Camping & Outdoor Programming
Encouraging Advancement
This past spring, my nephew joined a troop in Cincinnati’s Dan Beard Council. Since it was his first troop summer camp, my son and I drove over to surprise him.
It was a very interesting experience. It was my first time visiting Camp Friedlander. In fact, most of my scouting experience has been in the Crossroads of America Council, especially North Star District. This visit allowed me to see some new takes on scouting.
One of the surprises was a simple system for encouraging advancement. My nephew’s troop has an advancement board. The entire free time after lunch, scouts were hovering around the board, adding their own white tiles, moving the white tiles to reflect in-camp boards-of-review completed, and otherwise planning their advancement plans for the week.
The scoutmasters had encouraged the new scouts to take a white “tile” (a small piece of wood painted white) and use colored Sharpie pens to customize their tile. Hooks and eyes were set into the tiles to allow them to hang properly.
No adults were prompting advancement conversations, but the campsite was buzzing with plans. The troop had made clear that Scoutmaster Conferences were being held Wednesday and Boards of Review on Thursday. This chance for immediate advancement and the privilege of moving the tiles quickly helped further the drama.
In the electronic age, we tend to forget old tools sometimes work best. Our own Troop 35 has the privilege of a dedicated room 
for scouting. As a result, they have one of the old-school advancement charts hanging on the wall. (Generic and Cub Scout and Boy Scout specific charts are available.) Each boy can easily see his own progress. In my short visit in June, I saw several scouts go over and read the chart to find out where they and their fellow scouts stood.
If you want to encourage advancement, find a way to put advancement before the boys in writing. They will tend to think about advancement more often.
Sox Report: Week 6
We have nearly 150 Firecrafter candidates popping sparks at Camp Ransburg. I am going visiting to Camp Krickenstein next week. Maybe we can get them added to to the count, too.
Don’t forget tomorrow’s Mid-Summer Ritual!
New Cub Requirements for 2015-16
If you are not aware, BSA has issued new requirements, handbooks, and leader guides for Cub Scouts. This is a major overhaul of the program.
This new set of requirements will affect everyone in scouting. The surprising part is how it affects Boy Scout Troops.
As we have linked before, BSA through Scouter magazine and Bryan on Scouting has given us some summaries of the changes. We, as leaders, need an overview that tells us more.
Sox report week 5
Sox is aiming for 120 sparks for the year come the end of this week.
To make a spark, we all know, takes work!
Arrow Tour 2015 at Belzer
The Crossroads of America Council is excited to announce it will celebrate the Order of the Arrow’s centennial as an ArrowTour host. ArrowTour is an interactive event for Scouts (of all ages and regardless of OA membership), volunteers, and Scouting alumni that is traveling throughout the country during the summer of 2015. The tour will make a stop on July 14, 2015 from 4:00 pm to 8:30 pm at Camp Belzer at 6102 N Boy Scout Road, Indianapolis, IN 46226.
The purpose of the tour is to commemorate the Order of the Arrow’s 100th anniversary. During the event, participants will have the opportunity to learn about the Order of the Arrow, its story, and its future. Some of the program highlights include interactive exhibits, activities such as silk-screening and branding, and challenge games. Participants will have a chance to meet some of the Order’s national leaders, and alumni can learn about the Scouting Alumni Association and local alumni efforts to supporting Scouting in our area.
An exclusive ArrowTour Trading Post will carry ArrowTour and OA centennial merchandise. The Order of the Arrow will split the trading post proceeds with the Crossroads of America Council.
The program will conclude with a special show that recognizes the Order’s rich history and empowers participants to help shape the organization’s future. The Order of the Arrow is creating a truly unique and interactive experience for all Scouts, volunteers, and Scouting alumni.
The tour will open at 4:00 PM and will conclude at 8:30 PM.
You can find more information about the ArrowTour routes and program on the web at http://arrowtour.oa-bsa.org. You can also keep up with the tour as it makes its way around the country by following @ArrowTour on Twitter.
For Webelos interested in attending, if they attend with a Boy Scout Troop or Patrol, this event can count for Arrow of Light Requirements 3D and 4.
Risky Play: Scouts and Sports
Experts in child development are learning that “risky play” is less risky than parents believe and important to proper emotional development. In today’s world, many parents are trying to prevent their kids from under taking risks. They supervise the children and all of their activities. They select and organize activities to avoid any risks. So the criteria they seem to be using is that they want no risk of injury to their children. So what is it they do to give their children activity and avoid all of these risks? In many situations it’s organized sports. For others it’s allowing them to play video games all day.
So if the criteria is to avoid injury, how successful have parents been in achieving their goals? Are children safer in adult-controlled activities than activities where the children choose for themselves? We’ll skip questions of which activities help the children develop into self-reliant individuals or help them achieve educational goals better. It simply focuses on questions of safety.
Based on some summaries of Center for Disease Control studies, the evidence suggests the kids that define and decide the type of play in which they engage are less likely to be injured. Less than what? Less than organized activities, especially sports, where parents or unrelated adults are deciding what types of risks should be undertaken. Some summaries suggest that over 60% activity-related injuries to kids requiring medical treatment are from organized sports. That leads to two interesting insights related to scouting.
But before we look at the insights, why would these things be true? This increased tendency to injury seems a strange results until you think about the type of coaching that is often given. “Play through the pain” is the old coach’s refrain that has been abolished. Yet the injuries continue. Some of the reasons for this are that the kids are doing the same activity repeatedly. They are also specializing in the position or type of motion that is likely to cause injuries. Studies on baseball suggest that large pluralities of kids play with sore arms. Rotator cuff surgeries and other orthopedic sports surgeries are increasing rapidly among the young. They end up many repeated-stress injuries. So the very activities that the parents look for their children to avoid risk of harm actually is incurring ever higher rates of injury. So what risks are the parents seeking to avoid?
If scoutmasters would report as many injuries on the scout outings, troops would be shut down too harmful. Yet these same boys who do scouting, too, are more likely to be injured in sports than scouting. So what we see is the perceived risks of Scouting are far less than the actual risks of sports.
One of the other insights from the CDC studies is that kids who play sports and choose their own activities tend to be injured less than in organized sports. Part of it is natural avoidance. If they feel any soreness, they change their behavior. The second is changing positions and responsibilities regularly which avoids some of the soreness and trauma that leads to later medical correction. This leads to the second insight. Scouting allows the boys to determine what level of risk they’re willing to undertake. This self-determination is actually one of the best ways to minimize risk and resulting injury. Boy leadership increases safety rather than reduces it. It is the adult tendency to press forward with risk, discomfort, or pain that is harmful to youth.
Scouting is statistically much safer for youth than adult-organized sports.
Informal Minutes of June 2015 Committee Meeting
I was not appointed as the Committee’s secretary, so I did not take notes with an eye to that thoroughness. Nor was I a participant in each break-out session. With those warnings, I will highlight some of the discussions from the Committee Meeting.
Steve James, the District Chair, opened the meeting and emphasized that District needs to be focused on membership recruiting for August 27, 2015. He said, “We are in All-Hands-On-Deck mode. We need all Packs, Troops, and Crews to be part of the process.” Steve introduced our new District Executive Cornellius “Con” Sullivan. Con rapidly covered the points about our Council-wide Back to School Night that Darin Stendl, Con’s supervisor, had covered at the May Roundtable. Jump to the link for a detailed report. The most important part of the presentation for this report is that the marketing campaign’s call to action for the general public is “Sign up at your local elementary school.” This means that we need personnel at all of our District’s elementary schools.
During his presentation, Con emphasized that we have nearly 43 elementary schools to cover at sign-up night, while we only have 35 chartered units and 18 Cub Scout Packs. There is no way that the Packs can man all of the elementary schools. Con also underlined that there is a Recruiting Rally at Victory Field in downtown Indianapolis on the evening of July 16, 2015. (Literature about the campaign is available on the Council website, too.)
In Darin’s earlier presentation he had emphasized that the call to action does not emphasize Cub Scouts. It is a general call to join Scouting. This means that Troops and Crews could receive new members, too.
Con reported that North Star District’s Cub Packs are encouraged to participate in a District-wide Pack Overnight Campout on October 17-18, 2015 (I will need to review my notes to double check dates) at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Other weekends and campsites are available if Packs have fewer conflicts, but IMS is being pushed for North Star. IMS is close to home and exciting. Race cars and another race themed aspects will be emphasized through the weekend.
After Con’s presentation, there was a general open discussion of some of the logistics. One issue brought up is that customarily Packs collect the initial dues from new families on sign up night. Council then asks for a check from the Pack to Council to cover the new recruits’ BSA dues. This lead to some surprise and frustration. In addition, there was confusion about how much BSA dues the Pack should collect the first night to be considered a completely “registered scout.” Con did not have the answer at that time. These topics would be addressed in more depth later. For the duration of the meeting, the Committee agreed to take the issue under advisement and focus on the immediate mission of recruiting. At the meeting Con promised to clarify a few of these issues as quickly as possible.
This morning, he emailed me some clarifications. Read the rest of this entry »
Sox Report Week 3
This week Sox is reporting 34 Firecrafter candidates for the week. As of yesterday 28 had popped sparks.
Recruiting Boys by Camping
One of my regular refrains about recruiting is borrowed. “Get ’em in a tent, and you got ’em.” Boys of all ages want to camp.
When I was a Cubmaster, the most common questions the Cubs asked me was “When is the next campout?!” This was not really a question, so much as a barely contained exclamation on bouncing toes. They were fairly ready to explode. When the answer was anything other than “tomorrow” they nearly burst like a balloon, looking completely deflated.
The same excitement exists at 11 years old. By the time they get to 15 or 16, they still love tents and campfires. Now the emphasis is less on being outside where they can run and now about time spent together around the campfire. Stories, gossip, favored games, personal challenges, and complaints of the day become a greater bonding experience.
Knowing that boys want to camp at all ages, even if the reasons for enjoyment change, what can we do to improve our recruitment?
Sea Base Opportunity in July
“You think Survivor is tough? Check out Big Munson. The Out Island Adventure combines camping on a remote 100+ acre island, snorkeling on pristine coral reefs, trolling for sportfish, kayaking through red mangroves, and exploring the flora and fauna of Big Munson Island. You will wade ashore on Big Munson Island carrying all the food, water and equipment used during your adventure in a rugged camping setting. Powerboats will take you snorkeling and fish on selected days. A program mate will remain with you for the duration of your trip to assist you in appreciating this unique environment. This is a true high-adventure program, one that combines physical challenge with excitement and adventure. If your crew has strong camping skills and enjoys rugged camping, then the Out Island program is for you. This is a seven day event.”
The website describes Big Munson this way:
In December of 1982, a gift was received by the National Council of the Boy Scouts of America which was destined to change the very nature of some of the exciting programs offered by the Florida Sea Base. The gift was an untouched, uninhabited island over 100 acres in size, surrounded by the crystal clear water off Big Pine Key in the lower Keys.
On the entire string of islands called the Florida Keys, there are but a few that remain as they were when the pirates first rowed ashore in search of fresh water and game to provision their galleons. This island shows up on old nautical charts as Newfound Harbor Key, and on newer charts as Big Munson Key.
It is located three miles offshore from US 1, and a mere four miles inshore from Looe Key National Marine Sanctuary, known for some of the most fabulous reef formations found in the Keys. Sea Base has committed to retain this island in its natural state. Lightweight screened tents, cooking gear and other necessary equipment is provided by Sea Base, but all personal gear, food, and water must be waded ashore for your stay.
CAC North Star Unofficial Website 
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