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My son's COH is coming up. My husband, who is the advisor of son's Venture Crew, wants the ceremony to be as short as possible. So does my son. I am willing to dispense with the candle lighting ceremony, the Voice of the Eagle speech, the reading of the Scout mom poem and 100 Scouts. I am also willing to dispense with the explanations of the 12 points (I'm moving them to the program). However, my husband has planned to have the Scout Oath and Law recited by the other scouts who are present and not by my son alone. I believe that he has to recite the scout oath and law, as well as the 12 points, for his eagle to be legal. My husband and I have been hanging up on each other all week over this. I haven't found anything on the net that answers the question one way or the other. Please help.

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There are no requirements for an ECOH. I would expect presentation of the medal and badge along with mom/dad/mentor pins. The Eagle Charge is a nice touch. A regular opening with pledge, oath and law would be nice.

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My suggestion is that the order of the day is do what your son wants. It's pretty much his party. The thing about your son reciting the Oath and Law by himself is not mandatory. It was possibly done at his EBOR as that is a tradition in some troops...often done for the other ranks as well, but it's not even a requirement for that. His "Eagle was Legal" the moment he passed his Board of Review.

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The "design" of the ECOH is up to the Scout and his family, as long as it is in good taste, respectful and non-offensive. What you have described is not out of line. Brief is good. I've had Scouts who elected to have NO ceremony, and we just dropped the medal off at their house. Their choice.

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Just as with all other BSA ranks.....the second he passes his board of review he is that rank...

 

There is no Legal nonsense.....

 

 

Brief is good and the shorter the better is even better.....

 

the thing to remember is IT IS YOUR SON"S, not your court of honor.......Let him make as big or small a deal about it as he wants.

 

Abide by his wishes.

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This is good practice for his wedding. Keep your nose out if it, you play a supporting role. Do you WANT him and his wife to resent you ? Make a nice display of memorabilia from his scouting career and leave the rest him. Lots of pictures of him as a Tiger. That's as far as you get to go.

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Just as with all other BSA ranks.....the second he passes his board of review he is that rank...

 

There is no Legal nonsense.....

Unless National elects not to validate the application. Section 9.0.1.10 of your GtA.

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There is no reqirments that have to be met during a ECOR for the scout to receive his regalia. The agenda of the ceremony is typically troop tradition or what the family wants. I don't agree that "short is better" either, it would be same as a groom's father telling the mother of a bride that "shorter is better". The Eagle is as important to some families as a wedding or as umimportant as first graders garduation. I learned rather quickly not to give "any" opinion or tell the family how they should feel about it. Just present them with some ideas and let them decide what they want. I once presented the Eagle badge to a scout in a one minute ceremony at the scouts house with only his family attending. I also don't agree that it should always be the scout's choice. Sometimes the best choice for a scout is allow his family to honor their son. My first ECOR was a young man who wasn't suppose to live past age 6 because of a heart deformity. That scouts parents celebrate everyday as if their son was just born. The ECOR for our deaf scout was the same.

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First, congratulations, Mom! And thanks for all the hard work.

Second, advisor's wife, eh? I'm so very sorry. ;)

Third, our boys generally prefer to say the oath and law as a group. Most boys do the eagle charge, along with all other eagles in the audience, who are asked to come stand behind the boy.

Forth, our community is pretty much white-bread suburban, so I tell my boys that they'd better give their moms more than that fleeting peck on the cheek that those pathetic WASP's pass for kiss!

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Just as with all other BSA ranks.....the second he passes his board of review he is that rank...

 

There is no Legal nonsense.....

Unless National elects not to validate the application. Section 9.0.1.10 of your GtA.

Ya can open up that GTA and crawl right into it and slam it shut....

 

Once the local board passes it, it's gold far as I am concerned.....

 

How many times have you heard of drug using, shoplifting, bullying scouts get denied at the local level to only have it over ruled by national......

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Just as with all other BSA ranks.....the second he passes his board of review he is that rank...

 

There is no Legal nonsense.....

Unless National elects not to validate the application. Section 9.0.1.10 of your GtA.

Right, until some ignorant District guy rejects one of your Scouts' Eagle projects because it "won't last long enough" and then you'll be beating down the door to open the GtA back up. I didn't say right or wrong, I just said that the fact of the matter is that Eagle is not like every other rank, because National issues it whether you like it or not.
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  • 2 weeks later...

Thank you to all who wrote. My son's COH was last weekend and it turned out well. We did a breakfast cooked by his fellow scouts at the church which is our meeting place. My son's project was done in the parish reception hall so we had the ceremony and the party there to show it off. We had a color guard and then an honor guard of 4 friends led him in. 1 was already an eagle scout and the other 3 are all set to be. Then the scouts recited the pledge of allegiance. My daughter sang the National Anthem. Then we had a few speakers, all from our political party because my son did not want anyone from the other. Our local representative made a lovely speech about my son and his project, 3 other politicos spoke and gave awards. Then we got our parent pins, I gave him his eagle pin, he made his speech and gave out 2 mentor pins. We then invited all of the eagle scouts present up to recite the scout oath. At a recent COH we attended, the MC asked all Eagles to stand and identify themselves by name, troop and date of Eagle, which my son really liked. . We asked them all to come up front and surround my son before giving their dates. They went back to 1953!

 

Your responses helped me to calm down and plan this properly. My son was happy with the ceremony and so were my husband and I. My next son is now inspired to work towards his eagle because he had seen the positive impact his brother and the half dozen friends who've recently made eagle have made.

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Glad everything worked out. Congratulations to your son. Yes, the Eagle ceremony belongs to the scout, it is entirely up to him, what kind of cermony he wants to have.

 

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