Trail Talk – 4/7/25

Here are our Troop announcements for the week:

SUMMER CAMP MEETING –TUESDAY, APRIL 8TH!  I would like to start as close to 7:00 as we can so I am asking everyone to please come a little early this week! There will be some information you have to pick up prior to the meeting starting and often this causes a line! Come early to get through that line! This meeting is for PARENTS and SCOUTS! Our troop meeting on Tuesday, April 8th will be solely dedicated to Summer Camp. We will NOT be holding merit badge classes or game time or any of that. This is for scouts who are going to summer camp or might want to sign up for summer camp. If PARENTS or SCOUTS who are not signed up want to come and hear more about camp to make a final decision, this is the night to do it! Maybe this is what will help you decide to sign up for camp and you can do so that night!! Parents, you can sign scouts up and pay for camp at this meeting! We will gather in the fellowship hall. We will have tons of information to be handed out as well as FORMS that need to be filled out and turned in! If you are going to camp for sure, you need to be at the meeting! SCOUTS WILL BE SIGNING UP FOR MERIT BADGES ON THIS TUESDAY NIGHT. WE HAVE A DEADLINE FOR MERIT BADGES AND NEED TO KNOW WHAT PEOPLE WANT TO TAKE! BE THINKING ABOUT THIS NOW SO YOU HAVE AN IDEA ON TUESDAY NIGHT! I will be sharing a lot of pertinent information about summer camp itself.  WE NEED SCOUTS TO COME EARLY AND HELP SETUP! TRY TO BE THERE BY 6:00!

NEW MERIT BADGE SESSION – After we come back from spring break, we will be entering our third and final session of merit badges for the scout/school year. This will be NEXT WEEK, Tuesday, April 15th!  We try to hold three sessions during the year, so scouts have the chance to earn up to 3 Eagle Required merit badges. For this next session, let me make this clear: YOUR FIRST RESPONSIBILITY WILL BE TO FINISH ANY PARTIAL BADGES THAT YOU HAVE NOT COMPLETED YET. In other words, if you have not finished that merit badge that you were in during the last session, you will continue to be in that merit badge until you finish it(UNLESS THERE ARE CERTAIN CIRCUMSTANCES THAT YOU HAVE SPOKEN DIRECTLY WITH ME ABOUT and I am aware of several). If you have done as much of a badge as you can do at a meeting, you will go into a new badge. It is important that we learn, as scouts, to finish what we start and not wait until the last minute! If you need a new merit badge for the remainder of the school year, I will have merit badge lists ready on April 15th.  This merit badge session will last until Summer Camp. After Summer Camp, our summer merit badge session will focus on finishing partial merit badges and hopefully a few non-required merit badges that we can offer as well.

MERIT BADGE NOTE – I want to just make sure that everyone is aware that when you go to do a merit badge OUTSIDE of troop meetings, you must first get your Scoutmaster’s permission. Scoutmasters need to sign the merit badge card BEFORE you go to do a merit badge outside of the troop meeting. That is Scouting policy. It is one we ignore sometimes but maybe it is good that we get in the habit of not ignoring it!

 ADOPT-A-HIGHWAY – April 12th at the car wash next to the Speedway gas station on the south side of Schoolcraft at 9:00 a.m. Jim Gluys will be leading this one last time for Troop 244 and then Sean Harrigan will be taking over when we do this again in the fall. To get this done quickly and efficiently though, we need scouts to show up. This typically only takes about 3 hours if we have enough scouts. This counts as service hours towards your rank advancements! Please wear long pants and a long-sleeved shirt. Boots and hats. Bring gloves and a water bottle. We need everyone to attend. We DO need ADULT help to drive and escort the scouts for safety reasons.

APRIL CAMPOUT CAMP TAMARACK – April 25 – 27th we will be going to Camp Tamarack for our April campout. There is a signup and permission slip for this. The cost is $40. Permission slip is attached. You can pay on Zeffy or pay Sherry on Tuesday. You can also hand in the permission slip for this to Sherry on Tuesday. We will be tenting on this campout. There will not be a cabin. We will be staying in one of their campsites rather than in a cabin! We are looking to make this a high adventure themed campout. This will be a combination training for those going to Boundary Waters as well as a time for younger scouts to learn about what it often means to go on a high adventure trip. IF YOU ARE GOING TO BOUNDARY WATERS, I ASK THAT YOU TRY TO COME OUT FOR AT LEAST THE DAY ON SATURDAY!

GIRL TROOP LOCK-IN – May 2nd, 2025, at Pathfinder Church. This event is for the girl troop only! Sorry boys! We will be having a lock-in at Pathfinder Church starting at 6:00 p.m. on Friday May 2nd and ending at about 10:00 a.m. on Saturday May 3rd.  The cost is $10 and there is a permission slip attached to this email. You can pay Sherry and signup on Tuesday. There is a signup sheet with Sherry. You can also hand in the permission slip. We will have the use of the Fellowship Hall, the gym, the community room and the firepit out back! Scouts in the Girl Troop, let’s get together and have a good time! We will get pizza, and we will ask you all to bring snacks and drinks! I will get a sign up for this out and a cost to you once I confer with that darn SPL! Please put this on your calendar girl troop! It should be fun!

SUMMER CAMP 2025 –Pioneer Scout Reservation the week of June 15 – 21st! The cost for Summer Camp this year is $430 per scout and $215 per adult. Right now, we have 35 scouts, and 5 adults signed up for Summer Camp. I KNOW WE CAN GET MORE THAN THAT! We have 1 month until the price of summer camp goes up. We, as a troop, must make a payment to camp by the end of April. If you are waiting to sign your scout up or holding back on payments, it is going to hurt us, as a troop. Please go to Zeffy(click here) or see Sherry and sign your scout up now

“A week at camp is worth 6 months of theoretical teaching in a classroom” – Lord Baden-Powell, the founder of the Scouting movement.

PHYSICAL FORMS! – Every Scout and Leader MUST have an up-to-date BSA PHYSICAL FORM with all parts of the form filled out, Part A, B1, B2 and C if you plan to go to Summer Camp, Boundary Waters or the Mini-High Adventure. You must get a new one for this year. No Form, No Trip. WE NEED ALL PHYSICAL FORMS TURNED IN BY MAY 1ST.

WILDERNESS FIRST AID TRAINING –Just a reminder for those involved in this training. This will take place on May 3rd and 4th at the Brake’s residence. 2723 Vanderbilt Ave. Portage, MI  49024 starting at 8:00 a.m. each day. There will be a cost but I do not yet know what that is. I will let you know, once I know!

TAX EXEMPT DONATIONS – Now that we are back under the charter of Pathfinder Church, we once again have a 501c 3 status which means that we have an EIN number that allows for tax free donations! If you have been wanting to donate money to the troop for such things as our Campership Fund(help, send a scout to camp) or for other areas of troop need but haven’t wanted to be taxed on it, NOW is the time! Please talk to Sherry about donations to the troop!

 JERKY! – Our annual Jerky sale began on January 28th. Each stick sells for $1.00 and for each one sold, the scout earns 24 cents into their individual scout account. You can make payments for jerky at any time here – https://bit.ly/244Jerky

BOUNDARY WATERS –July 11 – 20th. The cost is $900, and we have been asking you to pay $200/month since January. Please be keeping up with those payments! We will be having an informational meeting during the regular troop meeting on April 15th at 7:00 p.m. Location at the church is still TBD. We will do a training/shakedown for those going on this trip on the Saturday of the April Campout. April Campout is April 25 – 27th. Come on the campout or come out for the day on Saturday!

Mini-High Adventure –The trip will take us to the historic battlefield of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. This trip is taking place August 2 – 6th. A day of travel, 3 days in Gettysburg and a day of travel home! The mini-high adventure sounds like it is going to be loaded with fun and some awesome things to see. Sign up now! The final cost is to be determined but could be somewhere around $150. That is a STEAL for a trip like this. We are going to ask for a $50 deposit currently to secure your spot. Sign up for this and pay the deposit with Sherry in the office.

Scoutmaster Minute – “to do my duty to God and my country” – With this duty in the Scout Oath we have a two-fold duty. We are to do our duty to God and our duty to country. Just as with the Scout Law of “reverent” a lot of people struggle with that word of duty to God. Many people these days don’t think that should be a part of the Scout Oath, but I think just like with the word “reverent” many people misinterpret this part of the Scout Oath. Duty to God can often mean something different to each one of us. For me, as a Christian, it means that I have a duty to my God and my Savior. I accept that because that is who I am, and I refuse to be ashamed of that. For others, duty to God might mean something different because of a different God or a different belief system entirely. I would challenge everyone to think about what it means to do your duty to God. What is a person like who does that? Are they loving? Compassionate? Caring? Concerned about their fellow human beings? If so, then I believe you are doing your duty to God. When it comes to the second part of this duty, “duty to my country”, I think this is something that scouts are still in the process of learning. I think that scouting does an excellent job of helping scouts to learn what it means to do your duty to your country. We have scouts take merit badges in 4 different Citizenship areas including Community, Nation, World and Society. Each one of them focusing a little differently on what it means to be a citizen. As adults, we are acutely aware of what it means to be a citizen, to obey the law, to pay our taxes, to sign up for selective service to vote, to speak our minds and so on. Youth scouts are only learning these things and they learn a lot of this through the merit badges they take, the conversations they have with their adult leaders and parents and through their interactions with their fellow scouts. They also learn a lot of this through the role models they see before us. This is probably the most important part of this. It is up to each adult the scouts see to set an example for the scouts in doing your duty to country so the scouts know what that truly means. If we flaunt our duty to the country, then the scouts will grow up thinking that is ok. Scouts, you are on a path towards becoming full-fledged citizens of this country in all ways. You aren’t there yet, but you will be someday. It is up to you to take the knowledge you learn from those that came before and make sure you do your duty to your country, whatever that might entail.

 “What Troop Does More!!” – 244