Scoutmaster Podcast 62

And now it's to you, Scoutmaster. Well, how many scouts does it take to change a lightbulb?

No, it just takes one, but it you know it takes a little while Because you give it one good turn daily. Yeah, okay, Hey, well, this is podcast number 62.. Yeah, Hey,

Hey. Well, welcome back to the Scoutmaster Podcast. This is Clarke Green.

So the March newsletter went out last week, So I hope you got that It was. The theme of the March newsletter was Weeblows, because it's kind of Weeblows season And you can go to scoutmastertypedcom and subscribe to the newsletter. And this is going to be the last week that you can go to scoutmastertypedcom. That's right, Because we're going to be changing over the home for the Scoutmaster blog and the Scoutmaster Podcast and the Scoutmaster newsletter. We're changing to- that's right- a new web address. It's going to go up live next Monday.

Keep your ears peeled and watch if you're a subscriber to the blog, and you will get notified of the new web address. Got a little bit more work to do, But next Monday it will be up and live.

How about that? Since our last podcast we heard from a lot of folks. Let's take a look at the email bag here for a moment. On podcast 61, we talked a little bit about levels of competence and the way that that works, And we heard from Phil Peck said: listen to the latest episode of the Scoutmaster Podcast. I've heard the whole thing about levels of ability many times before, but it's a great reminder.

I think I may work it into my roundtable next month as a training topic. Thanks Clark, Good stuff.

Well, thank you, Phil, for being in touch. Blaise Vitale left a comment on the blog. He said this podcast certainly is more philosophical than usual.

I think the same learning process applies to developing Scoutmasters as well And, yeah, I have to agree, It applies to Scoutmasters who have been around for 27 years, 26 years. These podcasts have been taking this brand new Scoutmaster from being unconsciously incompetent to being consciously competent. Keep up with the great podcasts. Thank you, Blaise, and thanks for staying in touch And thank you for the kind words. Sometimes I still feel consciously incompetent.

Yeah, I mean, I know there's stuff that I don't know, But hey, what are you going to do? What are you going to do? Keep moving, Keep moving forward. Bill McFarland said: greetings, Clark.

Once again, I want to thank you for all you do, keeping me excited about being a Scoutmaster, But special thanks today for recommending Working the Patrol Method. Despite my procrastinating, I ordered the book the other day and it arrived on Monday afternoon.

Well, despite a couple of meetings, I finished the book in short order. And what an amazing book that so simply puts everything a Scoutmaster needs to know when working with boys in such an easy-to-read manual. Like I said in my comments, this should be required reading for all leaders and I intend to have my senior patrol leader read it next, ordering extra copies for my assistant Scoutmasters too. Thanks again, And Bill's a Scoutmaster in Troop 8 in Pittsfield, Mass.

Well, Bill, I got to agree with you. Working the Patrol Method, that's a book by four Eagle Scouts.

It's prominently featured on the blog at ScoutmasterTypedcom, so you can find it and you can order it from Amazon, And it really is kind of a ground breaker. It will change the way that you look at being a Scoutleader And I recommend it to you highly, as does Bill. Thank you, Bill. Tom Glard wrote from down in Tullahoma, Tennessee, to agree with Scouter Dave, who we talked to a couple of podcasts back about Weeblows and crossovers and when other Scout troops get a little upset with you if you go after what they consider to be their Weeblows. He said this is a problem that is not just a local one. That's what Tom said.

Dave, you're not alone. Tom figured he wasn't alone either, because he has the same problem, Definitely a problem that I hear about from time to time, but there are ways to handle it, And you can hear our discussion about that subject in podcast number 60.. Tom went on to talk about how difficult it can be for Scoutmasters when they have a group of experienced leaders that all kind of retire at the same time, And I'm talking about youth leadership here.

You know they hit 15 and they've become pretty competent and they're doing a good job and they ring all the leadership changes through the troop and you turn around and now they're 18.. They're graduating from high school and you're back to square one- training again, working, mentoring, and it can be difficult. If you hang around long enough as a Scoutmaster, that's going to happen. I feel you, Man. I've been in that situation more than once. And Tom went on to say: with your help, I can have positive reinforcement on almost a daily basis.

It keeps me thinking about how to best let the boys do this themselves with as little interference from the adults as possible. And, yeah, Tom, I definitely got to agree with you, And anybody who's out there listening, who's been around long enough to go through these changes a few times, absolutely knows what you mean.

Thanks for staying in touch, Tom Heard from Will Hansman, who's a new Scoutmaster and has a brand new troop that has a brand new number: Troop 777 is now official. That's right, Troop 777.. Welcome to the world, He said. Just wanted to thank you again for your recent advice, give you an update. We're conducting a crossover ceremony tonight. Welcome in four new members.

What an exciting ride we have in front of us. Your blog and podcast Have and will continue to inspire and teach me in many ways.

Well, Will, thanks for being in touch and congratulations. I mean, yeah, you're taking off. Here you go. I'm going to be interested to hear about how the new troop goes.

So in this podcast, we're going to answer a couple of big questions. Yep, Got a question on Facebook that got posted to the Facebook page And we've got one that got called in, And I think that's going to be enough for this podcast.

So let's get started, shall we?

Scoutmastership in seven minutes or less. Well, Don posted this to the wall of our page on Facebook, at Scoutmasterblog on Facebook, And if you're not following us, get over to Facebook.

Go to Scoutmasterblog and hit the like key And here we go. You'll be able to follow what we're doing on Scoutmasterblog. Don asked this question.

He says: is it legal for a troop to place in their bylaws a requirement that a scout must attend so many meetings or outings to be able to advance in rank or hold office? If they don't wish to be scouts or to accomplish the tasks of scouting, who are we to say that they should attend 70 or 80% of all meetings and events?

I would think that we would want to have scouts coming and attending because they want to, not because we have bylaws saying that they have to. Well, Don, you know this is a pretty common question and a pretty common mistake that scout leaders make, And I'm going to answer your question and then we're going to talk a little bit about the broad underlying concepts that affect the answer.

So, first off, the simple answer is no. Scout units may not do this, Whether it's a troop, a pack or a crew. They cannot set up anything that changes the advancement guidelines. They can't do that.

So let's find out where it says that. The first place we're going to look is the Advancement Committee Guidebook And there will be a link to a PDF copy of that guidebook in the blog post that contains this podcast at scoutmastertypepadcom.

Here's the active statement in the book. You'll find it on page three And it says: No council, district, unit or individual has the authority to add to or subtract from advancement requirements.

So we're talking about the advancement requirement that says: be active in your troop or patrol for you know X number of months And that's for first class, star life and eagle. So, and that's for star life and eagle, The tenure requirement for star life and eagle, about being active.

The other place we're going to look is in the 2011 requirements book And there's a statement that is printed in the 2011 requirements book And it's the definition of what active means And a scout will be considered. I'm going to read you exactly what it says: A scout will be considered active in his unit if he is one registered in his unit and his registration fees are current. Two, he's not dismissed from his unit for disciplinary reasons. Three, he's engaged by his unit leadership on a regular basis And that means he's informed of unit activities through a scoutmaster conference or personal contact. And number four, if he's in communication with the unit leader on a quarterly basis, And it goes on to say this very definitive statement: Units may not create their own definitions of active. This is a national standard.

So there you have your answer. We do not set metrics on what active means, And this isn't my opinion.

This isn't, you know, something that I came up with through some kind of convoluted interpretation of things that I have read. No, It's right there, It's in black and white. It doesn't happen, You're not allowed to do it, And if you're doing it, you need to stop.

So let's talk about the broad underlying concepts about why in the world we would have this kind of policy. You know I can sympathize with the frustration that would cause somebody to do this, because I've been there Years and years ago we gave this a shot And it didn't last very long- And it's good that it didn't- And we got rid of all this crazy bylaws, business and leadership contracts and stuff like that.

Now here's what happens. So there'll be a series of scout meetings and outings.

You know this might be over several months And the attendance won't be all that great. It'll be very, very soft And the scouts won't seem to care. You'll get aggravated because you put a lot of time and effort into your volunteer work as a scouter.

And so you will turn to the tools that seem to be the most effective and available, which are pieces of paper with words on them. This is almost totally meaningless to you if you're 12,, 13,, 14,, 15 years old. You, as a scout leader, will go ahead and write your 70% rule, your 80% rule, and you'll take it to the troop committee and have them memorialize it in a set of bylaws or something like that.

And then you know, or you'll write leadership contracts because you'll sense, hey, the patrol leaders really aren't doing their job, They're really not responsible, They're not being mature. And so you'll sit down and draft a contract and the committee will look at it and pat you on the back and you know you'll get it all set up. It'll all be nice and tight and legal and everything.

And then you'll put it in front of the boys and they'll all stare at it like a dog with a new pan and wonder what in the world that it is. Here's what we think is going to happen.

You know, we're going to go through all these machinations. We're going to create our bylaws, We're going to create our rules and our contracts and things, And then we're going to sit down with the scouts and we're going to say to a 14-year-old boy: we're going to put a leadership contract in front of them and say, well, here's your leadership contract for being a patrol leader And we need you to sign this because you're going to agree to do all these things And you know that 14-year-old is going to sit there and he's going to go: wow, well, listen, I really appreciate this. I never really thought about this before.

I need to be mature and responsible And there's a set of tasks that I need to accomplish, and I really appreciate you bringing that to my attention. Here it is.

It's in a contract, So let me go ahead and sign that. And can I have my people look at this?

By the way, before we do this, I just want to make sure everything's legal, And then their behavior will somehow magically change or alter and they'll begin attending all the events and outings and they'll be mature, responsible adults. And you're going to do this by writing things on pieces of paper. Man, it's not going to happen. It's just not going to happen. I've tried it. I can guarantee it's not going to work.

So what does work? First, scouts leading their own program and leading their troop. Not just because they have patches, not just because you think that you have a youth-led troop. I mean, really go and look at it.

Who's doing what? Who's making the decisions, Who's making the calls, Who's standing up in front at meetings, Who's instructing, Who's leading outings? If it's the youth, you're not going to have an attendance problem. You're really not.

You're going to have isolated difficulties where it's you know, SAT weekend or PSAT weekend or homecoming or band practice, or you know some important sports event or something like that. Well, that's going to happen. We cooperate with those things. We don't fight against them. We cooperate with them. They're all part of growing up and being a part of an active community And scouting is all about that.

So we cooperate with those things. If a bunch of our guys need to be at a homecoming event or at a PSAT or something like that, oh well, you know that happens.

Schedules, conflict- Are you getting the message here? Scouting is not about trying to legislate or lawyer boys into a certain type of behavior. Scouting is about helping them become aware that these things are desirable, that this is how you become a responsible, mature adult. And if they're leading, they're true. And if they're leading, they're true And they have a true sense of responsibility for what happens. If nobody's bailing them out when they make mistakes, if nobody's hollering at them and carrying on and trying to expect them to be a mature, responsible adult, they're going to show up And they're going to be interested in what's going on And they'll be at the meetings And they'll be at the outings.

And this is not an easy thing for you to achieve as a 45,, 50, 55-year-old man or woman, Because we don't remember very much anymore- as much as we'd like to think we do- what it's like to be 13 or 14. And we don't remember that.

You know we didn't have those capacities at that time And that no piece of paper or writing or rule was going to make us have them. Now you know it's not as if your 15-year-old senior patrol leader has a set of adult capacities.

You know he's mature, reasonable and responsible, like a 25 or 35-year-old adult And that he's just making a choice not to use that capacity. He does not have that capacity. He's 15. He's a developing human being And our job is to work along with the stages of development in each individual case. As soon as you make a hard and fast rule like that about anything and scouting, you're going to find an excellent reason why the rule doesn't apply to some individual.

If one of your boys is a national honors society finalist and has to travel someplace, if he is a member of the future business leaders of America or the 4-H or something like that- and a lot of the scouts get involved in things like that- if he's a member of a lacrosse or a football or wrestling or a basketball or a swimming team and they all of a sudden go to districts or they go to states or something you know, you're not going to see that much of him And that's great because he's doing other things And the things that he is learning and scouting is helping to motivate that, for him to be able to do that, And scouting is helping to motivate that for him to be an active, contributing member of his community. So we don't need to monopolize all of their time and attention. We just don't.

So I hope you know I've been rambling a little bit here, but I hope that the broad underlying concepts help inform you a little bit about this. Is it frustrating to deal with? Absolutely.

Is it discouraging at times, Does it just, you know, make your ears turn red and steam start coming out? Yep, it'll happen. But once you have got yourself grounded in a couple of ideas that you cooperate with your community, you don't fight with it, that you want your scouts doing all these wonderful, great things that help them grow up and mature and become good human beings. That means you pay the price every once in a while of having very few boys at a meeting or an outing. You're going to get over it, Don. I hope that helps.

I'm going to answer your question. If you have any more ideas or concepts or questions about this particular subject, get in touch. You can do that on the blog, You can do it on Facebook. Hey, I'm going to tell you all about that in a couple of minutes. Anyway, This is Cliff Jacobson and you're listening to the Scoutmaster Podcast with Clarke Green

He's my favorite all time boy scout. Don't be afraid, you can call me. Tell me and I'll be around. Howdy Clark, my name is Todd Drady. I'm with troop 875 in St Augustine, Florida. I've got a quick question for you.

You seem to have a problem in our troop with scouts and adults both wanting to join campouts at the last minute, lack of communication or whatnot being the standard excuse, which may or may not be true, but just wondering how most troops handle signups for campouts, how far out should we be requiring a response and a commitment, and how do we keep both adults and scouts to keep their commitments up on campouts so that we can do proper planning, both for meals and for how many campsites to book, etc. It gets exceedingly difficult when we have last minute additions, last minute deletions, things like that.

So any advice, we appreciate it. Thank you, Hey, Todd.

Well, thanks for getting in touch. You can leave a voicemail, just like Todd did, and you're going to get information on how to do that here in just a moment. But let's get to the question Right now.

Todd, a lot of people are nodding their heads and saying, yeah, we have this problem too. I still have it. I have this problem all the time, And I've got to tell you that I've got a couple of pieces of advice that you might find more aggravating than enlightening.

So forgive me, but the first thing I'm going to say is: you have a youth-led troop, And if you have a youth-led troop, they're responsible for making these arrangements and communicating and things like that, and it's not going to be seamless, not by any stretch of the imagination. And if it becomes an ongoing concern, then the first thing I would do as a scoutmaster would be to go to my patrol leader's council and ask them the question, just as you put it to me in your voicemail.

Hey, you know, we have last minute additions and deletions and that causes us some trouble. And how do you guys think we might be able to fix that?

How can we make this better? They might have some really brilliant ideas.

To tell you the truth, some of this comes under not a problem to be solved and fixed and smoothed out, so much as it's part of the price of doing business as a Boy Scout troop. Here's what happens: Two weeks ahead of time, the boy makes a firm commitment to go on the camping trip. Two days ahead of time, he finds out something really cool is going on and he decides that he's going to do that rather than go on the camping trip.

He doesn't tell anybody and you know you're standing there on a Friday night wondering where he is and you call him up and oh, I'm not going and oh, okay, Or the other way around. The boy knows that the camping trip's coming up and he thinks, wow, well, wait a minute, that really cool thing is happening that weekend, so I'm not going to go.

And he goes home and then, round about Wednesday of the camping trip weekend, he mentions to his parents that he's going to go do the really cool thing during the weekend and the parents say, yeah, no, you're not actually. And so he decides that well, I'll go on the scout trip.

And then he shows up on Friday and nobody knows that he was coming. You know he doesn't have a permission slip, he didn't pay for the trip. Yeah, it's a giant mess. It's a giant mess. It's a giant mess and it's a real problem. I'm not discounting that.

It's, you know, not a real problem and it's not really aggravating. I guess what I'm saying is is that there's not really a good, clean way to have it done without getting pretty regimented and creating a list of rules and procedures- And I don't like lists of rules and procedures because they rarely work, at least in my experience.

So my idea is this: I want scouts to go camping. If they show up late, we'll try and find a way. And I put it squarely on the shoulders of the boys who are leading their troop. Hey, John, show it up.

What are you guys going to do? Can we make a way for him to be there?

Will it work out okay, Or do you need to send him home? No, They'll usually find a way to make it work. And it's a hot mess. It's a hot mess all the time. Patrols show up without food. Every once in a while that happens.

They think two or three guys are coming and those guys don't show up. Or they think two or three guys aren't coming and all of a sudden those guys show up.

And you know, this sounds a little Pollyannish maybe, but it's an opportunity for your scouts to start working in the real world and trying to figure out some of this stuff and trying to put it together. Now I know that I will get some responses from people who have an excellent administrative style and they have got this kind of wired and figured out and it's a long tradition in their troop and they've got it figured. We tried legislating this at one point and having rules and regulations and procedures.

You know, if you weren't current on your dues, you didn't get to go camping If you didn't make a commitment at least two weeks ahead of time, you didn't get to go camping. It just didn't work. For us It didn't.

Sometimes it's the family's difficulty, It's the parents who, you know, frankly, don't have it together and they don't make the right arrangements and things. So a boy ends up not going on a trip he was supposed to go on or showing up for a trip that nobody knew he was going on. And in that situation, when you kind of suss out that it might be a parental problem, I try not to penalize the boys for problems that their parents make, if it's at all possible. I hope some of this helps you, Todd, really, because the intention is to be helpful And I would like to hear other people's take on the question. But just to sum up, I would take this question to your patrol leaders council see what they have to suggest in the way of resolutions. I would also realize that part of this is a price of doing business.

I haven't made it happen seamlessly in the last 26 years, So we put up with some uncertainty and a little bit of chaos once in a while. But the idea of getting guys out on trips, that to me seems to be the most important concept and that would be the thing to aim at. And, plus, we do not want to make boys suffer the penalties of their parents not having it together sometimes. Hope it helps, Todd. Let me know what you think. Folks, if you have some input on the question, send me an email or send me a voicemail and we'll keep up the discussion And we're going to find out how to do that in just a minute.