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Is there it possible to add a method to mark camping as long-term and short-term? I have a few scouts that had to leave a long-term campout early, and the OA Eligibility Report is incorrectly logging those nights as short-term camping. Stuff like that is a real pain to keep track of manually, so a radio button or something similar in the Activity Logs would help, so things get tallied correctly in the report. It would also help when viewing the camping reports for the Camping MB. In fact, it would also be useful to have a radio button or something similar to mark tent vs cabin camping, so different reports can be generated for those as well.
Leaving a long term campout early makes it a short term campout for OA purposes. A Scout must camp 5 nights in order for it to count as a long term campout. The OA eligibility report is correctly counting nights as short vs. long term.
I prefix all campout names with Tent:, Cabin: etc to easily differentiate between those that count for rank or the camping MB and those that do not.
The OA says it is up to the Scoutmaster’s discretion as to what constitutes a camping night for OA election purposes so a Tent vs. Cabin radio button would not be used for the OA eligibility report.
No, the report is not counting correctly. If a scout leaves a long-term campout early, it was still a long-term campout, even if they were there, say, 4 nights. That should NOT count as a valid short-term campout. Those 4 night are still long-term and do not count as short-term. The OA report incorrectly labels these nights as short-term. But it doesn’t know any better, hence the request for a button, etc.
I mark the night as such as well, but a button would make it simpler and make reports more worthwhile. We shouldn’t have to use a prefix to do that when it can be easily done programmatically.
Tent vs Cabin would not be for OA report. Just for Camping Activity Log reports to be used for Camping MB, etc.
@RyanEash no you are wrong - they have to stay 5 nights - “The 15 nights must include one, but no more than one, long-term camp consisting of at least five consecutive nights of overnight camping, approved and under the auspices and standards of the Boy Scouts of America.” - it is not the Camp itself it is the nights the scout stays
Long term camp is different from short term camp. Staying two night at resident camp is not the same as experience as a weekend campout. So it should not be counted as short term camping. Ditto for four nights.
And doing four nights of long term camp doesn’t meet the requirement for five nights, so doesn’t get counted as meeting the requirement.
So, similar to a scout who has two 5 night long term camps and only gets to count one, the four nights should be extra long term nights; the four count for camping nights for the BSA National Outdoor Award, but don’t count for 5 night long term or any short term.
No, I believe it is the Campout itself. A scheduled 6-night Summer Camp is long-term, whether someone stays for 6 or 4 nights. I believe I even read something about this on Bryan on Scouting.
I have seen this from Chris Hunt in at least 2 Bryan on Scouting articles:
“I’ve heard feedback from parents with Scout in troops that don’t do very much camping. They can get in the long-term outing, but it takes a long time for their troop to get out on enough campouts to make up the other 14 nights. As a workaround they suggest they will send their son to summer camp, but then take him home after four nights so the experience will not count as a long-term camp. This doesn’t fulfill the requirement.”
This isn’t what the scouts who left early were trying to do here, but same result.
Should the OA look into the implementation of this one scenario? I am sure it happens quite often where a scout leaves a long-term campout early. And based on the above, the total in the OA report would be incorrect for said scouts. The OA may not have considered this scenario, or had no way to implement the fix at the time.
The responses you’re citing were germane to Camping MB interpretation, which is an Advancement Team issue. That is separate from how the OA (a separate subunit within BSA from advancement) interprets these scenarios.
The OA camping requirements are clearly laid out in the membership requirements here:
I know these are specifically talking about Camping MB, but for the definition of long-term and short-term, etc, I would think it would the same BSA-wide.
I would not make that assumption. The BSA uses different requirements for different things. The camping merit badge falls under rank advancements. OA eligibility falls under the OA.
