[Philmont] Skinning a cat

>
> And that my friends is the purpose of Scouting, to skin a cat.
>  
> If you substitute the words man for cat and well prepared for
> skin/skinned in the paragraphs above, you will see the purpose of
> Scouting is to prepare boys to becoming a man.

John makes a very good point. The question is, how do we apply this
wisdom.

We will not see Jim Moss on the trail, stopping every 20 minutes to
drink from his Nalgene. Likewise, we will not see John LeBlanc or Pete
Swiggum strolling through camp in their Crocs. We have all read
contributors' preferences about tents, stoves, raingear and long
underwear. We have all gained substantial backpacking knowledge
through this list and our own experiences. It is our responsibility as
advisors to pass on as much of this knowledge to our Scouts as
possible. The question for me is: How many decisions do we dictate to
the crew. If you have a Scout who drinks more water than everyone
else, who will drink all of his Nalgenes and borrow water from everyone
around him, do you tell him that it is your policy that hydration packs
will not be used? Maybe a strict policy on water containers is unwise.
  If you have a 100 lb. Scout who is trying to limit his pack weight,
are you going to tell him that he needs to take his basketball shoes
instead of his lightweight Crocs or no camp shoes at all? Maybe a
strict policy on camp shoes is unwise. If you have a Scout who's
family has financial difficulty sending their Scout to Philmont, are
you going to insist that he can't wear cotton T-shirts or Frog Togg
raingear?

Philmont is a learning, life changing experience. Advisors should
advise the Scouts, but decisions that do not affect the welfare of the
entire crew should be left to the individual Scouts. We all learn more
from our mistakes than our successes and we gain confidence when the
decisions we have made on our own turn out well.

As John said, "The purpose of Scouting is to prepare boys to become
men". You must be prepared to allow your Scouts to skin that cat their
own way, sometimes making mistakes, sometimes surprising you with a
better way to skin the cat.

Dan Preston
Scoutmaster, Troop 319
Louisville, KY

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As you gather around this virtual campfire with fellow
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Received on Fri Jul 20 08:45:41 2007