I became a scoutmaster in 1981. I went to district and council training and learned that the Boy Scouts should do the planning for their troop’s program.Boy Scout Troop 68 began holding a yearly planning conference during the first or second weekend of August. During the last thirty years it has been fun assisting the troop’s junior leaders develop their monthly themes and activities. Some activities became yearly traditions. Others did not go very well and were not repeated.
This year’s planning session, held today, will have at least one thing different then sessions of the past 30 years. I will not be attending. I have to work Saturday morning and I have a wedding to attend in the afternoon. I am not the scoutmaster anymore so it is probably best that I do not attend, to just step back and let the new leaders lead.
Jim, our current scoutmaster, will not be going into the planning session blind though. He and I were the adult leaders for last year’s session so he has a pretty good idea how to conduct one. Most of the Scouts who will be attending have also participated in a planning session, so things should run smoothly.
Jim did make two changes to the planning session this year. The first should not make a difference. He invited all the Boy Scout members of the troop to attend. The reason I do not think it will matter is that we will be lucky if half the 11 current members attend. Hopefully, the junior leaders do attend because this session is part of their job as leaders of the troop.
The second change he made does worry me a little. He invited parents to attend. Now, I realize that not all the parents will show up. They already have events scheduled, I am sure. My concern is that too many parents will attend and mess up the planning process. I am afraid the program could end up being planned by parents and not by the Scouts.
Am I concerned for no real reason? Will the session run smoothly with the parents there? Will any of them even show up? I guess we will know soon.
How does your troop conduct its yearly planning session? Drop a note and share your ideas with us.
With this year’s Boy Scouts of America National Jamboree now a part of history, it has made me think about the 2001 Jamboree which I attended as the scoutmaster of Central Minnesota Council Troop 1417, one of two troops we sent to Fort A.P. Hill that year. I brought back several things from that event that I just had to pull out of the closet after seeing all the pictures online from this year’s extravaganza.
As I was looking through my tote of Jamboree items, I came across some things that made me wonder if they are still printed for the current Jamboree. One highlight of each day was when the Jamboree Today newspaper arrived at the campsite. This daily paper, printed at the Jamboree, was quickly snatched up by the Boy Scouts and adult leaders. Each issue included color pictures of previous day’s activities, interviews with Scouts and leaders, and information about upcoming events and activities. We all quickly skimmed the photos to see if any of us had made it into the paper. Unfortunately, no one from my troop did, but it was still fun to read the newspaper. Many of the Boy Scouts keep their copy as a memento of the Jamboree.
Another daily bulletin delivered to each camp was the Leader’s Update. It was a short handout for the troop leaders and camp staff featuring all sorts of things important to us, but not necessarily interesting to the youth. If there was something I thought would be of interest to the Scouts I would bring it up to the youth leaders or talk to the troop when we had assembly. I still have nine of the editions, but unfortunately I am missing a couple of them.
So my question to those of you who attended the 2013 Jamboree, did they still print these two publications for the campers and troop leaders? Or were they found online? Or both? Did you keep your copies for a memento and add them to your Jamboree collection?
By the way, if you click or tap on the pictures you will be able to see a larger version of the photo.
It is August 1st, and that means this year’s new Hallmark Keepsake ornaments are in the stores and ready to sell. Beagle Scout Snoopy and his friends once again make an appearance as the Scouting series continues. This year captures the Beagle Scout as he climbs to the top of the mountain with the help of Woodstock and his friends. It is a fitting theme when you think about how popular rock climbing has become with Boy Scouts and how many summer camps now feature climbing towers.
Unfortunately, it is not one of my favorite Beagle Scout Snoopy ornaments. To me it looks like the characters are climbing a piece of frosting covered chocolate. Maybe the characters are climbing a gigantic s’more instead of a mountain! That would be quite tasty. The sticky marshmallow topping would make the climb a little easier, or would it make it worse?
Anyway, I bought two when I was in the store today. One will actually be used on the tree, and one will be stored away as part of my collection. I believe this is the seventh Beagle Scout ornament in my collection. Here are my articles from the previous years:
Campfire Fun 2007
Beagle Scout Day Out (canoeing) 2008
A Spooky Story 2009
The Fearless Crew 2010
Holiday En-tree-preneurs (selling Christmas trees) 2011
Salute The Flag 2012
Beagle Scouts Rock! (this year’s)
http://www.hallmark.com/products/general/keepsake-ornaments/beagle-scouts-rock-1495QXI2175_DK/
It looks like you may have to find a store to buy it. The Hallmark website does not to seem to include it as an online purchase. Will you be picking one up for yourself or that special Scout in your life?
I have noticed that when Scouts and adult leaders have written about what they collected at this year’s National Jamboree it always seems to be about the patches. I will admit that patches are cool, and that I collect them myself, but there are plenty of other things to collect at the B.S.A.’s big event. One of those things is pins.
When I attended the 2001 National Jamboree at Fort A.P. Hill in Virginia, I was ready to collect patches. I was not prepared to collect pins. I do not know if many council troops brought pins along to trade this year but our troop in 2001 did have a pin to trade. Unfortunately, our pins were pretty tiny. I had several of them though and I was determined to get rid of them for other pins, or something else that might catch my eyes. Like more patches!
As you may notice from my collection, I did not do very well with the pin collection. I did collect various other pins though, including the collection of Garfield the Cub Scout pins and a few of the official 2001 Jamboree pins. Yep, I guess you could say I was not into collecting the pins very much. I think I still have two or three of my council’s pins. Why are the the pins on a National Guard hat? Because the Guard was giving the hats away for free and it made for a great item to keep all the pins collected in one spot.
Did you collect pins at this year’s Jamboree? How many did you come home with? Which ones are the ones you prize the most? Do you have pictures of them posted online somewhere? Let us know.
The 2013 National Jamboree is officially over. The new Summit high adventure base has completed its first real test at handling large groups of Boy Scouts, leaders, and staff. It will be interesting during the next several weeks to see what the reports will read. Were there problems? How will things change for the next Jamboree? What will remain the same. What will change? And the most important question, did the Scouts have a great time? I would be willing to bet that Bryan at http://blog.scoutingmagazine.org will keep us informed.
I have been reading things online written by both leaders and Scouts who have attended this year’s big event. One thing that impressed me is that many of the council patches have really been outstanding. I wish I would have attended just to collect patches. Granted, I did collect a fair amount when I attended the 2001 National Jamboree, but I think I would have had to bring five times as many patches to trade if I would have attended this year.
Every Jamboree has plenty of stuff to collect, not just patches. There are shirts, pants, towels, neckerchiefs, books, pamphlets, pins, rings, papers, and lots of other miscellaneous stuff. And I would guess there is more to collect now then there was 12 years ago. The picture above shows some of the “official” things I accumulated during the 2001 Jamboree, including a towel, cap, and tee shirt. I even kept a couple shopping bags for good measure.
During the next few articles I thought I would share a few other things I saved from the jamboree, including some special items that are irreplaceable. Stay tuned. Or should I say, plugged in?
Shortly after becoming a 21 year old scoutmaster in 1981 I began attending the monthly district roundtable meetings, and learned quite a bit about how to be a good adult Scout leader. It did not take long for the commissioner to recognize my enthusiasm about Scouting. A few years later I was a member of the roundtable staff. We had a lot of fun and hopefully helped a lot of troop leaders become better at their positions. I even earned my commissioner’s award. It finally came to an end after several years as we all moved on and others took over, but I still attended roundtables as a scoutmaster through the next two decades.
I have been trying to figure out what to do with myself after stepping down as the troop’s scoutmaster a year and a half ago. I still help out with the troop as a committee member (the troop treasurer.) I have helped on a few activities and the occasional troop meeting. I think I may have been helping a little too much because a couple months ago I was told by one of the current troop leaders to back off. That caught me by surprise but it did get me thinking. I do want to stay involved in Scouting, but where does a retired scoutmaster fit into the program?
A couple people suggested I become active on the district or council level. I really have no interest in serving on a committee or some such role. I do not have the slightest interest in being involved with fundraising. I have never been very active in the Order of the Arrow. I am not sure I would like being a unit commissioner.
Which brings me back to roundtables. I was once a roundtable staff member. I think I might be able to bring a little something to help with those monthly meetings once again. There are a few things I would like to try to add a little fun and spice. So, I sent the commissioner an email asking if he would like some help this upcoming year. It did not take him long to respond.
Tonight I had a two hour meeting with Al. I threw a bunch of ideas at him and told him what I would be interesting in doing, and what I was not interested in doing, if I joined the staff. To tell the truth, now that I look back at the meeting, I wonder if I may have been a little too enthusiastic. He liked a lot of the ideas I brought up. Before you knew it, the two of us started creating a yearly plan for the 2013-2014 roundtable year. We now have our monthly themes, and even the September and October agendas plotted out. We plan to meet with our district executive within the next few weeks to get things finalized.
So I guess I am once again on the district roundtable staff after a two decade hiatus. Who knew that I would one day be back in that saddle?
We all have our favorite campfire skits. Sometimes they are short ones and other times they are a bit on the long side. They usually make us chuckle or laugh out loud. If they are really a good one, it will be one we want to be a part of when it is performed in front of an audience. Today’s post to the Melrose Scout Productions Podcast is one of my favorite skits, and yes, it does include me as one of the performers.
I first saw the “I Want To Marry The Princess” skit while I attended summer camp as the troop’s scoutmaster during the 1980’s. The staff did such a good job performing it that the Scouts and adult leaders in attendance where laughing hard and very loudly. It was a skit I immediately learned to add to our troop’s repertoire. As we began to learn the skit we decided to try to make the first act nice and slow, pronounced well, and acted perfect. But when it came time for the second act we threw everything out the window and went for speed. The faster we did it, the better the audience liked it. If we made mistakes, and we often did, the audience laughed even harder.
This video to the podcast features Jay and myself performing the skit during our 2000 Laughs For Lunch Show. Usually, the Boy Scouts would have performed this skit but I wanted to be a part of it that year. Jay and I really got into it. In fact, I was so much into character the at one point a forgot where the chair was and landed on the floor. Well, when you watch it I am sure you will understand.
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I saw it many times during my 30 years as a scoutmaster. That first year at a week long summer camp causes some boys to grow up a bit, sometimes more than a bit. It is their first time away from home, parents, and family for that long of a period. Unfortunately, once in awhile a boy becomes home sick and leaves camp during the week, but that has been a rare occurrence. More often than not, the new boy completes the week and stands taller and prouder when he arrives home.
Saturday’s edition of the comic strip For Better Or For Worse touches on this subject of growing up, and it does it with a mention of camp. I enjoyed it. I bet you will also. The comic strip can be read at
http://www.gocomics.com/forbetterorforworse/2013/07/06
What do you think?
I became a scoutmaster in 1981. I went to district and council training and learned that the Boy Scouts should do the planning for their troop’s program.Boy Scout Troop 68 began holding a yearly planning conference during the first or second weekend of August. During the last thirty years it has been fun assisting the troop’s junior leaders develop their monthly themes and activities. Some activities became yearly traditions. Others did not go very well and were not repeated.
