Pedro of Boys' Life has an exciting opportunity for the readers of Boys' Life. The message that follows is from him.
Write a one-page report titled *The Best Book I Read This Year* and enter it in the Boys' Life 1999 *Say Yes to Reading!* contest.
The book can be fiction or nonfiction. But the report has to be in your own words. Enter in one of these three age categories:

* 8 years old and younger,
* 9 and 10 years old,
* 11 years and older.

When Pedro receive your report, you'll get a free patch (featuring that dashing, well-read fella, Pedro!).

The top three winners from each age group will also get a Leatherman multi-tool, copies of Codemaster books 1 and 2, a set of the limited-edition Codemaster pin-and-patch set, plus have their names announced in Boys' Life!

The contest is open to all Boys' Life readers. Be sure to include your name, address, age and grade in school on the entry.

Send your report, along with a business-size self-addressed, stamped envelope, to: BSA, Boys' Life Reading Contest, S204, P.O. Box 152079, Irving, TX 75015-2079. Entries must be postmarked by Dec. 31, 1999.

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Virus Alert!!! How many emails do you get each month about these? Every month, I receive quite a few, all from well-meaning cyber-friends. Fortunately, most of these are unfounded. Before forwarding on a virus alert why not go into one of the web-related sites that has information to see if it is a real virus or just a hoax, before sending it out to your own cyber-friends and increasing traffic unnecessarily on the internet. These alerts which sometimes are hoaxes got me thinking about how easily some of us "adults" are taken in. Then I got thinking about our Cub Scouts, and ways we can teach them to be more aware of hoaxes and urban legends. One of the first steps could be to use "Ethics in Action". Ethics in Action is a BSA developed program designed to reinforce the character-building goals which have always been a part of the BSA. The Ethics in Action Program encourages Cub Scouts and their Leaders to think a little deeper about values and some of the decision and consequences of decisions that are a normal part of growing up. You can find the 15 different modules of this program in the Cub Scout Leader How-To Book. Although there isn't one on Virus Alerts there is one called Consumer Alert which helps boys analyze commercial messages on television and in printed advertisement. Planning this module for a den meeting could perhaps be that first step to teach our Cubs to "think deeper" about messages they receive.

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Ahem, speaking of commercial message at USSSP we offer a CD Rom of scouting images. The images are offered online free also. With Christmas being a few short months away this should be a consideration for your Pack/Troop.

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Resources

The scouting graphics for all levels of scouting are available on line at
http://clipart.usscouts.org or you can get it as a CD

For years we have been maintaining a free online library of Scouting images. Over the years many Scouters asked about how to go about having their own copy of all the images on the ftp site so that they could take the library with them on Scouting events.
This USSSP CD-ROM contains over 16,000 images (approximately 5,000 unique images in multiple formats) and 1,500 documents from our Clipart & File Library Site.

Purchase Your Copy of the CD:

If you would like to purchase a copy of the CD you can use our order form.

If you have suggestions for what you would like to see included on the next version of our CD, please drop us a line.

Download the Same Resources for Free:

Remember, you don't have to buy a CD to use any of our free resources. Please feel free to browse our Clipart and File Library and download anything that will help you or your Scouting organization. We built the Clipart and File Library for the purpose of making Scouting resources available to Scouts and Scouters to further the aims of Scouting.

Need Something You Can't Find At USSSP:

If you can't find what you need, please let the U.S. Scouting Service Project know and we'll see what we can do. Contributions Welcome:

If you have clipart, documents, or other stuff that you'd like to share, please let us know. We are always looking for new material to add to the library.

Versions and Future Plans

Version 1.1 of the USSSP CD has a new cover to indicate that it was produced by USSSP (Version 1.0 was produced by our fulfillment agent). The contents are the same as Version 1.0.

We are currently considering the production of a Version 2.0 CD with more content and resources