Activities
REMINDERS Week of Oct. 21, 2020
Reminders
- New District Name: The Monon District
- OA FALL ORDEAL Oct. 23-25
- Bewitched Belzer Bash
- Recharter
- Fall Camporee 2020 update and future schedule
- Cub Scout Adventures On-line
- Eagle Scout Information
- Merit Badge requirements during Covid-19
- District Committee Meetings and Roundtable Dates 2020
- University of Scouting – Nov. 14 2020
- OA NEWS: Temporary Camping Night Policy Due to COVID-19
- Guide to Safe Scouting Newsletter
Good Turn for Nature – service project
The council’s Fall Service Project – Good Turn For Nature – is right around the corner. This is a great opportunity to engage your scouts with the outdoors and teach them the importance of caring for nature!
The project runs from September 28 to October 27 and it is not too late to sign up. We are now in the process of matching units with host organizations. If you have not submitted your commitment form, please do so as soon as possible.
Click here to fill out the online form.
The following organizations are still unmatched and would love to partner with your unit:
- Cope Environmental Center
- Keep Indianapolis Beautiful
- Bitternut Woods Nature Preserve
- Shakamak State Park
- Lieber SRA
- Terre Haute Parks & Rec
- Whitewater Memorial State Park
For more information and a complete list of host organizations, check out the community page.
Please let me know if you have any questions.
Thank you,
Stephanie Marron | Activities Assistant
Developer, Harmony, Empathy, Belief, Responsibility
7125 Fall Creek Road North, Indianapolis, IN 46256 Phone: 317-813-7123
Troop 69 has Sea Base slots 2019
From Troop 69 Scoutmaster Chad Galer:
Scouters,
I have 5 youth spots for Seabase St.Thomas‘ Sailing Adventure this June 3-9, 2019.
If anyone in your troops or crews might be interested, please have them contact me as soon as possible and I can fill them in on the exact details. Estimated total cost is about $1400 per person ($900 for Seabase, ~$500 for flight).
Yours in scouting,
Chad Galer
SM, Troop 69
Lange Challenge Camping Participation (Camping Log info)
From NS Camping & Outdoor Programming Chair Paul Kovach:
Several questions have come regarding how to report data for the Lange Challenge. To help better understand the Challenge criteria and how the data will be used, directly for the Challenge, and indirectly to monitor camping in the council, please read below.
The Lange Challenge
To provide additional incentive for the council to emphasis Boy Scout camping and advancement. A contribution of $100,000 per year for ten years from the ADL Charitable Trust to the Crossroads of America Council, when Challenge criteria are met.
Challenge Criteria:
Scouting continues to be guided by the Scout Oath and Law.
- Achieve Journey to Excellence Gold Standard by having a minimum of 80% of Crossroads of America Council Boy Scouts annually attend long-term summer camp and/or participate in a high adventure opportunity.
- Achieve a minimum of 42% of Crossroads of America Council Boy Scouts advancing in rank in 2015. The percentage increases each year by 1% until 50% is achieved and then maintained.
- Achieve a minimum of 60% of Crossroads of America Council Boy Scout Troops annually conducting seven short-term overnight campouts in 2015. The percentage increases each year by 1% until 70% is achieved and then maintained.
Criteria #1 and #3 directly correlate with camping participation.
- Long-term or high adventure camping events are monitored according to the JTE standard for camping, which runs from July to June as currently tabulated. Since we also want to capture the most recent summer camping season, the period for this reporting is extended through the end of August, thus the total reporting period is July 2017 to August 2018, inclusive. The reporting should count the total number of scouts in the unit participating in long-term or high adventure camping events.
- Short-term camping, such as monthly outings, are encouraged through planning in the Ideal Year of Scouting program. The requirement is for at least 7 short-term campouts over the reporting period. The reporting must count the total number of unit campout events. The spreadsheet allows additional data on each event to be reported to improve our understanding of troop events.
Thanks for your efforts towards camping data collection! If you need further clarification or have other questions, please contact Paul Kovach.
ALSO ==> See this prior post for the documents and references: Camping Log / Lange Challenge Update .
Camping Logs due this month (Aug 2018)
Pack and Scout Leaders,
Please continue to send your questions to Paul Kovach and I regarding completing the Camping Log assignment for the Lange Challenge. We’ll post an FAQ within the week from the questions we’ve seen thus far to help you in your compilation of the log data.
Thanks to those who have completed their logs!
Please also see this prior post:
Camping Log / Lange Challenge Update
Hello North Star Key 3 and extended Scout Leadership:
A few weeks ago I sent an email about logging your Pack and Troop’s camping hours to qualify for grant funding from the Lange Challenge. The next collection date is end of August, we will do a call-out as the time approaches.
However there was no information on the start date of the data collection period.
Please start that data collection back to July 2017. The full data period goes from July 2017 – December 2018.
Linked here please find:
- Email: NS Camping Log Hours instructions email_25Jun2018 (verbiage only);
- Template tracking workbook for Packs (Camping Nights Log North Star_PackXXXX) and Troops (Camping Nights Log North Star_TroopXXXX):
- Lange Challenge verbiage: Lange Challenge ;
- Lange Challenge status report by District as of 6-May-2018: Lange Scorecard – 5.6.18 [reference only].
Please let us know if you have any additional questions. Thanks and have a great rest of your summer!
YiS,
Cheryl Bilsland, NS Communications Vice-Chair – on behalf of Paul Kovach, NS Camping & Outdoor Programming Chair
Don’t Forget! Saturday May 26
Please see the following two posts on service events for Scouts on Saturday, May 26:
Memorial Weekend Grave Dressing
500 Festival Parade Setup
Thank you for all you do for Scouting, and for your greater community!
Scouts – Your Service is requested at the INDY 500 Parade!
On behalf of Bill Hodgson, North Star District 500 Festival Parade Chair:
REMINDER!
Please recall North Star still is scheduled to set up 500 Festival parade chairs on Saturday, May 26.
Scouts in uniform should arrive to set up chairs at the 300 block of North Pennsylvania, between New York and Vermont Streets.
Please arrive between 8:30 to 9:00 AM. Good for 5 service hours!
Yours in scouting,
Bill Hodgson
Troop 73
317-560-0597
Scouts at the JCC Annual Earth Day Celebration 2018
On behalf of North Star District Executive Jessica Hofman:
North Star had the opportunity to host a few stations at the Jewish Community Center’s Annual Earth Day Celebration. Volunteers from Troop 18 and the Council ran a rope bridge, a fire starting station, and a catapult station for thousands of families to stop by and enjoy.
Through surveys done at the event, we were told that our stations were a crowd favorite! This event could not have been possible without the help of great volunteers! Thank you to Ray and John Matutes from Troop 18 for taking time out of their Sunday to help!
Required Unit Reporting of District Service Hours
On behalf of North Star Program Chair Mark Pishon:
ISSUE: Two separate reporting databases
The national website, accessible through my.scouting.org, reports directly to National Council and is used for your unit’s national statistics such as contribution to the World Movement of Scouting’s billion service-hour challenge, but not Journey to Excellence scoring.
We know this is a problem because many of our largest and most successful troops have reported zero service hours on one or both of these websites. At the same time, these units have had Eagle Scouts reporting hundreds if not thousands of service hours. The scouts are getting proper credit, but it is not passing on to the units.
Journey to Excellence has a separate scoring for service hours which can receive a separate gold-level recognition.
ACTION ITEM:
Make sure your unit secretary or registrar is reporting the same service hours to both National BSA on my.scouting.org as well as to the Crossroads BSA website (service hours form found here).
To prevent this being a problem in the future, our District will be reviewing these statistics quarterly. For troops, we will be looking at Eagle project reports against unit reports. Discrepancies will be pointed out to units.
For Cub Scout Packs, we will be looking at zero-hour reports as needing updating.
Remember, we are part of a world-wide effort to demonstrate the value of scouting to our communities. Your reports help that marketing effort.
CAC North Star Unofficial Website 
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