[philmont] Troop Merge - How does it affect a Trek

Merging with other troops . . .

It's not clear from your question as to what you mean by merging with other
troops.

I hope the following information is helpful without duplicating your current
understanding of Philmont rules.

Our 2004 crew included members from 3 local troops, and we recruited when we
realized that we could not get a full crew from our own troop.

What you can't do:
1. expect to show up at Philmont and merge with another crew that is not a
full crew, in order to get a full crew
2. expect the staff at Philmont to help you complete your crew by giving
you names of other troops who are also lacking a full crew, whom you can
contact and merge with once you arrive there.
 
What Philmont expects:
The holder of the reservation has to come up with his own crew members, at
least 7 but no more than 12, and to do so in time to complete your payments,
training, medical paperwork, Philmont paperwork, trek selection, etc. Also,
if the holder of the reservation cannot meet the payment requirements of
Philmont because of too few crew members, he cannot "give away" his
reservation to another troop. He is expected to return the reservation to
Philmont so that they can pass on the reservation to the next troop on the
waiting list.

What you can do:
1. Recruit crew members from other troops in your area to get a full crew.
Your local scout office can often help you. You can even add crew members
from people outside your area if they become known to you. Occasionally,
you will see on this list a request/invitation for additional crew members
to join a crew in another state.

However, there are pros and cons to recruiting crew members whom you don't
really know.

The disadvantage is that any personality issues or behavior issues usually
become much more intense during the course of a 12-day trek, and it's
helpful to know your crew well enough from training with them to be aware of
those issues and deal with them beforehand. Also, if you haven't trained
with them, you have no idea if they possess the necessary equipment or the
physical stamina. If they are lacking in any of these areas, it will
negatively impact the Philmont experience for everyone else in the crew.

In my case, it worked out quite well. Our last crew in 2004 had members from
3 troops, but we all went as one crew under one tour permit using the
reservation number that had been granted to our troop. I checked out the
new recruits by calling the scoutmaster of their troops to get a
recommendation before allowing them to join our crew. I was looking for
qualities that showed good scout spirit, physical fitness, etc. The mix of
different folks added to our Philmont experience. And it allowed us to have
a full 12-man crew. Our mix included 2 scouts and 1 dad from one troop, 2
scouts and 1 dad from a second troop, and the remaining 6 came from our own
troop. We were fortunate enough to complete our recruiting in the September
prior to our June trek.

Jon Mather, ASM
Troop 387, Kingsport TN
Philmont 1998, 2001, 2004
  

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Received on Sun Apr 6 09:28:39 2008