Programming
National Jamboree Rally:This Saturday
As noted earlier on this website, Crossroads of America Council will hold a rally to encourage enrollment in National Jamboree.
The Rally will be held at the Scout Center on Sun
day, March 13 at 2:00 pm.
The National Jamboree will take place in July 2017 at Bechtel Scout Reservation in West Virginia.
Encourage your scout and venturers to attend the rally, even if they do not have an initial interest.
If you cannot make the Rally, please let us know. We can arrange to have a Jamboree Scoutmaster attend your troop meeting. (The Rally will be better for building excitement.)
Hope to see you at the Rally.
The Scout Staff
I am fascinated by the old use of the Scout staff or walking stick as part of the scout uniform. The scout was expected to be able to use his staff for many uses. Take a look at this article on ways to use the staff and use scout craft.
The scout staff is also the way that a scout can make his uniform his own. He can add handles. He can add medallions.
In Del-Mi District, many troops give a Webelos crossing over into scouts a scout staff at the cross-over ceremony.
Update on Training in District
In July 2015, I posted an article regarding the poor status of training in North Star District. At the time, we had about 46% of our scouters having completed the required training for their positions. Rechartering for 2016 is complete. Now is a good time to take a look at how we have progressed.
Some of the problems in the July 2015 report were failures of record keeping. The Council’s centralized method of reporting and maintaining training records often caused lags or omissions in updating individual’s records. As a result, many scouters had completed training but it did not appear on their records. This meant that the statistics were inaccurate.
With the advent of my.scouting.org’s allowing Unit Key 3 (Chartered Organization Representative, Unit Committee Chair, and Unit Leaders) and Unit Training Committee Chairs being able to update individuals’ records, we have been able to update old records very aggressively. This has solved many of the omitted-records problems.
Another problem we had is that units had no training program in place while district and council offered few training alternatives outside of University of Scouting or summer camp at Ransburg to cover these gaps in training. With district offering training at camporees and at unit meetings, this began to cut into this problem.
Now we can see the results, from 46% trained we are now at 88.6% trained.
Thank you to the many scouters who have helped achieve this astounding improvement in our numbers!
Committee Meetings: Useful?
The great Bobwhite Blather has some hints on making sure that Unit Committee meetings are held and effective.
Here are a few key comments:
So how do you slog through the routine of a monthly committee meeting without causing your committee members to “check out” and put you on mute?
With people saying they’d prefer almost anything to sitting through a boring meeting – eight percent reportedly would rather have a root canal than endure a litany of boring status updates – it’s vitally important to engage your participants so they can share the essence of their knowledge. And being a volunteer organization, we can’t compel them to attend, like your employer can, so we need to make them want to attend.
- Most of your meeting should involve tasks in which participants are dependent on each other to advance the outcome. If only one or two people are involved, the rest of the attendees will either be sitting there silently watching the clock or contributing in ways that may not be helpful.
- If your meeting has no purpose or agenda, you’re doomed to waste your participants’ time. They don’t know what to expect…and you don’t know where you are going next – or even why you’re there.
- Expect a solution to arise out of the discussion. Don’t make a habit of putting off topics until the next meeting. Make it a priority to resolve issues and make assignments. The old adage applies: Nothing gets done in meetings – the action takes place when everyone leaves the table.
- Everyone attending should have a stake. Anyone who leaves without something to do probably shouldn’t have attended in the first place.
Frank goes on to explain when emails would be more effective. It is worth a quick read.
Jamboree 2017 Rally
On Sunday, March 13, 2016, from 2:00 to 3:30 pm, Council is holding a National Jamboree Rally. It is essentially an informational meeting about National Jamboree.
Jamboree will be from July 19 to 28, 2017 at the Summit Bechtel Scout Reserve in West Virginia.
To be eligible a scout must be 12 years old (or 11 years old and graduated from sixth grade) and a First Class Scout.
This means that current Arrow of Light Webelos are eligible to participate in 2017.
Make sure that all Scout Troops and Arrow of Light Webelos Dens are made aware of the call out meeting.
February 2016 Eagles
Congratulations to February’s Eagle Scouts:
| Alec | Damer | 514 |
| Austin | Damer | 514 |
| John | Diedrich | 174 |
| Samuel | Ristow | 56 |
Order of the Arrow Election Reminder
Remember that February is the month for Order of the Arrow elections in your boy scout troop and venturing crew.
If you have any questions, contact the Chapter Advisor John Ruggles.
Ideas for Spring Camporee Theme
It seems like we just finished Winter Camporee. Now we dive into planning the Spring Camporee.
It will be here sooner than you think. For us to be able to order patches for delivery at the Camporee and begin planning in detail, we need to find a theme for the Camporee before February 29th.
Please ask your PLC and patrols to discuss what they think would an interesting theme and would have the most scouts from their patrols attend. Then send us an email of the best idea, selected by your PLC.
January 2016 Eagles
Congratulations to the following new Eagle Scouts. There official status is “prospective” 
because their rank has not yet been confirmed by National Council. When the rank is confirmed their official date of rank will January 13, 2016.
- Matthias Benko, Troop 174
- Rhodes Lacy, Troop 18
- Lars Olson, Troop 343
- Mitchell Thompson, Troop 358.
Congratulations again!
NOTE: As a part of District's new efforts to confirm the scouts' service hours, Eagle Board Coordinator Jerry Simon will be reporting the man-hours reported by the Eagle reports to District Executive Con Sullivan. This will be used as a means to make sure that each troop is adequately reporting their service hours to national council and local council. This may result in emails to the Troops where underreporting appears to have occur in any given quarter.
White Stag Spring Course
Did you know that National Youth Leadership Training, locally known as “White Stag,” is available three times in 2016?
Here is the information from Council’s website:
NYLT (White Stag)
NYLT is a six-day course patterned after a month in the life of a unit. Content is delivered in a group and team outdoor setting with an emphasis on immediate application of learning in a fun environment.
The NYLT course integrates the best of modern leadership theory with the traditional strengths of the Scouting experience. Through activities, presentations, challenges, discussions, and audio visual support, NYLT participants will be engaged in a unified approach to leadership that will give them the skills and confidence to lead well. Through a wide range of activities, events, games, and adventures, NYLT participants will work and play together as they put into action the best that Scouting has to offer.
Flyer
- Two-Weekend Course — March 18-20 and April 8-10, 2016 (Must attend both weekends)
- June Course — June 12-18, 2016
- July Course — July 10-16, 2016
If you have any scouts who would be interested in the spring session, make sure they are signed up soon!
CAC North Star Unofficial Website 
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