Boy Scout Troop 648 Scottsdale, Arizona

Thank you to those who were able to attend the Troop Committee Meeting tonight. We discussed the funds required of the Troop for Friends of Scouting. It’s anticipated that about $1400 would be required of the Troop to be given to Council. We are planning another fundraiser at CPK again, but are looking for donations – personal and any corporate contacts to make up the other $1000 (last year we made just under $400 for the CPK fundraiser). Please let myself of Mr Benyi know if are interested, or know of anyone who is interested. Thanks in advance.

Mark Blair

Troop 648 Scoutmaster

This is a friendly reminder that our Scouts on the PLC Will be meeting at 6:00 PM at the Troop meeting room. Please be sure that your Patrol is being represented at the meeting. Thank you.

Mr Blair

Greetings! I hope you are having a nice Labor Day holiday. This is a reminder that we will be holding our regular September Parent & Committee Meeting this coming Tuesday, 9/3 at 7pm at CCC. We will not be in the usual conference room but will instead be over in Room 10, which is near by the splash pad area, across from the Worship Center.

At this meeting, we will review the calendar for the upcoming year, discuss Summer Camp for next year, and will also go through various other Troop Business. I encourage everyone to attend if you are able.

The meeting will take place at the same time as the regular Troop Meeting.

Thanks!

Jacob R Benyi

At tonight’s Troop meeting Arjun is going to be discussing his Star Wars Trading Cards. If anyone has something they collect, please bring it tonight, and if time permits, you’ll be able to show it to everyone. See you all tonight at 7:00 PM

Mr Blair

A baker’s dozen scouts with four adults along for the ride spent last weekend with 3000 of our closest friends in the ‘wilds’ of Sedona’s Oak Creek canyon, maneuvering the ‘Arjun course’ which included riding the creek rapids, traversing the venerable slide rock, launching off the jumping rock, and finishing in the wading pools, then trooping back up creek to do it over and over again.  The water was cold, the sun hot, and multiple scouts avowed that this was the best outing they had ever attended.  Hard to believe it almost wasn’t to be!  When we arrived at the park entrance in the tight canyon after 9:30AM, the ranger at the road was waving all traffic away shouting that the lot was full, and the wait for a space would be 3-4 hours.  Deflated, but not defeated, we reconnoitered at a spot down canyon, and executed a plan which had the scouts entering the slide rock area from above, and two of the adults waiting the 3+ hours in line to get in to the lot.  With that challenge overcome, other small challenges (one participant’s overnight bag was left in Phoenix, a battery in one vehicle gave up the ghost) were also easily dealt with, since Flagstaff WalMart was a mere 10 miles from our chilly 47 degree campsite.  Nothing dampened the spirits for this bunch of adventurers!  Well, maybe the salsa discotheque still in full swing at midnight at the next campsite down the county dirt road from our camp was a bit much.  But certainly not the huge crowds in Slide Rock Park.  Amazingly enough, with a sea of easy-ups as far as the eye could see, young and old and all ethnicities represented, everyone contributed to making the best of the crowded conditions, and it was almost as pleasant as if we’d had the creek to ourselves (which we usually do in our normal outings).  After 5 hours in the creek, some great requirement sign-offs and even better cooking back in camp, the boys were ready to head down the hill for home early Sunday morning.  After some urging of the adults to finish up our final tasty breakfast, the boys’ site policing and Thorns & Roses were efficiently done, and we hit the road for home by 8:30AM, gaining 50 degrees in the 2 ½ hours it took to get back to the baking church parking lot.   

Just a quick reminder that we will not be holding a TAC meeting tonight. If you don’t know what a TAC meeting is, don’t worry, we’re not having one tonight. We held one last week at the PLC retreat for the month of August.

Scoutmaster Troop 648

Hello Troop 648,

I want to put in one e-mail some updates and information for those not available to receive it this weekend from the PLC Retreat. As you all are aware the next group of leaders have been selected and met this weekend to plan the Troop’s next year (October 2019 – September 2020) of fun and exciting camp outings and meetings ( A huge thanks to Mr. Benyi for planning, organizing and executing the weekend – not to mention the ice cream Saturday Night). Those have already been uploaded to Scoutbook (Thank you Dr Komar). I will have those outings and Meeting Months available tomorrow night on the white board at the meeting.

Since we had a PLC Meeting Sunday Morning, we will not be having one tomorrow night. Also since we had an adult/leader meeting Sunday (Also known as the Troop Activity Committee Meeting – TAC Meeting) we will not be meeting next Tuesday.

A big thanks goes out to the Scouts from last week’s meeting who went above and beyond the call of duty and helped us move all of our Troop Meeting gear to our new and improved meeting place. Which leads me to my next announcement…..we have a new and improved meeting place. Tomorrow’s meeting will be held in “The Forum”. This is the building that our previous meeting place was held (South side of the CCC Campus), but in the “South” room. The meetings will be held there….until we need to move again (which shouldn’t be for a long while).

Here are some quick items that were discussed at the PLC Retreat:

We are going to continue the Patrol method and Meeting assignments (this will be posted all year)

We are going to work on the Chain of Command in the Troop.

We are going to start including time for Patrol competitions and points awarded to the winning patrols, as well as points for attendance at meetings, outings and service events (10 points to Gryffindor!!!!!)

There will be a trial of a “No Cell Phone Policy” for meetings and outings as directed by your leadership Council

Thanks for making it all the way to the end of these updates. Thanks again for everyone that was involved and look forward to seeing everyone soon.

Mr Blair

Troop 648 Scoutmaster

Greetings!

I hope everyone has had a great summer! This is a reminder that following the annual Patrol Leader’s Council Retreat this weekend, we will have our wrap-up Troop Activity & Parent Meeting from roughly 8:30am-9:30am at the Scottsdale Plaza Resort, this Sunday. (August 4) Any parents and/or leaders wishing to attend are welcome. The PLC scouts should have the calendar together for the 2019-2020 scouting year and this will be the first opportunity to see what is in store for the coming year. I won’t know our specific room number until we get checked in, but Dr. Blair or I can confirm the location this weekend.

Thank you,

Jacob R Benyi, Committee Chair

ATTENTION CAMPERS!!!! Below is the information for the upcoming outing at Slide Rock. Please let Ian Achor know if you have any questions.

Another successful trip to Camp Geronimo by Troop 648.  This year, we had 18 scouts participate in summer camp north of Payson.  

It was a bit of a crowded one at Geronimo, over 900 people. We managed through long lines for swim tests and dinners with great patience and the camp was quite efficient after the first day.

We had site 5, which was new for our troop.  This wasn’t too far from the center of camp, but we were up a hill and slightly back for a fairly isolated camp.  

Our scouts completed a plethora of merit badges.  This may have been the best completion percentage for merit badges in over 10 years! That merit badge work, along with their Big-G Gold award effort, kept the camp clean by a lack of scouts except at night. 

We had five days of perfect camp inspections and another Big-G Gold award for our troop.  We had one of our younger scouts finish the “I DID IT ALL” challenge.  We worked hard on our service project and represented our troop well at our flag ceremony.

Mr. Cole reported that it was one of the few Thorns and Roses for summer camp at Geronimo that he’d ever heard scouts bring up thorns about being too cold overnight without there being rain! Don’t think that’s anything to worry about now that they are back in the Valley of the Sun.