White Stag Staff Portal

• The event date is a busy time of year for most families, impacting participation.
• The timing of the event during December did not fit well with our program calendar year.
• The amount of effort and time the youth and adult staff contribute to the event negatively affected the quantity and quality of time needed for staff development.
• The "hurry-up" effort to plan and implement the event negatively affected the numbers of people who could attend.
• The timing of the event in December did not allow us to give timely recognition to individuals for their contributions and success during the prior program year.

• We can recruit parents during Candidate Day to help plan the event, lessening the demands on youth and adult staff.
• We can ask the youth and adult staff to contribute time to the part of the event that is most important, the program itself, rather than the logistics of putting on the event.
• While we will still present youth and adult Silver Stags during summer camp, we can recognize the individuals in a more public forum, giving them additional praise and public acknowledgement that they deserve. This will also allow a larger audience to take part in the recognition that just those that are present at camp.
• We can invite outstanding candidates who were recognized during camp do the dinner along with ther parents and leaders. This will be a positive public relations move for us and will solidify the candidate, their family, and their leader's relationship and commitment to the White Stag program.
• Planning the vent further ahead will allow us to locate an venue more conducive to a larger group necessary to accommodate candidates and their families.
• Planning the event at the junction between one program year and the next will allow us to more formally celebrate our successes and bridge over into the following year.
• A larger location will allow us to draw a bigger crowd and increase our opportunity to raise funds from the event.
• A larger location will allow us to invite and recognize distinguished alumni, who we have done a poor job of maintaining relationships. We can do more to recognize individuals who are having an impact on their community because of things they learned during their participation in White Stag.

Evaluation Competency Session Added

About SMART Objectives

• What should the learner be able to do?
• Under what conditions do you want the learner to be able to do it?
• How well must it be done?

If you can answer these three questions, you are writing SMART objectives. Mager's three characteristics are:

Performance

An objective always says what a learner is expected to be able to do; the objective sometimes describes the product or result of the doing.

Conditions

An objective always describes the important conditions (if any) under which the performance is to occur.

Criterion

Whenever possible, an objective describes the criterion of acceptable performance by describing how well the learner must perform in order to be considered acceptable.

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The Updated White Stag Code, or Script

In use since the early days of the program, and its origins unknown until recently, we have learned that the White Stag code is in fact based on the Hungarian Runic alphabet, a writing system used by the Magyars in the Early Middle Ages in the same time period as the events depicted in the White Stag legend transpired. Bela Banathy introduced the concept of the "White Stag script" early in the program, and its name was wrongly changed over the years and some of the characters were inadvertently and incorrectly modifed.

Here is the updated alphabet for the White Stag Script:

This is an example of the original Hungarian Runic alphabet.

Similarly, numbers can be represented with runic characters. The numbers are read from left to right, as in the example below.

Source: Wikipedia and Hungarian Runes.

Leadership is...

...the process of influencing people by providing purpose, direction, and motivation to continually move the organization and individual forward, upward, and onward.

Building the White Stag Community

In 1997, Bela Banathy challenged us to build the White Stag community for the future. He laid out a 10 ideas for developing a vision of our future and expanding our community. Are we on the right track? To find out, read his challenge yourself.

Books

	White Stag Books
	Resources for Leadership Describes eleven essential, time-tested skills of leadership. Focuses on Representing the Group and methods for influencing others. Condensed from years of research and practical experience, articulates key elements and specific traits of leadership. 278 pages; Fifth Edition. Published 2000. Available as a Acrobat file.
	Follow the White Stag Describes the underlying Principles, Aims, Methods, and Content, Evaluation Instruments, Organizational Structure, and perhaps most importantly, the Spirit and Traditions that make the program distinctive and leave a lasting impression in young people's hearts. 236 pages. Third Edition. Published 2000. Available as a Acrobat file.

	Related Books
	The Backcountry Classroom This unique collection of lessons represents not only the fundamentals but the very foundation of leadership and outdoor skills. No outdoor students, educators, or leaders should be without a copy. Lesson Plans. By Jack Drury, Bruce Bonney, Dene Berman, Mark Wagstaff. Buy now on Amazon.com.
	Effective Leadership In Adventure Programming Explains how the key elements of leadership work in theory and practice, and it helps train the next generation of adventure leaders—training that is paramount to developing the field. By Simon Priest, Michael A. Gass. Buy now on Amazon.com.