Wood Badge

Now I don't want to give too much away, but I have to write about my latest Scouting experience.

This past weekend I began my participation in Wood Badge, the penultimate Boy Scout training for leaders.  It focuses on leadership skills and builds onto core beliefs of the Boy Scout program.

It was a transformational experience.  It shows what great leadership is and what functions are necessary to become a great leader.  The activities are very much what Baden-Powell said of Scouting; "Games with a purpose".  We had fun, but also learned at the same time.  And that is what Scouting should be; a game with a purpose.

I truly believe that all Scouters should go through this training sometime in their Scouting career.  The sooner the better in my opinion.  I can already tell that I'm changing for the better and as such my Troop, Pack and my family will benefit from this.

I don't want to reveal too much so I will end it here.  But take my word, go through Wood Badge.  Get trained.  Go back to your unit with this training and give the youth a better program.

Back to Gilwell!

Keeping the outing in Scouting

I am a firm believer in the idea that the out of doors should play an integral part in Scouting.  Back when Scouting was in its infancy, Scouts would venture into the outdoors often and usually to a much greater extent than boys nowadays could dream about.  Of course that’s back when the outdoors were more accessible and in all honesty, more abundant.

Things have changed.  We’ve become more urbanized and as such Scouting has evolved in that direction too.  There’s nothing wrong with that, but we cannot allow outdoor activities and other interactions with nature to fall by the wayside.  I feel that for many troops the outdoors are a mere periphery and not the main focus of Scouting.  I disagree with this approach.

One of the main reasons that most boys join Scouting is to go out into the wild and to experience nature outside of their yard or general neighborhood.  As our society becomes more technology oriented our connections to nature fade.  Scouting has always been a major connector to nature, but it too has started to falter.  Many new merit badges are very urban centered (animation, multi-media, computer aided design, etc.).  Though most merit badges deal with the outdoors or nature, the trend of urban centered merit badges is increasing.

I’ve heard of troops that only go out once a quarter.  I’ve also heard of troops who only “camp” in fully furnished cabins.  My own troop, which was once known as “the camping troop”, has also fallen into the “no outing” category.

This has got to change.  We’ve got to put the outing back into scouting.  We have to give the youth a good, quality outdoors program.

It’s incredible how many places there are to go camping, hiking or otherwise have great Scouting trips.  The first place you should look when searching for decent outing locations is your State Parks.  State Parks tend to have great campsites for reasonable prices and on top of that, they usually have a museum, visitor center or other facility for educational info and events.  So you’re really killing two birds with one stone with State Parks; easy camping facilities and activities to fill in the time between meals and Scout activities.  Be careful, however, you don’t want to fall into relying on State Parks as your sole outing destination.  They are great for beginner campers, but the more seasoned youth will begin to bristle towards these easy locations.

Outings don’t have to be limited to parks.  You can take your Scouts to any number of other destinations or activities.  Civil War re-enactments, military museums (i.e. the USS Alabama), museums, cultural centers, science parks and many other places are great alternatives to just straight camping in the woods.  My Scoutmaster when I was a boy took a small contingent of Scouts to the nuclear power plant at Oak Ridge where the boys were able to earn the Atomic Energy merit badge.  I also remember going to the Space Center in Huntsville, Alabama.  We earned Space Exploration.  So you see, there are so many things you can do with your troop that may or may not be readily obvious.  It certainly pays to research and see what’s available in your area.

Going on outings not only gives the Scouts a fun experience, but they also given them knowledge and a deeper understanding of our world, be it natural or societal or educational.  While hiking through a Civil War battleground, Scouts can get a better picture of what happened during the war and what the war was about.  This is hard to get from a textbook or movie.  Going to a city council meeting teaches the youth the processes of municipal government and thus a greater understanding of civics and how our cities work.

Life skills are also a major thing to get taught on an outing.  Rope work, proper handling of axes and other tools, cooking, orienteering and other normal Scout skills are best taught in the field, actually building and living in a camp.  You can have the Scouts practices their skills at meetings, but it isn’t until they have to rely on those skills that they actually get ingrained into the young mind and are thus able to be accessed readily.

The long and short of it is that we need to keep kids in the outdoors.  It is an integral part of our organization and we need to keep it alive.  Not only is it a major part of Scouting, it is a primary factor that draws youth to us.  Without it, we’re done.

Recruiting

I went out on a recruiting run tonight.  I got one potential Tiger Cub and one Webelos II.  It's better than nothing.  I hope those boys will enjoy our pack.  It's a small pack, but we are enthusiastic about Scouting and try to give the boys a quality program.

Recruiting is hard.  It's often a thankless task.  You try your best to recruit boys, but either you can't get many or they aren't the "right" type of boys.  In mind there is no "right" type of boy.  Every boy needs Scouting.  It's a program that can reach youth who may not respond to other programs or activities.  It's got a great moral code that gives a great basis to one's conduct.  I will take any boy into the troop and try to mold him into a good person.

Scouting has had a bad rap for a while.  We've been seen as nerds, uptight dorks who are a bunch of goody two shoes.  Well, yes, we are good people.  We don't break the rules and yes, we wear uniforms.  However, we get dirty.  We go out into the wilderness and we make it back.  We are tough and strong and resourceful.  I certainly don't think we're dorks, but it's an image that we've had for a long time.  It makes it hard to get boys in because they fear being less "cool".  I know I didn't readily reveal that I was a Boy Scout when I was in school.  At least not until I became an Eagle.

Another challenge to recruiting, that I've seen, is how some leaders seem to want to pick and choose their potential Scouts.  They want the best of the best, the cream of the crop.  They don't want the poor, single parent kids.  That would be too much work.  Well, I can tell you from growing up in a family like that that Scouting really made a difference.  It saved me.  It gave me morals and lessons that I would never had gotten otherwise.  I am so thankful that I had this program in my life as a boy.  We need to push back the idea that there two kinds of boys; the ones we want and the ones we don't want.  There is only one type; boys.  Every boy can benefit from Scouting, especially boys who don't have a dad at home like me.  I would argue that the it's these boys whom we need to reach out to.  If we can reach these underprivileged boys and can make a difference in their lives for the good then little by little our world will change for the better. If we ignore them as we do now, then yes, they'll most likely turn to violence, drugs and other negative avenues.

It really drives me crazy when leaders criticize these boys.  I was close to being one of them.  I was poor.  My dad wasn't around.  Is it fair to just ignore a boy because he's poor?  That is showing a horrible example not only to those boys, but to the other boys who come from families with two parents and a higher socioeconomic status.  If we say "Oh, we don't want those ghetto kids", what kind of example are we setting?  We're essentially saying, "You're not as good as we are so we don't want you".  It hurts and it makes things worse.

Probably the biggest hurdle in recruiting is the sense of proprietorship over schools that some troops/packs have.  They feel that they own certain schools and to trespass is a mortal sin.  I wonder where the fairness is in that.  How is it that one troop has access to better schools than other troops?  Is it fair just because a troop is located in one section that they can only recruit from the schools down the street?  I feel that this hinders scouting because it really limits the options for boys.  If a troop recruits from a school and they meet on Tuesdays, but won't let the troop that meets on Wednesdays recruit from the same school, what happens to the boys who can't meet on Tuesday but Wednesdays works for them?  There is no choice for these boys right now.  Also, the programs might be different.  One troop may be more of a merit badge/skills troop whereas another troop may be an outdoors troop who does many trips.  Well one may appeal more to a boy than the other.  We need to collaborate and recruit together.  It doesn't really matter where the boy goes, we just need to get them into the program so they can learn and grow.  I think that we should band together and offer the boys options.  One troop might work better than another.

Something else about recruiting.  Parents need to join too.  We're not a babysitting agency.  The only way a troop/pack can function properly is parent involvement.  But most parents take their kids to the meetings and disappear until the meeting is over.  I'm sorry, but that's just not conductive to a good troop.  So parents reading this, join your boy's troop even if it's just in the committee.  The troop needs your help!

Introduction

I'm going to be using this blog as a place to vent and to bemoan and hopefully to encourage other Scouters.

I'm an avid Scouter and have been for most of my life.  I have a toddler whom I adore and I can't wait for him to begin his Scouting career.  I fell in with my current troop about 5 years ago.  They were having a yard sale and I stopped to buy a desk.  I started talking to one of the moms and when I realized that this was a Scouting event I suddenly realized I wanted to get back into the program.  A few weeks later, I was attending meetings.  I didn't become an Assistant Scoutmaster until about 2.5 years ago.  Since then I've been helping regularly and now help with Webelos.

I believe that Scouting is an extremely important organization and something that must continue to grow.  I grew up without my dad around.  My parents divorced when I was about 6 or 7 and when I was about 10 my dad moved to the East coast and I moved to Tennessee.  I saw him once or twice a year after that.  It was a lonely time for me.  I missed my dad and really craved an adult male role model.  This came in the form of my Scoutmasters.  There are 4 that I remember very well.  The chief among them is Mr. Watts.  Mr. Watts was my best friend Jack's dad and really the closest thing I had to a dad too.  If my mom and I needed anything, he'd be there.  He is a great Scouter and taught me and the other boys many things.  I am so very thankful that he's in my life.

Through the leadership and support of Mr. Watts and the other Scoutmasters, I made it to Eagle (just barely, I had my court of honor a month before I turned 18).  This was the biggest accomplishment of my life until the completion of my Master's degree.  It took a lot of work and effort to complete and was an accumulation of several years' work.  That day in September 1999 I joined an incredible brotherhood.  The brotherhood of eagles.