My son's been a boy scout for a month now and we've hit our first bump in the road.  Actually, multiple little bumps, all at the same time (yesterday).

1. Our troop didn't get their first choice of weeks for summer camp, so they're going July 3-9. Which means my son's buddy from cub scouts can't go.

2. Last week they elected their first patrol leader. He's a boy in my son's class, but they don't really know each other very well. The past week my son said this other boy is "acting kind of strange". Yesterday after the scout meeting, he admitted that this kid (who had pretty much never spoken to him up until they were in the same troop) has been calling him names at school and it's really starting to bother him.

3. My son and I had a misunderstanding about the troop meeting. I thought I was dropping him off and walking over to pick him up at the end. He thought I was hanging out at the track until it was over, so he was a little upset when they finished the meeting and I wasn't there yet. One of the ASL's and his two boys were there with my son, they were the only ones left. My bad, but it added to an already upsetting day.

So..walking home from the troop meeting, he's having a hard time with boy scouting. For #1, I think he'll be OK once he gets used to the idea. Unless we continue to have problems with #2. For #2, we discussed our usual ideas for handling name-calling. He's completely not impressed with any of them. I'm not sure if we should try and do anything additional through the troop or not?  For #3–well, we'll just to have to communicate a little better.

Any ideas on the problem with the PL? Should we let the scoutmaster or someone know, so they can help this kid? Or is it too much to expect this new leader to not pick on his fellow scouts outside of scout meetings?

1. Yeah, I'm not especially worried about this one. We'll go ahead with all his forms and stuff, I think he'll come around in the next couple weeks when the fees are due.

2. See, I kind of thought that. But..what do I know about boy scouting? :D They do have a couple troop guides, but I don't think they were at the meeting last night. The SM also wasn't there, one of the ASM's ran the meeting.

3. The ASM said they'd be done at 8. I was there by 8. They'd finished about 10 minutes early. your last point about 2 adults–there was only 1 adult there, the ASM.  One of the boys at the meeting may have been over 18–but he was gone too. And, I would have been the only parent there at the meeting. No one to talk to. I got the distinct impression from the first couple meetings that parents aren't expected to hang out. I will be a little more careful in the future–because an hour apparently isn't always an hour.  I told him in the future he has the option to walk home with one of his friends, or call me (which he already knew).