Trail Talk – 7/21/25

Good afternoon Troop 244!!!

I hope that everyone has had an enjoyable last couple of weeks! I hope you are all truly enjoying your summer! I am looking forward to seeing you if you are around this Tuesday(tomorrow night) as we begin meeting again this Tuesday! The Boundary Waters trip last week was incredible and truly an awesome experience. All 27 members of Troop 244, 17 youth and 10 adults, had a great time exploring the backcountry, enjoying the scenery and experiencing the wildlife of one of the most remote areas in our country. Hard work and lots of growth happened all around! There were lots of stories that were shared between the crews after we all got out of the backcountry. Hopefully the scouts that were on this trip will share these stories with all the rest of the troop. If you are a scout who did not go on the trip, make sure that you ask the scouts who completed the trek in the Boundary Waters about their trip!

We also had a lot of talk and discussion amongst leaders and scouts about ideas for the next scouting year while on the Boundary Waters trip! We want to talk further about these ideas and have them brought to the planning meeting on August 19th. See below for information on the planning meeting.

IMPORTANT NOTES AND ANNOUNCEMENTS FOR THIS WEEK:

Troop Meetings Resume – We took a week off scouting last week but we are back at it this Tuesday! We have a meeting tomorrow night! Make sure that if you are in town, you attend our next Troop 244 meeting, tomorrow night! We will be working on merit badges and rank advancement(see below).

Summer Merit Badges – For the rest of the meetings this summer we will be working on merit badges and rank advancement. You will have two options: non-required merit badges or required partial merit badges unless you are a T21 scout, then you will continue to work on T21. Right now, I have two merit badge counselors who are willing to offer non-required merit badges. Mike King will be offering the Veterinary Medicine Merit Badge and Christy Szekely will be offering one of the non-required merit badges she is qualified for. She will let the scouts choose! If need be, I will look into offering a non-required as well. If there are any other leaders out there who could offer a non-required merit badge, please let me know! Non-Required merit badges will be 1 of your options. Your second option will be to work on partial REQUIRED merit badges if your merit badge counselor is at the meeting. For instance, if you did not finish First Aid merit badge you can work on finishing that with Mr. Carr as he will be at the meetings! So, either you will be doing partial required merit badges OR one of the non-required merit badges. If you are a T21 Scout, you will continue to work on T21 Rank Advancement.

Mini-High Adventure – Just a reminder that the mini-high adventure is coming up soon! August 2nd will be here before you know it! NEXT WEEK ALREADY!! If you haven’t signed up for this trip, this Tuesday is the last day to sign up. If you do not have your permission slip in yet, you need to get that turned into Sherry. Make sure you are ready to go on Saturday, August 2nd.

EAGLE SCOUT COURT OF HONOR – Sunday, August 17th at 2:00 p.m .at Pathfinder Church. Please put this on your Calendars now! We will be celebrating 5 of our scouts earning the rank of Eagle Scout! These include Ivan Kwigzile, Ethan Wadsworth, Elliott Anderson, Ryan Greene and Ash Cowne!! That’s right, Ash is going to come all the way back here from North Carolina to participate in an Eagle Court of Honor with his old troop, the best troop around! Troop 244!! Let’s make sure as many of you come out to celebrate these scouts as possible! Let’s make it an afternoon to remember. I will need scouts to help participate and set up for the ceremony to arrive by 12:30 p.m. Thank you!

ANNUAL PLANNING MEETING – On Tuesday, August 19th, we will NOT have a regular troop meeting. Instead, we will be having our Annual Planning Meeting for the year. Adult leaders and Youth Leaders(any member of the PLC), put this on your calendar now! We will start as close to 6:00 p.m. as we can! THE TROOP WILL PROVIDE HAMBURGERS, BRATS AND HOT DOGS! We ask everyone else to bring a side dish to pass! The goal of this meeting will be to look ahead at the next scout year, plan out troop meetings, merit badges, and activities including campouts and such. I severely need the input of the YOUTH. I need Senior Patrol Leaders, Assistant Senior Patrol Leaders, Patrol Leaders, Assistant Patrol Leaders, Troop Scribes, Quartermasters and so on. All adult leaders are invited to help with ideas and plan activities for the next year! Your input is so important to making this troop one of the best!

Scoutmaster Minute – One of the most satisfying feelings recently was the feeling of turning off and powering down my phone before hitting the backcountry at Boundary Waters. I do not use my phone as my primary camera. I use an actual camera instead, so I had no need of my phone in the backcountry. It felt great not to have it with me during those 5 days in the backcountry. No worry about texts, emails, social media or anything else. I didn’t even think about it. It took me back to when I was younger as a scout and early adult leader and we didn’t have the cell phones. We either had to use pay phones to call home or we didn’t talk to anybody back home until we got home. My dad was, of course, often on trips with me but I would rarely talk to my mom on a trip until we pulled into the driveway back home after the trip was over. I had no idea what had gone on in the world and everything worked out. It helps me to realize how truly connected we are to our technology these days when we don’t really need to be. When we got back to the outfitter after the backcountry was done, the feeling of turning my phone back on was dreadful. I eventually did turn it back on because I wanted to check to make sure that my daughters were doing good. However, I intentionally avoided my email the entire day we got back to civilization. I didn’t look at it until the next day. It made me think “should we really dread turning on our phones”? Should technology do that to us. I have felt for some time that phones and social media have really detracted from our society and caused a lot of the disconnect we see amongst people today. At Philmont last year, after getting off the trail, I was going across basecamp and noticed 5 boys from another troop, all sitting next to each other but all of them on their devices and not talking to each other. Is that really how we want our society to be? Is that how we want to relate to each other? I don’t know your feelings, but I know, for me, that the answer to those questions is a big NO! I challenge you to think about the next time you go to scroll on social media to question whether it is necessary. Could you go and talk to a friend or family member instead? Just think about how much technology invades your life and how you could turn that around.

 “What Troop Does More!!” – 244