Trail Talk – 6/8/26

Good afternoon 244!

For most of you scouts this starts the beginning of summer vacation today! I hope you truly enjoy your summer and look forward to both the adventures ahead but also a time for rest and rejuvenation. This last weekend we had a bit of those at the Pentwater Campout! We had a blast with beautiful weather, pool time, arcades, Go-Karts, good food and good fellowship! The scouts will all talk about how much they beat me in Go-Karts, but I will remind them that in one of the races, I smoked everyone! 😊   I actually told the guy I was their Scoutmaster. Turns out he is an Eagle Scout, so he let me go before everyone else!

SUMMER CAMP 2026 June 21 – 27th, 2026 PIONEER SCOUT RESERVATION. This is coming up so fast!! You are going to start hearing a ton from me about Summer Camp, so get used to it! As of me writing this trail talk today, we have 13 days, 1 hour, 15 minutes and 12 seconds until Summer Camp! That is crazy! THAT IS LESS THAN 2 WEEKS AWAY FROM NOW! I will be sending out more reminder information concerning Summer Camp this week! The big thing for everyone is to make sure you are thinking ahead! BE PREPARING FOR SUMMER CAMP! Being prepared is the best way to ensure that you have a great experience! Make sure you have the right stuff to pack! Make sure you get your pre-requisites done(attached to the Trail Talk this week).

PLEASE SEE THE MINI-HIGH ADVENTURE MAMMOTH CAVE INFORMATION BELOW!!

IMPORTANT NOTES AND ANNOUNCEMENTS FOR THIS WEEK:

MINI-HIGH ADVENTURE MAMMOTH CAVE – July 26 – 30! Cost is $250 per person. You can sign up for this adventure starting this Tuesday!  You will be going to Mammoth Cave National Park and exploring the wonders there. You will also have time in the schedule to choose certain activities to do. This sounds like it is going to be a blast! There will be a short informational meeting for this trip on July 7th at 6:15 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall before the scout meeting! Make sure you start thinking about this now and sign up as soon as possible! The Permission slip for this adventure is attached!

PATROL LEADER’S COUNCIL Meeting change – Our next PLC meeting will be on Tuesday, June 30th at 6:15 p.m. I would like to meet the Tuesday after summer camp to debrief on Summer Camp and get everyone’s feedback!  Instead of meeting the first Tuesday in July, we will meet the last Tuesday of June at 6:15 p.m. Put it on your calendar!

POPCORN!! POPCORN! POPCORN! – Do you like popcorn? I know I do. We have some popcorn leftover in the scout room from last year’s popcorn sale. We would sure like to get rid of it. You can purchase popcorn from the troop at a reduced cost of just $10 per bag! That is a 50% discount! Stop in on a Tuesday night and help us get rid of the leftover popcorn so we can clean the clutter in the scout room! You can see Sherry to pay the $10 and get the popcorn!

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.
•  Join us at these unique training sessions at summer camp and let’s make 2026 our most skilled summer yet!
•  The Tread Lightly/Leave No Trace training is on Tuesday from 4pm-5pm.
• The Paul Bunyan training is on Wednesday from 4pm-5pm.

Scouting America PHYSICAL FORMS! – There is a new printing of the Scouting America Medical Form for 2026. It is attached to this email. Chances are this printing will be required for NEXT year. If you haven’t filled out your physical form for this year yet and you don’t want to have to worry about doing it again for next year, use the attached copy of the new Scouting Americal Medical Form now. If you have already done your medical form, I am pretty sure the 2024 form is still good for now, however you may have to switch over next year. There is really no difference between the forms except for some formatting. It is really just a new “printing” of the form.

Meat Stick Fundraiser – Our annual Meat Stick Fundraiser is coming to a close this Tuesday night, June 9th! Make sure that you return any unsold meat sticks. Please, also make sure that you return any money that is still owed back to the troop. Remember, a portion of that money goes into your scout account. If you don’t turn it in, not only does the troop lose out on what we paid for the meat sticks, but you also lose out on money in your scout account! See Brandon Beery for all of this on Tuesday night!

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. We will be having 1 last meeting concerning Pictured Rocks on Tuesday, June 30th during the troop meeting. I would like to meet with everyone just to make sure that everyone has the right equipment, that we are still set on things like transportation and expectations, to go over the itinerary one last time and to answer any last-minute questions! Please put that meeting date on your calendar! The day that we arrive in Munising and are staying at Bay Furnace Campground, we will use to go over some Backcountry Procedures that I want to make sure everyone is aware of and knows what to do!SWAMPBASE – July 9 – 18th The dates for leaving for this trip are getting closer and closer! July 9 is only 1 month from tomorrow! 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!

PRESIDENT FORD HISTORIC TRAIL – Every wanted to try a unique opportunity to earn your Historic Trail Award? One that involves the only United States Eagle Scout President who came directly from the State of Michigan.  One of the things you can do, and you don’t have to do this as a troop is to complete the President Ford Historic Trail. You can get a group of scouts together, along with some scout leaders, and pick any day that the museum is open to do this. Basically, to complete the trail, you start at 7:00 am and complete an 8-mile Kayak Trip down the Grand River from the DNR Park in Plainfield Township to Riverside Park in Grand Rapids. You then do a 3.5-mile urban hike in Grand Rapids, the city where President Gerald Ford grew up. The city where he became an Eagle Scout. After the 3.5-mile hike you can go and visit the Gerald R. Ford President Museum for 1 hour and finally, as a group, your group will write a 250 letter/essay about your experience. You do have to register for this ahead of time. We have a Scout family that is planning to do this very adventure on June 28th. If this is something you are interested in, you can work out details to maybe meet up with them and do the trail at the same time. I just thought I would share this opportunity with everyone. The Clapp family is the family planning on doing this on June 28th. You can see the attached map to see exactly where you go on this trail. Here is a link for more information: https://michiganscouting.org/president-ford-historic-trail/

KALAMAZOO LOAVES AND FISHES – Volunteer Opportunity. One of our scout parents recently reached out to me and let me know that there is a huge and urgent need for volunteers at Kalamazoo Loaves and Fishes. They have jobs from sorting food to packing meal kits to actual distribution to their client. This would be a great way for scouts to earn service hours. You could do this individually or as a group. For more information you can get into contact with the volunteer coordinate, Jillian Bryant at her email address: Jillian@kzoolf.org

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 – Last week I wrote a bit about the overall requirements for completing the rank of Eagle Scout. This week I would like to start focusing a little more closely on some of those requirements. For the next few Trail Talk, I am going to focus on the one requirement that seems to trip everyone up and hold them back from getting their Eagle in a timely manner; the Eagle Scout Service Project. Scouts often make the whole process of doing the project way bigger and way more complicated than it needs to be. For this week’s Trail Talk, I am only going to focus on the very first step in the doing the Eagle Scout Service Project.

The first step in doing your Eagle Project is to come up with an idea for doing a project. I tell scouts that I always consider two things when deciding whether a project meets the requirements of an Eagle Project. The first thing is “is it large enough in scope that it will allow you to show and use your Leadership abilities”? This simply means that you are not doing this by yourself, but YOU are leading a TEAM of people to complete the project. You have to show leadership. The second thing is “does it provide significant community service to some community organization”? In other words, you are simply just doing an Adopt-A-Highway service project. You are focusing on a specific organization and fulfilling a need that they have that benefits our community. When it comes to choosing an Eagle Project, scouts have lots and lots of avenues they can pursue. They can check with their school, their church, Pathfinder Church, their city, the Red Cross, the library, humanitarian organizations, animal shelters or animal protection organizations, homeless shelters, and many, many more. I always tell scouts to find something that you are PASSIONATE about. Don’t just pick something to pick something and do the project. Pick something that you are really going to feel a lot of vested interest in and when you complete the project, you are going to feel a sense of ownership over. Once you have picked a project, you run the idea by me, and I will let you know if it fits the scope of an Eagle Project. If you want to have a more whole idea of what the project will entail, it often helps to take a look at the Eagle Service Project Workbook. This is the workbook that you will do ALL of your paperwork in. It is a fillable .pdf file that you type directly into. When you go to present your project, you will print it out. When you want the Eagle Project Workbook, I ask that you let me know and that you let me send it to you. The one I have already has some information that you need and will save you some time.

Next week, we will talk about the first part of the Eagle Project Workbook and really the second step of the project which is getting your project approved! It must be approved before you can do it!

“What Troop Does More!!” – 244!!!