Greetings. I’m trying to find out if on June 1, will all ranks and dens automatically advance in scoutbook? I read the May/June Advancement Newsletter and it seems to hint that it will. Our schools run until June 26, and according to the Guide to Advancement “Ensure Cub Scouts advance in rank annually by school year’s end and are recognized in a meaningful ceremony.”
Thank you!
Kristina,
Dens do not automatically advance in Scoutbook. June 1 is the date BSA National moves the Socuts up in ScoutNET. To advance your den’s, go to the Edit Den page for each den (except Webelos) and select Advance Den. We recommend starting with Bear and working your way down so that it is easy to tell which dens still need to be advanced.
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Kristina, you are not required to move your dens up on June 1. You can wait until after you move your dens up at your pack’s end of school year ceremony. Cub Scouts have until the end of the school year to earn their rank, and the Pack Committee has the discretion to grant some extra time, if needed, as described in the Guide to Advancement section 4.1.0.4.
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It is not always June 1 that National does the rollover. This year it is later.
I think it’s usually more like June 10-15.
Just in from National: The Grade and Cub Scouting Program Rollover will occur the weekend of June 14 to 16. During this process, ALL youth grades will be advanced one grade and all 12th grade registrants will be advanced to no grade.
Note this change will ONLY take place in ScoutNET and Akela. There will be NO change to grades in Scoutbook.
To change grades in Scoutbook use the following:
for non-LDS packs, Lion, Tiger, Wolf and Bear dens advance den will increment the grade.
for Webelos dens, LDS packs, all troops, crews and ships, use the Feature Assistant Extension’s Edit School Information quick entry to increment grades.
This can be done at any time. You do not need to wait for the BSA to update grades.
Does the grade advancement that BSA is doing actually do anything, or does it just change the Scout’s grade? Will it automatically make my Wolves into Bears, or am I still responsible to advance my Dens? What if I already advanced my Den on 1 June, will they be advanced again during the weekend of 14-16 June?
In Scoutbook you need to advance your dens. The grade roll the BSA does is only for ScoutNET. Lions will be moved to Tigers, Tigers to Cub Scouts (ScoutNET doesn’t distinguish Wolfs and Bears) and 3rd graders to Webelos.
@edavignon Thank you. So, if I advance a Scout in Scoutbook, that has no impact on ScoutNET? In terms of “year”, these two data systems are completely independent?
Correct, you can advance your dens now. It will not have any impact on ScoutNET. When the BSA does its grade roll, ScoutNET and Scoutbook will once again match.
What do we do with the Webelos and AOLs? How do they “advance”?
Webelos and AOL are the same program and are managed under the Webelos Den Type. You cannot advance a Webelos Den Type as it is the last level of Cub Scouting. Once the Scout has AOL or aged out they move to a Troop or end their scouting career for now.
To distinguish the first year Webelos from second year Webelos, you can edit the name of the den. So Den 20 Gummy Bears could become Den 20 Webelos Gummy Bears and Den 06 Flying Snakes could be Den 06 AoL Flying Snakes.
Maybe I missed something, if not, I’ll probably need to submit a feature request.
When you advance a den, is there a way to assign the date? I advanced some dens on 1 Jun, so they all have that date. I finally got the go ahead from some of the den leaders to do their dens last night, and they all have 6 Jun. The only way to make all of them say the same date is to go in and manually correct each membership record. This shouldn’t reflect the date that someone had the opportunity to go in the system and make the change, it should reflect the date that the Pack has chosen to designate as the den advancement date.
So, did I miss something when advancing these Scouts?
You didn’t miss anything. The date you click Advance Den is the date that will be recorded in the Scout’s membership and on leadership positions that are updated.
The date doesn’t really matter for any functionality. There are no restrictions on awards based on the membership dates.
