fred johnson

99.9% of the guys don't have trouble at the EBOR. It's a 99.5% correct assumption. The only reason to not have it signed by the district/council rep is that it just adds an extra chase / hoops and it would move much of the EBOR content earlier. Effectively, creating two EBORs. BUT I could accept one more signature. I think it's just assumed the EBOR is that signature.

"Develop" is the 6th word of the Eagle rank project requirement. It's explicitly there. It's repeated throughout the GTA and workbook. On the flip side though, "develop" is a subjective term. I would expect that "develop" refers to the efforts that the scout is looking to use to fulfill the rank requirements. IMHO, if the scout doesn't "own" his project (concept, development, etc), then the scout is really just coordinating labor for another person's project. Effectively, a service project and not an Eagle project. District comments can be suggestions or directions or warnings. Usually, it's easy to tell which is which. And even then, it's more about what the EBOR will be expecting. You have identified a short-coming in the process. Discussion (comments, directions, warnings) from the reviews are hit and miss recorded at the beginning of the plan at a later time. So the short-coming are #1 District signer should have a place to make comments in the proposal. GTA says to have the scout hand-write corrections and updates in the proposal. The purpose of hand-writing is to expedite signing without sending the scout home for minor edits. The trouble is not all comments fit clean into a single field. In addition, comments are often warnings that if you take it one direction it will be a valid Eagle project. If you take it the other direction or don't do something, then it is not a valid Eagle project. District reviewers could really use a place to record those comments. Having the scout write that after-the-fact in the plan in the first box is just too hit and miss. The scout might miss the comment or record it differently to make the project look better. Then, we have the question of whether the scout did receive the comment or not. #2 District signer should make a copy of the proposal and provide the copy to the EBOR. Proposals get cleaned-up and re-written after signatures are done. I've been in some EBORs where I was sure the proposal had edits that changed the scope or boundary of the project.

I agree. But if scouts do repeatedly run into project issues with that beneficiary, a friendly conversation is useful. BUT as you said, the beneficiary should not need to know anything about scouting. That's why I think the workbook needs a minor change. Above the beneficiary signature it does say that he is signing because in his opinion the scout fulfilled requirement #5. How would the beneficiary know? My opinion is you can't expect that of the beneficiary. It's not reasonable.

I've seen that over and over again. Your advice is dead on. Brow beating occurs by adults trying to justify their own value as an adult lead. Sometimes the best thing we adults can do is just back off and let scouts own what they are doing.

Of everything in scouting, the most Eagle project and it's associated workbook is one of the most straight forward and readable processes that exists. It's written exactly so that a scout can navigate the process on his own. BUT, a scout can't succeed without reading it or having someone else tell him what it says. The workbook is relatively short, very readable, concise, quotes sources. It has a message to scouts and parents on how it works and what to expect. It gives scouts a format for the proposal. It asks the exact questions that the scout needs to answer. I really don't know what more you could want except your own process. But then I guarantee you there will be others criticizing for valid reasons the process you create. There is no such thing as a perfect process. And, the process is not the target of the goal. It's kept simple so that the good deed and leadership are the heart of the effort; ... not the process. The BSA Eagle project workbook is less complex than many of the classes I took in middle school and high school. I really think these comments don't give enough credit to the scout. The real issue is cutting corners and looking to do the minimum. Even then, an EBOR conflict only occurs when you really really cut corners and you do significantly less than a debatable minimum. If cutting corners and doing as little as possible is what you want, then you do need the coach, a mentor and parents to escort you through the process and you need things signed and guaranteed as good. Beyond that, read the sentence and answer the question as written. Start with more respect for our scouts. Step back and let them lead their own advancement. And ya know it should not happen often, but there will be negative results. The EBOR not approving a project is explicitly meant to be the rare, rare outcome. But the EBOR needs the flexibility because of the edge cases that can and do occur. The only other option is to add other extra, non-value added steps to the process.

Talking with beneficiary is really just letting them know BSA expects out of the scout. There is nothing you can expect out of a beneficiary related to following the BSA program. I do find it a mis-match in the process that the Eagle Project workbook beneficiary signature says the beneficiary has the opinion the scout met the requirement. How would the beneficiary know unless they are part of scouting? The whole idea is to reach out into the community. Reaching out beyond scouting. So it's a contradiction. IMHO, the beneficiary signature should just say the beneficiary has accepted the project and the scout met the expectations as laid out in the project proposal.

I remember others being skeptical. I remember being a relatively new volunteer not thinking it was a big issue. Now long time in, I'd argue it's a HUGE issue. I'd argue Tigers is a similar issue. Lions and Tigers prop up membership numbers at the expense of Boy Scout membership. #1 it lowers the maturity of the cub program to not resemble scouts. #2 it burns out the volunteer intensive cub program. It's not a three year commitment. Now, it's a five year commitment. #3 most non-leaders have had enough of scouting by Webelos #4 it creates a different non-scouting view of scouting.

Duplicate

Same. We've seen three years of bad pattern. Can't seen to fix it. Just not the critical mass of numbers. Those that do and stay are burnt out by Bears. Heavy drop off. Tigers that visit the next year see smaller numbers because some tried in kindergarten and had too few to make good experience. We've talked to some families that don't join at Kindergarten. They feel their kid isn't ready. They then try in 1st grade and see few as we have heavy drop off in Lions. We'd rather wait and recruit in 1st grade as we think we'll get much better numbers. ... To be honest, I think we could hold off to 2nd grade and get better numbers. You can then treat Cub Scouting as still family oriented, but less day care and more the beginning of man'ing up. Beginning to explore and try things meant for older kids.

Is there a way to avoid recruiting Lions? For years, our pack did a good job of recruiting. Lately though, the council has stepped in. To be honest, they've fumbled. They mean well, but they don't know the dates or the secretary at our school. So what happened is the fliers went out at the wrong time or not at all. But beyond that, our pack lost the choice whether to recruit kindergarten Lions. Our pack has talked and we've just done badly at it year after year. We can debate the pluses and minuses. Personally, everyone probably knows my opinion. I think Lions is killing the Cubs. And I suspect Tigers isn't helping either. So ... Any suggestions for how a pack can politely ask the council to not flyer or advertise Lions to their school?

This is the best answer. I've seen it done before. A really weak Eagle project passes because of other leadership demonstrated by the scout. Then the EBOR does discuss with the SM and others what happened and tries to improve the situation. But the EBOR does have the option to say we need more or we need a new project.

We've been through this time and time again. Like the US constitution, the process isn't very good except when compared with all the other processes. ... Every process will fail when pushed beyond the limits. IMHO, district reviewers could do a better up writing on the proposal and adding explicit words about expected leadership and planning. In addition though, that's what the whole project is about. It's documented everywhere. It's documented the scout can strike out on his own AT HIS OWN ADVANCEMENT RISK. If the scoutmaster failed to know leaderhip is expected, bad on him. If the district failed to communicate it, bad on them. But I really find it hard to believe that between the SM, district review and the explicit words written in the Eagle workbook, the scout did not know that significant planning is expected. It's documented everywhere. What does happen though is people continually try to find the least, the minimum and how to skirt by. I've had mothers ask explicitly "what is the minimum to complete it?"

Best answer - "Yes - it counts" ... but I must confess I do STRONGLY encourage the scout to include others beyond his own genetic tree.

Let the scouts decide. Be careful. Even when you say "let the scouts decide", adults strongly influence the scouts. That influence can support or defeat the scout's how scout's work together. The idea behind "let the scout's decide" is more than just they will choose right. It's about their owning the decision, learning from their choices and bonding as a troop. Also, it keeps the adults out as scouts will become passive when adults make even the most passive comments. It's really about how scouting works. Scouting is for the boys to grow and explore. To do that, you need to let them take leadership even in the early beginning. Ask and guide. But be careful how much you inject. You'll find new scout patrol versus mixed age patrols as a big debate. People will try to label one as traditional and one as not. Looking back on how scouting started, it can be argued the new scout patrol is the original model. But it's a moot issue.

The day of collection is pretty much out of their control and fully planned by the Red Cross (or other org). The scout would have to focus on taking the drive to the next level through promotion, education and other surrounding activities and events. The scout would need to treat his project effectively separate from the blood drive. In another words, the scout's project needs to have significant impact, planning and development. The blood mobile and people collecting blood is a good deed, community service and a big big impact. BUT, it's not the scout's good deed, community service or impact. When I've been approached with this and similar, that's how I've treated it. The scout needs to layout the scope and realm of influence of his project .... what's his commitment to plan and lead. It's that scope that needs to have a significant impact and show planning and leadership. It's hard though as you don't want to be the bad guy who might cause a blood drive to not occur. But on the other hand, the blood drive impact is not the scout's project.

I've purged and purged recently. I still have a shelf of most of the versions of the boy scout handbook and most of the scoutmaster handbook. I tried to donate 1950s and 1960s Boy's Life magazines to the local Boy Scout museum. I was told there are so many out there that I should not feel guilty in the slightest. I was told the best thing is toss in paper recycling garbage. Beyond that though, I've tossed most of the materials I have. They get dated. A few I keep as I found them extremely useful or use templates from them. But if I teach a course, I'm going to download the syllabus if I can. Purchase if I can't find online. Beyond that, the only reason to keep the old stuff is nostalgia.

Here here. Scouts are to be well rounded, but not by pounding boredom into them. So many of the merit badges are worse than worthless in today's society as the topics are pounded into them by school and other groups. Asking them to do them in scouts hurts the scouting program. Scouting covers them in poorer form than it is covered by school. How about this ? Add an option for scoutmasters to wave merit badges if they have already been sufficiently covered in the local school or other channels. If waved, find a challenging MB to replace it.

Lots of dead-on aim comments. Some stronger than others. ... My apologies for re-grouping. Wow. Why haven't I ever thought of that. Great comment. Why isn't it there? Too often we give lip service to patrols being the fundamental unit without actually creating a structure that makes it happen. Never knew that. Interesting. I've always heard that BSA started by organizing troops and the first troops were numbered <city> #1, City #2, etc. BSA had a VHS video on how to do annual planning from the 1980s. It showed youth step-wise planning. It was a good video. Now, I can't find great instructional material. But then again, I don't digest all the BSA documents as much as before. Perhaps I've missed the new guide. It used to be something that I was very proud of our troop for doing well. BSA's documents have not been consistent over the years. Too many different authors more focused on getting the document out then on creating a consistent program across all printed materials. Then once printed, the bad information says around for decades. My opinion is BSA should have just a few "printed" materials and the rest should be PDF online so they can keep fixing and improving. Printed the Boy Scout Handbook. As for the rest, it would be better to just have on-line docs and a contract with a on-demand printing company. It would be much cheaper and much more consistent.

Broken situations are not the good basis of modifying rules. Sounds like ... Scout was less interested in earning Eagle than the parents. EBOR could have been well justified in not passing for many reasons. My experience is broken situations are arrived at after a long trail. Avoiding bad situations is for the journey, not after you arrive. Yeah, I strongly recommend sharing the plan with the troop and with others. There is no way to enforce that though. Just like the rest, the scout can blaze out on his own path and it is evaluated afterward for advancement.

Well Stosh.... I know you are a scouter, but real scouters just don't do that.

Yeah, I must admit staying organized is a good life lesson to learn. MBs have relatively little value. The value is becoming an organized person or a self-starter or one of many other character traits reflected by someone who completes merit badges. That's why I like to keep the adults out of it. It's a natural lesson coming out of the structure of the program. IMHO, those are the best lessons.

My experience is it's best to let the boy manage the process as much as possible. It's his advancement. He can keep incomplete blue cards in his handbook or a zippered pocket in the handbook cover. Trying to track partials (etc) inserts the adults too much into the process. It's supposed to be the SM who works with the scouts, not the ASM in charge of XXX and the ASM in charge of YYY and the committee member in charge of ZZZ and the .... Let the scout track it. Partials are fine. Scouting is about exploring life. If he tried a merit badge and did not finish, that's his choice. And that's absolutely fine. My oldest had 20+ incomplete merit badges and still had 30+ at time he earned Eagle. Personally, it shows a smart scout who doesn't waste time on a bad experience or something that doesn't interest him.

Yeah, that does not seem fair. Plus then the crew adviser works with one gender more than the other because of an award that only that gender can earn? Structurally that's just wrong. It divides the crew membership.

Maybe I'll have to revisit it. I just don't want to sit at another committee meeting where we review painful details of scout advancement. I want to spend little time reconciling handbook to online records. We find going from the box to BSA online is quick and easy and all we need. .... I just don't want to grow the beurocracy.

Sadly with a bit of pride, you might not be that far off. If summer camp had a primitive hunting program, they would take it. Our scouts like being active and getting dirty. ... Sometimes they even talk to us and tell us their plans. Na for us, if a PL wanted to help his scout with advancement, he'd ask the scout for his BSA Boy Scout Handbook. I don't really understand how you can save time. I've used scoutbook and troopmaster. It takes time to keep the individual records up to date. Simply recording who attended a camp out in those tools takes time. Recording service takes time. Recording individual requirements takes even more time. I'd have to have an adult who's sole job was to keep those systems updated and accurate. And, another person who posts the records to BSA and purchases advancements. We're really concerned with just having the handbook right and having BSA online records right. Beyond that, it just doesn't matter to us. Each to their own. I can understand where you like having that data and the reports. I actually don't want it because of the implications. Each to their own.