Scouts and MBs?

[Margaret in CO]

My 12yo finds himself in the position of acting SPL, as the SPL is never there. Ds pretty much knew this was going to happen when he ran for ASPL. Anyway, I've been musing on doing MBs at meetings. What do your troops do? Acitivites, work on MBs or a combo of the two? This next week we'll finish Per Fitness as they've been at it for 12 weeks. Last week, they did the entire Fingerprinting MB as it's a gimme and we needed a filler. (Ds and another boy already had it, so did lots on Communications). We're starting Aviation as my dh is the counselor for it and we hadn't had a Green Bar (PLC )and it was an easy one to plug in. I'm not sure that we should be hammering on MBs every week though. Thinking and typing...

[Brenda in MA]

never works on merit badges during meetings. Usually, they work on scout skills (First Aid, knot tying, etc.) so that the younger boys can learn the skills they need to advance. If they are not doing scout skills, they often plan menus and activities for their next outing. Fairly often, they will play group games and have a little social time. They meet twice a month as a troop, and the individual patrols meet on off-weeks. The boys generally earn their badges at summer camp and at local merit badge colleges a couple of time a year.

I kind of wish that they would work on some badges during the meetings, but this has never been the tradition for this troop for the past 8 years.

Brenda

[periwinkle]

never works on merit badges during meetings. Usually, they work on scout skills (First Aid, knot tying, etc.) so that the younger boys can learn the skills they need to advance. If they are not doing scout skills, they often plan menus and activities for their next outing. Fairly often, they will play group games and have a little social time. They meet twice a month as a troop, and the individual patrols meet on off-weeks. The boys generally earn their badges at summer camp and at local merit badge colleges a couple of time a year.

I kind of wish that they would work on some badges during the meetings, but this has never been the tradition for this troop for the past 8 years.

Brenda

This is pretty much how our troop does it, too.

[RebeccaC]

Our troop has between 45 and 55 boys. They will sometimes have separate MB classes and will at times have more than one going. Some they do at the same time every year so if the boys doesn't take it this year he knows it will be offered at the same time next year. There are nights when all the boys work on the same thing. The week before a camp out each patrol, there are usually 5 or 6 in our troop, works on a menu, shopping list, and work roster. Last Monday of the month is game night or court of honor. Our troop meets on Monday nights. So about two nights a month are MB nights and one night is campout prep and one night is game night or 3 times a year court of honor or the once a year showing of the dvd A Time To Tell.

They do have some MB classes that meet on nights that the troop does not meet. My boys did the train MB or railroad what ever it is called :rolleyes: last winter and that class met on Wednesday evenings.

Our troop encourages boys to take as many MB classes at summer camp as possible. My oldest son earned 3 and my youngest earned 5 this past summer.

No boy is allowed to be SPL or ASLP unless he is in the senior patrol, past life scout rank working on finishing eagle. So all of our SPL and ASPL are over 16. A boy can not be SLP or ASLP unless he has done the week long camp of JLT and a one day JLT that our troop offers once a year. Our troop is a boy run troop and this is one reason for that rule.

We do tho run about two adult leaders per boy. My dh makes most of the campouts and our troop does one campout per month all year long, 12 all total, plus high adventure and a week long summer camp.

[RebeccaC]

I should add that if a boy is under 1st class in rank they are working on skills not MB. They try and have all new scouts to 1st class rank with in 6 months of joining the troop.

Most of the adult leaders are fathers or fathers of eagles who have left the troop. Moms do the fundraising with a couple of exceptions. I was asked to be the counselor for the Archeology MB because that was my field. There are a couple of other mom who are a counselor for one or two MB. Mom are strongly encouraged not to sleep over on any of the camp outs. In fact they will make it very difficult for gals who would go and they seldom go again. Moms are encourage to come and eat dinner with the guys but are not allowed to cook or clean up.

Our troop is really a father son thing or a boy working with the dads of other scouts.

[JFS in IL]

What Rebecca said...'cause my ds was in the same troop and I want to hit 2,500 posts!

[TheLisa]

I just wrote a long reply that got lost! Here's the short version!

We don't do MBs at our weekly meetings. The boys do scout skills, planning, or socializing. The last 20 min is game time.

They boys are encouraged to call counselors and schedule meetings- it's supposed to develop phone/interview/meeting skills. They are allowed and encouraged to work with a buddy. DS 13 has usually worked alone. He is more motivated then the other boys. He is Star- the others in his patrol are Tenderfoot or 2nd. The troop is low on older members, so the younger boys don't have strong role models. DS often acts as SPL, because the SPL and ASPL didn't show up.

[dirty ethel rackham]

At our troop meetings, the boys do not work on merit badges as a group. The older boys that are instructors help the first years get their First Class rank within that first year. The meetings are about kids working independently on what they are interested in, preparing for campouts, skills for high adventures, and social time. We have merit badge clinics throughout the year as well as encouraging the boys to earn them at summer camp.

Our troop is completely boy led. The ASMs and the committee guide the SPL and ASPLs , but the boy leaders run the troop. The adult leaders do assist heavily behind the scenes, but they are in the background at the meetings. This is both good and bad. The boys develop leadership skills over time and learn from their mistakes. However, it can mean that things can be chaotic and someone usually drops the ball. This chaos drove my middle son (the one with auditory and sensory issues) a bit nuts and he dropped out. It also requires that the boys be self-motivated. This is hard for my son who is still in the troop because he has some social anxiety issues exacerbated by the chaos.

We do have several women ASMs, but they take a background role at meetings. They are heavily involved in the committee. The scout master has always been very careful not to let the experience be controlled by "nervous nellie moms" (and we have a few.) Moms are welcome to go on campouts (since we are a large troop and need drivers), but they are in the adult patrol and they do not have much interaction with the boys, except that these fine young men do assist them in getting set up - unloading the car, setting up their tent, etc. On the few campouts I have done, I have felt very pampered. Since I am not an ASM, I do not do as much with the troop as dh, but I make a point of going on the climbing campout because I am an experience instructor.

[Margaret in CO]

Some history on our troop--we're in crisis mode right now. we have 2 boys that just made Eagle, 4 finishing up, only 1 new Scout from this past year (2 dropped out) and then 8 left from a big pile of Webelos from 2 years ago. My 12yo is up for Life in a few weeks and has been PL for 6 months, so he does have some experieince. We are a small troop and once the older boys hit high school sports (most do 3 sports a year here) they simply aren't around. A few months ago, we had a disgruntled older Scout decide to see how much uproar he could cause with a bunch of lies and accusations. I think we've mostly worked through it, but we had to remove one Scout and have lost 2-3 other families. Our SM stepped down for awhile as he felt he couldn't be effective with all the wild accusations flying about. I'm not sure we're going to get him back. Our ASM is only filling in, but his boy is gone for the rest of the year and then will Eagle out in the symmer, so we'll lose him.

We only have 2 boys that have not made 1st Class, so rank advancement is not a big time filler for us. Those boys are just working on their swimming skills and then they'll have it. We'll only be crossing over 2 Weebs this next spring. We've never done "new boy" patrol as that would leave 1 boy in a patrol by himself (as we rarely see the older boys) and 1 boy by himself as he was the only new one and then one huge patrol that came in with my son. We had sort of a split with the newbies working on various things, but now some have zoomed ahead. We also have a problem with 2 adult leaders saying "I won't do CiW for another year" and one saying "I won't do PM with a boy under 14". Well, yeah, but you can't add requirements. Our patrols seemed to naturally split into the 2 we have from the dens they were in since Tigers. We do use meeting times to work on menus and planning and then cleaning up from whatever the last campout was. So, this week will be Aviation and a Green Bar, they have next week off for Columbus Day, then campout planning day and we may or may not go back to the airport the next, depending on what the boys decide. We have another 12yo as one PL and the retired SPL for the other PL who is 15, so we're not dealing with all high school boys by any stretch.