It is with a heavy heart that we share with you that Debbie Carey passed away last night. On Thursday, Debbie was at the Council Service Center in Marlborough and collapsed outside. She received CPR from the building manager and was taken by ambulance to the hospital in Marlborough. She was then flown to UMass Medical in Worcester.

Please keep her husband, Warren, and her entire family in your thoughts and prayers as they deal with this unexpected tragedy.

Debbie served the Scouting family for over 30 years and will be greatly missed.

The following arrangements have been made:

Thursday, January 4th – visiting hours

Shepherd Funeral & Cremation Service, 216 Main Street, Kingston, MA

Friday, January 5th – Church Service and Burial Services

11:00 am – Holy Family Church – 370 Middleboro Avenue, East Taunton, MA, 02718 followed by final resting place at Plymouth County Cemetery South Meadow Road, Plymouth MA (near the Plymouth Airport).

The Council Service Centers will be closed on Monday, December 25, for the Christmas Holiday.

The District Award of Merit is presented to registered Scouters who render service of an outstanding nature at the district level. Nominations must be made on the national nomination form and must be received no later than January 30, 2018.

Completed nominations can be sent via email or dropped off at the Canton or Marlborough service center.The awards will be presented at the District’s Recognition Dinner.

Calling all unit leaders—the Scoutbook Youth Advancement sync is officially underway!

All Scouting units with active Scoutbook subscriptions have recently been invited to complete the Scoutbook Youth Advancement Sync with ScoutNet. The Scoutbook Unit Admins have been notified and given instructions on how to activate this sync by December 31, 2017.

This sync will allow units to approve advancement in Scoutbook, which can then automatically sync with the BSA national database. Scoutbook users will no longer need to access Internet Advancement to track and report their unit advancement.

Scout Shop staff should know that the Advancement Report from Scoutbook and the Advancement Report from Internet Advancement are both certified and should be accepted. The bottom of the Advancement Report from Scoutbook looks like this:

Starting January 1, 2018, units with active Scoutbook subscriptions will only be able to approve advancements for Scouts who are in the advancement sync. If you have not activated your unit and/or Scouts within your unit, you will not be able to approve advancements for that Scout(s).

Note that as a unit activates the sync, the unit can un-approve Scouts who have not yet been registered (entered into ScoutNet or My.Scouting) and continue the sync for the rest of the unit. Once registration is complete for the outstanding Scouts, the unit can then approve them and they will then be included.

Check out the user guide for more.

If you have any questions about the Scoutbook Youth Advancement Sync or if your Scouting unit has not received the sync instructions, please email Scoutbooksync@gmail.com.