Adult Education
YPT Status: 175 expiring or expired in next 90 days
As rechartering approaches, we enter the season when many scouters have their YPT status expire. As we all know, no scouter can be renewed for membership unless their YPT status is current through March 1, 2017.
We have 31 expired scouters.
We have 144 scouters who will expire their YPT status in the next 90 days.
We have 50 of those in the next 30 days.
Please log in to your my.scouting.org account today and review your training status under “My Dashboard.”
Review your unit’s training status under the “Training Manager.” Access is limited to Unit Key 3 and training authorized personnel. (Please note persons authorized for access in 2015 will need to be renewed by the Unit Key 3 through the “Organization Security Manager” in 2016.)
YPT Status: need immediate attention
As October 1st approaches, the District Commissioner’s staff is ever more concerned about training, especially Youth Protection Training.
As previously published, your YPT should be renewed each year between March 1st and October 1st. This eliminates many problems at recharter time. Please help by logging into your my.scouting.org account and double checking your YPT expiration date.
As of this writing, the District has 29 scouters who are now expired on their YPT. A total of 168 scouters are or will be expired before November 10, 2016. There are probably another 50 or s0 (unverified) who expire before March 1, 2017. All of these 218 or so people can cause their units to be unable to renew, if the person expired is a required office to recharter such as committee chair, or maybe dropped from membership in order to allow their units to recharter.
Three units have 3 or more scouters whose YPT is expired at this moment. Several units will have more than 25% of their scouters YPT expire before November 10, 2016.
Please begin an aggressive campaign in your unit to bring these numbers down now.
Cub Scout Position-Specific Training
North Star District in cooperation with Del-Mi District will be holding in-person Cub leader position-specific training from September 6 through September 9, 2016. Tentatively the trainings will take place at Carmel’s Monon Center off of 111th Street between Westfield Rd/Rangeline Rd and College Avenue.
Positions that will be trained include Pack Trainer, Den Leader specific
, and Cubmaster Specific training. Each session will begin with Youth Protection Training.
While National and local councils have shifted focus to using e-training for these sessions, many veteran scouters have said that their first training in scouting done in-person did more to have them feel part of a larger community and network. They felt more welcome and less isolated when they began their work in Cub Scouts.
We are offering this training in order to enhance the quality of the experience for our newest Cub Scout leaders. They will come face-to-face with other new leaders and meet veteran scouters who can serve as future resources.
If you would be interested in serving on the faculty, please contact Jeff Heck or Con Sullivan.
If your pack does not have a Pack Trainer, please make a special effort to send a representative. This will help us move the District to its goal of 100% trained scouters.
Specific dates and times are to be determined.
Youth Protection Training
We are are just 70 days from the opening of Rechartering. Now is the time to begin reminding your scout leaders who need to renew their Youth Protection Training recertification in even-numbered years.
Failure to have scouters properly certified in a timely manner is one of the biggest problems in rechartering. Last year we posted an article explaining that the ideal time of year to renew YPT is between March 1st and October 1st of each year.
As of this morning, across the entire district our scouters’ YPT status looks like this:
- 28 have expired (mostly in the past 30 days)
- 27 will expire in the next 30 days (end of August)
- 46 will expire in the following 30-day period (end of September)
- 38 will expire before the end of October.
Encourage your leaders to renew early (before October 1st) to bring them inside this window. Review your unit’s training status on my.scouting.org to identify whom you need to contact. Make a plan to bring YPT up-to-date now while scouting obligations are quieter (camp is over, high adventure crews are returning home, and annual planning is over the horizon).
You can offer YPT classes at your regular meeting. You, your training coordinator, or your unit commissioner can run a video for several volunteers at one your regular meetings or annual planning conference.
REMINDER: District Committee August 4th
A quick reminder that the District Committee will be meeting August 4th at 7:00 pm at Second Presbyterian Church, 7700 N Meridian St, Rm 407, Indianapolis, IN 46260.
Fall Camporee planning is full swing. Please work on your troop’s event. Some ideas are available on a previous post.
We are also working on finalizing basic information about the Winter and Spring Camporees, so come with your thoughts.
Membership subcommittee is in full swing preparing for Back to School Recruitment. Your packs and troops plans to participate (yes, troops helping packs recruit) is crucial for our success. We already know that some packs are spread thin on manpower. They are small and cover many schools on August 25th. Your help is needed for their success.
Fall also has many special events like a Rocket Launch in support of membership recruitment, Cub Scout leader training, Battle of Belzer, Cub Family Camp and many others. We need your help in planning for their success.
Adapting to Scouts’ Needs
Many of our units have now completed summer camp. The leaders have learned more about their scouts in that short week than they will the rest of the year. Some scouts are easy to manage and guide. Others require more skill to manage and guide.
Now is a great time to discuss with the other leaders of your unit the lessons learned about each of your scouts and to strategize on how to better serve them in their individual needs.
I grew up in scouts with some physical impairments. We never discussed these impairments with my scoutmaster. My family took the attitude that these were my hurdles to overcome. In retrospect, my scoutmaster had to learn my needs independently without much guidance. It gave him a tougher task. In the ’70’s and ’80’s, those things weren’t discussed as freely as today.
Over the past couple of years I have learned about the BSA’s standard practices for learning about and implementing individualized plans for scouts. This effort started from the efforts of Rebecca Zirnheld and Jody Winter to teach our troop about these standard practices. Over the intervening months I have come to see the value of these standard practices.
I highly recommend that all scout leaders read the the 8-page Guide to Working with Scouts with Special Needs and DisAbilities, No. 510-071 from the scouting.org website on special needs. If you have specific issues to address, more detail is available in the Scouting for Youth with Disabilities, No. 34059 (2007).
The key take away for me from these pieces of literature:
- Students with special needs have a Individual Education Plan (“IEP”) designed at school.
- 18% or so of students have an IEP.
- An IEP can be a useful tool to help a scouter better understand his scout, if the parents wish to share the highly confidential IEP.
- If the parents do not wish to share the IEP, a scouter who knows an IEP basic outline can ask more informed questions.
- The scouting literature is very helpful to guide a scouter deal with known problems and foster open communication with the parents.
Sometimes we can best avoid future confusion and conflict by learning more about what resources are available to us before they are needed.
I could imagine a situation where a scouter finds his newest scout has ADHD, which is a new to the scouter. The scouter could ask the parents to meet with him for 20 minutes and have the guides at the meeting. The scouter could say to the parents, “I don’t know ADHD except what I read here. Let me show you what it says. What else do I need to know about your son that this guide does not tell me?”
Invariably, the parents will tell a great deal that the guide does not. But that is the point. The parents know their son the best, so asking is key.
Other useful websites:
How Do You Encourage Adult Involvement?
Some units struggle for adult volunteers. Some units struggle with adult hyperactivity (different from plentiful adults). Either struggle often reflects poor volunteer management and delegation.
New adult volunteers will always try to make scouting more like other volunteer organization or corporate situations — unless the unit leaders teach scouting philosophy first. How do I know? I have been that adult struggling to find my place in the unit and frustrated with the youth’s mayhem.
When there are too few volunteers or excessively hyperactive adults buzzing around, these are both symptoms of the same problem. The committee chair is not corralling the adults and letting the unit leader (e.g, Cubmaster or Scoutmaster) do the leader’s job.
The committee chair needs to know the scouting philosophy and be teaching the adults, “Don’t just do something! Stand there!”
We have the luxury of brand new Troop Leader Guidebooks having been issued in two volumes (ok, volume 2 is due later in July 2016; close enough). These volumes replace the Scoutmaster Handbook. These Guidebooks are meant for all leaders in a troop.
These guidebooks do a wonderful job teaching how an adult should participate in scouting at the boy scout level. Offering these guidebooks early to new troop parents allows them to see the program clearly, early. They can learn the power of standing and watching a scout struggle to light a fire. The new parent can learn the power of that silent adult presence in encouraging the scout to keep trying.
Once the new parent sees the philosophy of scouting they are easier to lead to the clearer common goal.
Now an adult who is tasked with teaching the scouts how to purify water on the hike can be directed to a ScoutmasterCG article and told to “help the scouts.” The adult is now better able to see, that does not sit the scouts in a classroom for a lecture. It means find a scout who can lead the class and the adult can sit in the back of the room as a resource. For a novice adult, this likely means reading the article, pulling out the equipment, experimenting with it, seeking coaching from the scoutmaster, putting the equipment away, then inviting the scouts in to learn the skills. Now the adult is ready to teach by sitting still.
How does the adult know when to intervene? The author of the new Scout Leader Guidebooks Mark Ray as a guest on ScoutmasterCG Podcast 317 (at the 37:00 minute mark) tells of a troop that has a catch-phrase for knowing when to intervene”CFD.” That stands for “Confused, Frustrated, Dangerous.” The Scoutmaster can just walk by and say to the hyperactive adult, “CFD,” and walk away. The hyperactive adult then knows that this situation did not constitute confusion, frustration, or danger, so the adult should be silently or courteously present but not interfere. In many situations, the adult should walk away silently.
So now our new adult who is assigned the role of helping with water purification can know when his role is most valuable. The teaching scout is in charge until CFD-boundaries are needed. The adult becomes a calming force to cut down confusion and frustration. The adult imposes limits on dangerous behavior. So scouting is not scouts left in a room by themselves or off in a corner of the campsite without adult interaction. The scouts are trusted players in the game of scouting with quiet coaching from the Scoutmaster Corps.
Many adults who avoid volunteering are afraid of too many demands being placed on them. Teaching them CFD-boundaries early can remove many of their fears about truly volunteering because the load is much lighter than they feared. (Yes, this is true for Cub Scouts, too, it just takes more study and preparation on how to carry it out.)
So the lessons here to recruit more volunteers and make them feel valuable:
- Ask them to read the Troop Leader Guidebooks (vol. 1 for all, especially novices; vol. 2 for adults having done some troop campouts already).
- Hold the adults accountable to CFD boundaries of involvement.
- Oh, and feed them well!
The will learn their place in scouting and enjoy it.
Summer Camp Learning not Just for Youth
Summer camp is all about making scouting memorable for the youth. This is the culmination of everything we are trying to achieve in scouting of the rest of the year. The living together in a community of peers. The exposure to the elements and adapting. The planning. The frustrations. The joys of success.
But summer camp is not just an opportunity for youth to learn.
Adults can take training. At Ransburg scouters can take many of the position specific classes. When the scouter comes home, the scouter will be “Trained.”
Make sure all of your new parents take as many classes as possible. You should set an expectation that adults are going to learn. This improves your volunteer corps but also sets a good example for the scouts.
When a scout wonders in to camp when he is supposed to be in class, looking for his parent, he will ask for his parent. If he is told that his parent is in class, what is the scout going to say?
ScoutmasterCG: Top 10 Ways to Frustrate Youth Leaders
It is time again for our monthly weekly homage to Clarke Green at ScoutmasterCG.
Clarke, a thirty-year veteran as a scoutmaster, points out 10 ways to frustrate your youth leaders. While Clarke’s articles always have their sweet spot for the boy scout program and higher, I contend that many of these lessons need to be learned by our Cub Scout Leaders, too. Even more so, we often commit the same errors at home with our own children.
I would be fascinated to hear from readers in the comment section below or on Facebook about their thoughts on this article. (Remember to comment, you must have a Word Press or affiliated user name. Comments are moderate for spam, germaneness, and compliance with the Scout Oath and Law.)
So do any of you have personal stories where you violated one of these 10 pointers? What did you learn from the experience? How do you handle similar situations now?
While you are looking at Clarke’s site, make sure to check out his latest book So Far So Good (print or audio). It is the story of a new Scoutmaster learning the ropes as he works with the scouts. While it focuses on boy scouts, Cub Scout leaders can learn, too. They can learn how to teach without being classroom teachers. They can learn more about the goals the Cubs will be attempting to achieve in Boy Scouts, so that the Pack is better preparation for things to come. The Cub Leader can learn how better to explain scouting to new parents, increasing parental involvement and scout retention through better understanding.
Just don’t frustrate your youth unnecessarily!
Prototype Unit Handbook: Request for pack and troop forms
I am beginning a project that I want to complete by May 30th. I am looking to design a prototype of a new parent handbook.
I am asking for your help.
First I am asking each unit to email me a copy of their current handbook, annual calendar and handout on costs of membership by May 5th. We will use these as sources of best practices. Documents in a word processing file are preferred.
Second, I am looking for a panel of editors to assist in assessing the result and focusing on simplification and clarity.
Some of the concepts I will be building come from Scouting Magazine’s article last spring. They had to be more generic nationally. Ideally we as a district can put in more specifics in a prototype.
CAC North Star Unofficial Website 
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