Hi,
Up front I want to say that I'm not a "new" Scouter. Going on my 4th doesn't make me a long-timer by any means, but I've got my feet wet in 2 packs and District events to have an idea of the big picture of Scouting and Cub Scouts.

I've noticed that there is a wealth of talent, resources, energy and time put into the Boy Scouts side of the BSA. From lots of literature to scout reservations leaning to equipment with order boys to (in my District's case) more BSA leaders at Roundtable than Cub Leaders, it almost seems like Cubbies are an after thought.

I know the reasons for this: by the time boys get to the BS, their parents (and thus leaders) know what's going on and have a vested interested in the program. People who joined as cubs but who had to leave due to time, money or distate get weeded out leaving a core group of leaders.

Cub Scouts has a huge turnover in leaders. This is due, in part, to parents starting in 1st grade and then realizing they don't want to be a part of the program to parents joining when their sons are older (Bears, Webelos) and thus are only there for 1 or 2 years. By the time their convinced this is a great program and they should be in the leadership, we've lost a year or so of their time.

With that said, it still seems extremely complicated and intricate all of the info we want our Leaders to absorb. There's the basic training, and the reading of the scout books. There's the Cub Leader Handbook and the new Pack and Den resource guide. There's websites and extra manuals, BALOO, first aid, Roundtable, forms, awards, applications, money, uniforms, pinewood derby….agh! It's great stuff if you know what's going on, but the learning curve is tremendous. And by the time they good at what their doing, they're moving up to a Troop. Cub Scouting is just the proving grounds of the Boy Scouts, it seems.

I'm enjoying Cubmaster Chris' podcasts. They have their place in this vast network of Scouting. But I also think an audio "school" of sorts could be made. As more ipods and mp3 players get sold in this country, I think people are going to be taking advantage of their exercise, driving, or chore time where they could be inputing scouting knowledge in a wise fashion. You can't look up something on BoyScoutTrail.com while tooling down the road to Disney World. But you can with a podcast!

But podcasts need to be ordered and searchable. If a Webelos leader needs info on Arrow of Light or the Treasurer needs ideas on money mangement, where could he go? Internet for sure. But why not listen to someone who's been through it, has put a lot of good stuff and bad stuff through their processing noggin and is willing to spit it out for others to learn from. (Check out the STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW podcasts at How STuff Works.com. I like their style and format.)

What's the point of this post? I don't know where this will lead. But it's an avenue where that doesn't seem to have been touched on in the WWW and discussion on it may help.

YiS