2009 Quality Council Goals

In the first two years of the Centennial Quality program Blackhawk Area Council has qualified as a Quality Council both times. For 2009 we will again strive for the Quality Council designation. The Executive Committee and the District Chairs recently met to set the council goals for 2009. These goals are challenging but achievable if we all work together. However, it is difficult to achieve goals of which you are not aware. So I'm posting our goals below so everyone will know what we are going to achieve in 2009.

• At least 60% of our individual units will be Quality Units.
• We will organize 18 new units.
• We will achieve 1.00% growth in traditional membership.
• We will achieve at least a 72.2% retention level.
• We will retain at least 92.0% of our units.
• We will recruit and train 17 unit commissioners and increase commissioner visits to 4.0 per unit.
• We will recruit and train 20 additional district committee members.
• We will have an active endowment committee and secure at least 12 new endowment gifts.

As I mentioned above these are challenging goals. But with everyone from the council and districts working together they can be achieved.

Sycamore February Roundtable Moved

The Sycamore District Roundtable for February 12 has been moved to St. Thomas the Apostle Church located at 451 West Terra Cotta Ave. in Crystal Lake. Please let your fellow scouters know about the change. This is the new church on the corner of Rt. 176 (Terra Cotta) and Oak Street, not the one near Route 14. Roundtable starts at the regular 7:15 PM time. The council Fireside Chat will be at the beginning of the meeting. The Fireside Chat is an opportunity to ask questions or make suggestions about our council operations.

Sycamore Tiger Time has Moved Locations

The Sycamore District Tiger Time {website} activity has changed locations. It is still in Crystal Lake on February 14th, but will now be held at Hannah Beardsley Middle School {map}. If your pack or a pack you work with has registered please make sure they know about the change. Check-in for the activity opens at 7:30 AM with the program starting at 9:00 AM. Note that preregistration was required for this event and has already closed.

Weekend Activities

This weekend I was able to attend a couple of training activities. The first was a staff development session for the upcoming Powder Horn course {see website}. Mike Condon and staff have an exciting hands on course planned to identify rescources available to Venture Advisors and other Scouters to use in operating a successful unit level high adventure program and to support the Venturing Ranger Program. The course will be held April 17-19 and May 1-3.

The other training activity I attended was a BALOO (Basic Adult Leader Outdoor Orientation) training course that was held in Sycamore District on Saturday. For a pack to conduct a campout they are required to have a BALOO trained adult involved in the planning and in attendance at the outing. So it is important for this training to be made available to the packs. Susan Clancy-Kelly and her staff did a great job putting on this training and the following Webelos Leader Outdoor Training. It was good to see our pack leaders in attendance so their units can conduct a campout.

Quality Council

Congratulations to everyone, Blackhawk Area Council has qualified as a Centennial Quality Council for the second year in a row. This is due to the efforts our many volunteers and professional staff. Without the efforts of each one of you this would not happen. Let me share with you some of the numbers for 2008. We organized 36 new units; had membership growth of 0.3%; increased retention to 73.20%; and received 21 new endowment gifts last year. Those are all great individual accomplishments but to put them all together is outstanding. In addition our commissioner service and district committees each added 22 new, trained members to further provide support to our units and programs.

Many of these goals are intertwined. For example, if we had not increased our retention number as much as we did we would not have had an increase in membership. By increasing our retention number from 72% to 73.2% we retained about 140 more scouts this year. That translates into fewer new scouts that need to be recruited to show growth. Membership growth means more families being involved and more families means more volunteers to help with commissioner service and district operations.

Soon we will be setting our 2009 goals and working on achieving those. But for now I hope you can take some time to enjoy our 2008 results.

Congratulations again to all of our volunteers and professionals. Without your direct involvement this would not be possible.

Council Coordinated Committee

The Council Coordinated Committee (CCC) meeting is this Thursday, January 15, at Pecatonica Middle School. This meeting is the equivalent of a district committee meeting with the focus at the council level. Each district should have a representative for each of the breakout sessions. The meeting is open to any volunteer that would like to participate, you do not have to be the chair of the equivalent district committee.

Arrowhead & Wanchanagi Fireside Chats

This week we held our annual Fireside Chats at the Arrowhead and Wanchanagi Roundtables. I want to thank the District Commissioners, Nichole Mezera and Jerry Coots, for allowing time at their Roundtables. I'd also like to thank all of the scouters who attended and participated in helping to improve our council.

The Fireside Chats are an opportunity for the district scouters to discuss issues with council representatives and to make suggestions. Each year we compile all of the suggestions we receive and supply those to the appropriate council group for consideration. A number of new activities, programs, or process changes are adopted each year as a result of the input we receive at these chats.

Webelos Cross-Over

This is an exciting time of year for 5th Grade Webelos Scouts. They have been learning the basics they need to know to join Boy Scouts and are looking forward to joining the “big kids” in all of their exciting activities. In areas where there is more than one troop available the important question is which Boy Scout Troop should the Webelos Scout join? That is a question for the Webelos Scout and his parents to answer. In order to make this decision it is important to visit the available troops to see which will be the best fit for your family. There are a number of considerations to take into account in making that decision. One factor is the night the troop meets? Does that fit with your family schedule? Another is when is summer camp? Is it a week when your son can attend? But more importantly is the personality of the troop. Every troop runs the same program, but they all have different personalities. You want to pick a troop that best fits your son’s needs. One last thing to keep in mind is that your decision is not a permanent decision. If things do not work out with one troop you can always transfer to another troop.