there is new technology. Don’t accept that  training costs what it costs, maybe there is something you’re overlooking.  Rather than hand out  $10 of copies  why not  scan and email them out or burn them to a $.30 CD. 

Time to dust off the planning hat.

Ok  is everyone up on their Chairman duties  for this time of year.  You should have recharter done or wrapping up.  You should have moved on to planning the summer.  We want to wrap this up  soon. You should have the summer shcedule ready for the April Pack meeting. 

We had to wait until this last round table to get the information on one of our normal  summer events  a tented sleep over on the local texas league  ball field.   I have a hard time getting behind the local team.   I grew up  in the radio broadcast area of both the Omaha Royals and the Kansas City Royals. I was able to go see the guys in Omaha  and then listen and often watch  them when they moved up to the big leagues in Kansas City. Our local team as I mentioned is Texas league which is a third string farm team for the Padres.  Who are the Padres?   Within 6 hours driving time we have  the Houston Astros and the Texas Rangers. Why is our team farmed by the Padres. Any way  it's a great family time. I took my son to both events last year and had a blast though we didn't camp on the field. 

Last year we had a summer fun night at a local soccer field.  we had waterballoon games and  learned how to play Ultimate Frisbee bee bee . The committee decide we want to stretch this out this year and instead of  just 2 hours we're going to try  a whole day.   then we are also going to  do another two hour session later in the summer.  

Last but not least  our raingutter pool party.  What better place than a pool to have a raingutter regatta? We use this to cap off our summer. 

This is all to try and get our summertime pack award.  Now is also the time  to start planning the next years program.  Group campsites in stateparks fill up fast, You may already be too late for a fall campout.  Why do you need to start  all this planning so soon?   Districts are looking for Popcorn Kernals. Trails-end  will be visit you areas soon.  You need to have a plan to create a budget.  You need a budget to set popcorn goals, and boy do we have a steep goal this year! we had a record year last year. Now we have to try and beat that.

Get out there and plan so you can take a summer break too.

Marketing the Scouting Community

I have been very lax in blogging recently. I am trying to wrap up my Wood Badge ticket.

I  have been relatively active on the scouting community. I recently  had a request for my address from the Project manager Linda Flemming.  A few days later I recieved a large padded envelope  in the mail. It had a Letter from the Chief Scout Executive, another sheet explaining the item was a Beta, and a beta  scouting community button.

I truly appreciate the button and letter. I will wear it proudly. I was however concerned that they sent  this all in such a large envelope. I will tuck the letter away, but it is not going  to be framed so having it uncreased   was a bit of overkill. I agree with Mike Rowe  that "green" is not the right  color for  the enviromental conscienousness  movement. Should it be brown? I couldn't tell you.  Scouting has espoused the Leave No Trace or minimum impact  theory for a long time.  I hope that National Council will leave less of a trace  when shipping items, in the future.

Leave No Trace is not just habits of outdoor behavior, but a way of living and being responsible for the use of our natural resources at all times. It's turning off the computer. It's recycling  the envelopes. It's living "Leave No Trace" not just preaching it.