Trail Talk – 5/11/26

Good afternoon Troop 244! I hope you all had an enjoyable weekend this last weekend! I want to see that I am once again impressed, not surprised but very impressed with Troop 244!! This weekend David Glist had his Eagle Project on Saturday, and he had 23 volunteers with 70 hours of service show up to the project to complete it! THAT IS AWESOME!! I am so astounded by how YOU show up for each other! This is a busy time of year, and I know there is a lot going on but please, keep on trying to show up for each other and for your troop!

NEXT CAMPOUT: MAY CAMPOUT – PIONEER SCOUT RESERVATION May 15 – 17th, Cost is $40. TUESDAY IS THE LAST DAY TO SIGN UP FOR THIS CAMPOUT! Right now, we have about 11 scouts and 7 adults going on this campout. That is an awfully small group for cleaning up a campsite as big as Klewer! We will be camping at Crockett Campsite but then going across the bridge to work on cleaning up Klewer Campsite, our home for Summer Camp! We need YOU! We need more people to sign up for this campout to help make it a great weekend of service to our camp! PLEASE SIGN UP THIS TUESDAY or on ZEFFY!

 

IMPORTANT NOTES AND ANNOUNCEMENTS FOR THIS WEEK:

SAFEGUARDING YOUTH TRAINING – If you are an adult leader who has not updated their Safeguarding Youth Training yet, this needs to be done by the end of the month. The original YPT training will no longer be valid as of May 31st. Every adult leader will have to have completed the SYT training by the end of the month if they haven’t already. Scouting America is being very serious about this. They will remove you from the Troop roster(suspend you) temporarily until the training is done. You will no longer be able to help out our youth. Please login to my.scouting.org and complete the new Safeguarding Youth Training if you haven’t yet!

JUNE PENTWATER CAMPOUT – June 5 – 7, Cost is $45 per scout and $20 per adult. THIS IS OUR END OF THE YEAR CELEBRATION! School is out and it is time for summer to begin in full! We have been going to Hill and Hollow Campground in Pentwater for over 30 years now as an end of the school year celebration for all scouts! Hill and Hollow Campground is a great place to camp! They have a pool, basketball courts, and beach volleyball and are attached to AJ’s Fun Park which has Go-Karts, an Arcade and mini golf. Scouts must bring their own money for anything at AJs! The cost of Go-Karts, mini-golf or Arcade are NOT included in the cost of the campout! This is a great time and place to spend with your fellow scouts and just unwind! If the weather is nice, we will go to Lake Michigan Beach for a little while! I would like to start getting people signed up for this campout as soon as possible so we can start planning/preparing! THIS IS ONE CAMPOUT YOU DO NOT WANT TO MISS!

UNIQUE OPPORTUNITIES AT SUMMER CAMP – Ready to take your outdoor skills to the next level at summer camp this year? Troop 244 is looking for Scouts to step up and lead the way in conservation and woodsman skills! Whether you want to master the art of the axe or become a guardian of our wild places, we have two awesome opportunities for you:

Leave No Trace & Tread Lightly: Conservation is at the heart of Scouting. Get trained in these essential ethics to ensure our favorite trails and campsites stay pristine for years to come. Please note: Completing this training is a key requirement for earning the Outdoor Ethics Awareness Award!  We will work on the remaining requirements after summer camp.

Paul Bunyan Woodsman: Ready to move beyond the basic hatchet and Totin’ Chip? Learn advanced woodsman skills, tool care, and safety while earning this historic mark of a true outdoorsman.  A Paul Bunyan Woodsman card will be issued upon successful completion of this training.   Please note: Completing this training is a key requirement for earning the Paul Bunyan Award!  If the requirements for the award are not completed at camp, we will work on the remaining requirements after summer camp.

• Leveling up these skills doesn’t just earn you a patch once all the requirements are met—it makes you a better leader and a more capable Scout.
• The Tread Lightly/Leave No Trace training is highly encouraged for scouts who are an Outdoor Ethics Guide.

HELP NEEDED! – We have been contacted by a couple of people from Pathfinder Church who need some able-bodied young people to help with some yard work around their house. One family needs some wood moved around. Another family needs some help with general yard work including weeding, raking and maybe mowing. This second family is willing to pay if you want to earn some extra cash! The first family would be a family to help out through service! You could earn service hours for the first family, and you could earn service hours for the second family IF you did not accept payment! PLEASE CONTACT EITHER ME OR MRS. BALDWIN IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN HELPING OUT WITH EITHER OF THESE TWO OPPORTUNITIES! This would be a great way for our scouts to give back to members of Pathfinder Church who support our troops in many ways!

SUMMER CAMP 2026 June 21 – 27th, 2026 PIONEER SCOUT RESERVATION. For those of you who have not paid in full, please do your best to get your payment as soon as possible. Please also make sure that everyone is working on getting their Medical Forms for Summer Camp. This MUST be the Scouting America Medical Form, and it must be the ENTIRE form: Parts A, B and C! Turn these in as soon as possible but no later than the end of May! BOTH ADULTS AND SCOUTS must have medical forms.

Meat Stick Fundraiser – MEAT STICKS! MEAT STICKS! Pick up your meat sticks to take out and sell at the troop meeting. This year, in order to get most out of the fundraiser, we are selling the meat sticks at a price of 2 for $3 instead of $1 apiece. This helps us to make more money overall for each scout’s individual scout account. You can see Brandon Beery at the troop meetings to get meat sticks to sell and to turn in the money from your sales!

PORTAGE MEMORIAL DAY PARADE – Memorial Day, May 25th! We will once again be marching in the Portage Memorial Day Parade. I have contacted the parade organizer and am still waiting to hear back from them about our spot and details! The parade starts at 10:00 a.m. and we will end at the Portage Bandshell behind the Police Station. Usually, the parade lasts about an hour.

Scouting America PHYSICAL FORMS! – Every Scout and Leader that goes to summer camp, Swampbase, Pictured Rocks or the mini-high adventure MUST have an up-to-date SCOUT PHYSICAL FORM with all parts of the form filled out, Part A, B1, B2 and C. You must get a new one for this year. No Form, No Trip. WE NEED ALL PHYSICAL FORMS TURNED IN BY MAY 1ST.

Pictured Rocks Backpacking Trip – The trip itself is July 9 – 15th Cost is $300 due by June 15th. PREPARE! PREPARE! PREPARE! Make sure you get your Scouting America Physical Form completed and turned in. This includes Part C. Once June hits, I will begin planning in earnest about the Menu, Food shopping/organizing and getting the Troop gear together for this trip! Just like you, I need to get through this school year!

SWAMPBASE – July 9 – 18th Please stay up to date on all information for this trip.  Get your Scouting America medical form filled out! Prepare! Prepare! Prepare! Please see Mike King if you have any questions about this trip!

Troop 244 Payment Portal – Zeffy. Our Zeffy page remains open for you to make payments or by troop merch! Wanna pay for the campout, Pictured Rocks, SwampBase, Registration, etc. Go to the following link: http://bit.ly/pay244. For troop Swag/Merch you can click on this link: http://bit.ly/244swag

Scoutmaster Minute  – EAGLE REQUIREMENTS – I am going to start a short series of discussing the steps of the Eagle Scout progress. Parents, if your scout does not normally read this section of the Trail talk, please make sure they read this for the next few weeks. I am going to discuss various aspects of how the process works to make it all the way to the rank of Eagle Scout.

For this week’s Trail Talk, I am going to keep it simple. A scout starts along the  path to Eagle the moment they start working on Rank Advancement. The moment they start saying the Scout Oath and Law they are working towards Eagle Scout. At some point in their scouting career, they are going to make a choice. They are going to have to decide if attaining the rank of Eagle Scout is something that they want or something that is not important to them. Not every scout makes it to the rank of Eagle and that is ok. It is the things we learn along the path that help us later in life, whether you make it to Eagle or not. Should you choose to follow the path to Eagle, then we are all very aware of the beginning stages of that path. Every scout starts out in the beginning ranks. Their path begins with the Scout Rank. For some, this is a repetition of things they did if they were in Cub Scouts and earned the Arrow of Light. For others, this is brand new stuff, and they are learning the scout method for the first time. Suddenly they are thrust into this thing we call the Oath and Law. They are learning about “ranks” and how you advance in ranks. They are learning about knots, knives and so much more. By the end, both sets of scouts are in the same place. They continue their path by moving through the ranks of Tenderfoot, Second Class and 1st Class or what we commonly refer to as “T21”. Here, they are learning skills that get increasingly more difficult as they go. They are learning a lot of physical skills like knots, First Aid, Cooking, Camping, lashing, and at the same time they are also learning a lot of “soft” skills such as Citizenship, Teamwork, how to care for the environment, organization, commitment, service and much more. By the time they reach the end of T21, they have(hopefully) mastered a lot of the skills that will now carry them forward as they dive ever deeper into what it means to be a scout and for some, eventually, an Eagle Scout. When they earn their 1st Class Rank, we often say that they have reached the “halfway” point in their climb to Eagle. Mathematically (7 ranks, 4 of them done) this may be true. Realistically, we all know that this is far from the truth! There is so much more ahead on the trail for the scout to learn and grow. They have so much yet to experience and do! I want to encourage all scouts to make sure that you don’t just stop at 1st Class, that you don’t just stop learning but that you take advantage of what lies ahead! It is an experience like no other! Trust that from someone who has done it!

“What Troop Does More!!” – 244!!!