Camping records

[Apache Bob]

:confused: At present I work in a District position. I know how Troops, Crews, and Packs keep their camping records (manual and with software). How does your District and Council keep the camping records or do they?
Its important information to know so if a Troop is not camping much help or assistance can be given. If the district does not know, how can they offer to help.
We have at present two ways we are trying to help. The first is to have very active camping Troops partner up with inactive Troops and have them going camping together. The second way is working with the OA to assist the inactive Troops.
Our Council keeps records on Summer Camp and High Adventure trips but no records other than the Tour Permit on the weekend camping.
What do you do?

[Nuts4Scouts]

As far as I know, the only "record" of camping my council would have is the Tour Permit. I do not think they keep track in any way of the different reasons the Tour permits were issued. To me, that would be adding a lot of extra time and paperwork onto the council Tour Permit Person, who already has a lot to do.

Maybe when BSA finally puts the whole Tour Permit process online, tracking where units are going will be as easy as requesting a report from Scoutnet. Until then "tracking", and giving any needed "camping assistance", is something the Unit Commissioner would do. The UC, if he is in touch with his units, should know how often they are getting outdoors and if the boys need any more camping opportunities for advancement.

[Apache Bob]

Let's hope that the tour permit on line will be one way to pull that information on the camping of a unit.
I agree that the unit commissioners will know that information or at least can find that information out, but here's my problem with going to the commissioners. Time and time again I hear that as the answer to the problem. Go to the commissioners and they will find out for you.
Your commissioners have an important job to do in the units as I am sure you will agree. They service the units and try to catch problems when they are small. No it will not take too long to find out how much they went camping for the year. While they are doing that let's ask them to set up a time for FOS visits. What about having them check to see which adults need additional training so the training committee can schedule more training programs.
Do you see the problem I mean?
How are the district's in your council checking camping activity? If some Troops in your district are not camping how is your district camping committee working to insure they have that information and then what are they doing to help these units start to camp?
I know that I have not worded the above very clearly but do you understand what I am trying to get at?
Comments, please. Thanks in advance.

[WB Bear]

BSA has a form, National Camping Award, available for the units to track the days and night of camping by the unit and also the individuals. There are different levels of the award Bronze, Silver and Gold. These should be available at your local Scout Service Center.

As far as keeping track of them on the District level the really only way is by the Tour Permits. The units MUST file one with the Council. Prior to the monthly District Committee meeting, someone from the District Camping committee goes to the Scout office and records what permits have been filed. He/she brings that information back to the District Camping Committee to address any issues and then to the District Committee to report. This is a committee responsibility, not the Commissioners. Hopefully the UC will be aware of a unit not camping and can provide the Camping Committee some insight to the situation.

What I have seen to be the most effective way of reporting is have a form listing all the units in the District and columns for 12 months. Each month they place a check mark is placed in box if a tour permit has been filed. That way you can see at a glance which units are not camping and can deal with it.

[WB Bear]

The Commissioners should be getting the information of the camping report from the District Commissioner who will be in attendance at the District Committee meeting.

[Apache Bob]

Thanks for the feedback. In my mind it was the job of the Camping Committee to gather the information on camping. At the present time the only thing they put together is where units went to summer camp or high adventure. I did think at one time the Council Camping Committee sent a report to National the first of the year showing the Councils camping for the past year.
We are trying to make sure that all our units are giving the Scouts a camping experience. There are several small units in an urban area that are not camping or not camping very much and we are working to make sure that have everything they need to go camping.

[ScoutmasterJerry]

I think it is the units job to track camping at the unit level and Scout level.
If the District or Council needs to know if a unit is executing the Outdoor program or not they should as the commissioner that is making regular visits to the unit, has a strong relationship with the unit Scoutmaster and Committee, and has seen the units annual plan.

As both a Scoutmaster and a member of our District Committee, I do not think it is the function of the District or the Council to baby sit the units in it.

Unit health is tracked by Commissioners.

Happy Scouting!

[WB Bear]

SM Jerry I agree that the unit should be keeping track of their own camping however so does the District. It is the District Committee and the Council are responsibilities to assure their units succeed. Camping is an important responsibility of the Program function—one of the 4 major functions that every council must fulfill in order to provide successful Scouting program. The other functions are Membership, Finance and Unit Service. The Commissioners are responsible for the Unit Service function.

[ScoutmasterJerry]

We keep good records of our nights of camping. I have never been asked by the district or Council (and I am on the District committee also) for camping records.
The District and Council track summer camp attendance and Special camping opportunities... Camporee etc. But to date, I have not seen or been asked to produce unit camping records.
We volunteer that info when we submit for the Camping awards... but then again that is a unit keeping record, filling out the form, and submitting it.

I agree with what you are saying about the function of the District and Council.. just not sure it is being done.

Happy Scouting!

[Dan Kurtenbach]

Good discussion. It might be more helpful to other leaders if these kinds of issues are discussed in the Leaders Scouting Forum rather than here on the Parents forum.

This forum is for parents-mentors who are new to Scouting, not currently involved, and/or not a Scouting volunteer.

[ScoutmasterJerry]

Dan, I agree that this may be a better topic in the leader forum, but on the other hand it is a question that came up in a recent "New Scout orientation" we held at my Troop. One of the parents asked about record keeping which included finances, camping, advancement etc. We discussed our use of Troopmaster software and how it tracked this stuff for us. There was also some discussion about what stayed at the Troop level and what went downtown to the Council office.

Anyway- you are correct this is a leader topic, but I do believe that it may serve to answer questions that new parents may have also.

I am on our District Webelos to Scout transition team, we host an open house as well as conduct a big Webelos Camping experience each year. I hear a lot of questions from new BOY SCOUT parents, particularly those that have been in the Cub Program and do not understand the differences in Cubbies and Boy Scouts. Questions like camping and gear, advancement differences and of course the question of Boy Led troops seems to always come up.

I think you were right in another post that this discussion may chase new Parents away... Maybe... If I was a new parent I would want to know as much as a could...And do agree with the saying that the only dumb question is the one not asked.

For all the new Parents out there.. There are many of us with many years under a campaign hat... ask questions, we would love to help.

[Dan Kurtenbach]

Thanks, Jerry. All I'm suggesting is that we honor the intent of the folks who created ScoutParents.org, and organized it with a Parents Scouting Forum for "parents-mentors who are new to Scouting, not currently involved, and/or not a Scouting volunteer," and with a separate Leaders Scouting Forum "for leader parents-mentors currently involved in Scouting as a registered adult volunteer." On the ScoutParents.org home page, the "Parents Scouting Forum" is on one side, and the "Leaders Scouting Forum" is on the other side -- another indication that the idea is to have two separate forums serving different groups. Helping this website fulfill its goals is just something we should be mindful of when we decide to post. I hope no one would be offended by a simple, "Hey, let's take this discussion over to the Leaders forum" when the thread was clearly started by an active leader rather than a "parent[]-mentor[] who [is] new to Scouting, not currently involved, and/or not a Scouting volunteer."

[ScoutmasterJerry]

Well said Dan.

Happy Scouting!

[Nuts4Scouts]

Perhaps if the forum owners feel strongly about this they can simply move the threads to their proper areas.