A week at Philmont: Strictly for Scoutmasters
by The Gimlet
The week began with a picture: 30 Scoutmasters. Later in the week, our wives kept having a hard time identifying their husbands. Their middle-aged guy in the Scout uniform was hard to identify among all the other middle-aged guys in Scout uniforms.
As my experience was mostly a classroom there is little that is specifically exciting to report. I enjoyed discussing how to make Scouting work with Scoutmasters from all over the world. We had three BSA units from Europe (Trans-Atlantic council) represented. We saw slides about Kandersteg scout reservation in Switzerland and camping at Normandy. The discussion from Scoutmasters from all around the United States from every kind of troop helped us all to think of ways to improve our programs at home.
The vision of scouting is a great one. I sometimes refer to the program as a “bait and switch”: the boys come for camping and adventure, and come out with character and virtue. We have to have the camping and adventure or we, as adults, lose the chance to teach them the principles they need to become great men.
Philmont is uniquely able to provide the opportunity to meet a diverse group of men and women who have common goals. We come from different religious, racial, and economic backgrounds, but all want the boys we work with, and our sons, to become men of character and virtue. The good men of Lutheran, Catholic, and Methodist background attending the program with me equal the best men of my tradition in their hopes and ability to train their boys to become men of honor. A scout is a friend to all other scouts, and Philmont is a place where you get to see that at work. It was a unique experience and I am better for it. Anybody who has the opportunity to go should seize it. You and your family will be better for it.
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Tags: new mexico, philmont
