Author: Jeffrey Heck
Preparing Web Resources for Recruiting Season
Many scouters do not feel that they are technically savvy. One of the resources available to units is the beascout.org. This website is intended to help people who are interested in scouting find units near their house.
As we go into a major recruiting season with a heavy marketing blitz, we need to be aware of how our units are listed on that website.
Here’s a link to a video to help key unit personnel update the information on the website.
Order of the Arrow Cookout at June Meeting
On Sunday, June 7, 2015, the Lowaneu Allanque Chapter of OA will hold its annual cookout at Marrot Park, across College Avenue from Park Tudor School, approximately 7351 N College Ave, Indianapolis, IN 46220.
OA Brotherhood Members should bring side dishes. Ordeal Members should bring drinks. OA will provide meat and buns. Please Register by Friday, June 5, 2015.
The Firecrafters and OA will join together for the cookout.
Prior to the cookout, Firecrafter members will hike the Monon Trail beginning at the Park beginning at 1:00 pm.
The cookout will begin at 2:00 pm.
Joint Service Project for LOA and Firecrafter
John Ruggles announced a reminder service project Saturday, May 30, 2015 at the American Legion Post #3 from 8:00 AM -12:00 NOON. Mr. Ruggles is the the advisor for our LOA chapter of the Jaccos Towne Lodge of the Order of the Arrow.
This project is a great way to pick up some service hours for our chapter. The post will provide sodas.
We will be combining this service activity with Firecrafter.
Can your Troop Boost Advancement at Camp?
What are some ways that your troop can truly excel in advancement at summer camp? If you do increase your emphasis on advancement with scouts, does it make more work for the adults? Maybe not.
As we discussed earlier this week, it pays for the adult leaders to be familiar with the Guide to Advancement (2015) that is now available online as a webpage and as an e-book in PDF form.
District Committee Planning Session June 11th
All members of North Star District Committee should attend Committee Planning Meeting.
To that goal, Vice President of District Operations Stroh Bronn and Director of Field Services Rob Hemmelgarn will be leading this session on the evening of June 11th. The session will be held at St. Luke’s United Methodist Church, Room N101 (the same room as the May District Committee Meeting). The class will begin at 7:00 p.m.
Merit Badge Counselor List
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One of the major projects for the District Committee is going to be making sure that the Troops’ expectations of who is a registered Merit Badge Counselor matches the District’s records.
The Guide to Advancement (2015) now has a system for automatically de-registering merit badge counselors who do not respond to emailed inquiries. Several of our former merit badge counselors are no longer registered in that position, who believe that they are. A copy of the current merit badge counselor list has been mailed to all of the Troop’s Key 3 (chartered org rep, Scoutmaster, and Troop Committee Chair).
Revisiting Rules of Advancement
As summer camp draws near, we in scouting are entering the height of “Advancement Season.” More work toward advancement will occur in the next 75 days than at almost any other time of the year. Some of this is due to participating in merit badge sessions for boy scouts and day camp activities for Cub Scouts.
For many years, most scouters relied on learning the rules of advancement by watching and experiencing our home unit manage advancement. We would learn to improve on these techniques by attending classes or through casual conversations with other scouters. Few of us had ever seen the Guide to Advancement.
As with most BSA publications up to 2013, if you wanted to read it, you had to pay for it. The Guide to Advancement was always a recommended book to have on a unit’s shelf, but few units purchased a copy or updated it regularly.
What is the Fundamental Unit of Scouting?
As adults, we are involved in our units: packs, troops, and crews. We rarely stop to consider who is the most important part of the unit. As we talk to Council representatives, they talk about our units as packs, troops, and crews. This is for a good reason. Their job is to support the adults at those levels. Council’s (and, therefore, district’s) focus is on creating and maintaining a place for boys to do scouting.
This focus from council on units can easily confuse the adult leaders that those units are the primary units of scouting. If council focuses at that level it must be the most important, right?
Wrong. The most important is the den or patrol. Our focus is the boy and his enjoyment and growth. The den or patrol (which I simplify to patrol for reasons that will become more clear shortly) is where the boy experiences scouting. He wants to do scouting with his friends. He is more likely to continue scouting if his friends are physically nearby. The patrol is where this proximity can and should occur.
Clarke Green shares some very interesting literature from Canadian scouting about why and how this works. It is worth a read.
What should we learn from this? Do these lessons apply to Boy Scouts only or do they apply to dens and crews?
The stronger the identity and cohesiveness of the patrols, the stronger the pack, troop, or crew. The boys doing what they love as a patrol will never fail to seek more of the fun. They want to spend time with their friends their own age. If they get this, they will want to share the joy with younger scouts. It starts a healthy cycle of do, model, teach, and do again.
Cub Scouts for kindergarteners?
One of my son’s fellow Cub Scouts had a father a bit older than me. The father still had his Cub Scout shirt from the 1960’s with the Lion Cub Rank. This was the predecessor to the Arrow of Light and Webelos program. Webelos originally meant “Wolf, Bear, Lion: WBLs.”
In 1971, our current program started with the Tigers phased in the 1980’s.
Now BSA is pilot testing a reintroduction of the Lion rank. Instead of the highest rank, Lion would be a new rank for kindergarteners, similar to the Girl Scouts’ Daisies. Minnesota’s Northern Star Council was first. It has now expanded to the Garden State Council and Western Massachusetts Council.
Webelos to Scout Transition . . . For Adults
We spend a long time and effort worrying about the boys transitioning from Cub Scouts to Boy Scouts.
Frankly that’s not the biggest problem.
The people who have the hardest time transitioning are the former cub leader-parents. Boy Scouts is often a culture shock.
Considering that a former cubmaster may be very accustomed to watching the boys progress from year-to-year in there nice, tidy, little den. Rarely is there a difference in age greater than 14 months. The den leader is an adult, who maintains order much like a teacher in a classroom does.
And then the transition the Boy Scouts.
CAC North Star Unofficial Website 
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