NJCubScouter

In that photo, I just noticed the traffic cone on the other side of the airplane. It can't be more than a few feet from the plane. Did they think someone wasn't going to notice the airplane sitting there and needed a traffic cone to warn them? Speaking of traffic control, I am noticing how far, far away this thread has gotten from its original topic, not that we have an actual rule against that. It's more of a guideline.

Based on the responses to your post, and my experience, I think it varies from place to place and maybe from time to time. I'm not sure why I remember this, but when I was somewhere around the fifth grade, the student council president (an eighth-grader, it was a K-8 school) was a Scout, and sometime during his eighth grade year he made Eagle. Of course, this was about 50 years ago. (!) In high school I was elected student council treasurer (not sure where that stands in the pantheon of "leadership") and I was a Boy Scout. Our student council presidents and class presidents were not Scouts as I recall. In fact if I remember correctly our class president (all four years) was really not involved in any other activities of consequence, but he must have done something right along the way because he is now a state court judge (an appointed, not elected position.) When my son was in high school, and on the robotics team, for all four years the overall student captain of the team was a Boy Scout - three different Scouts from two different troops, all of whom were either Eagle at the time of their election or made Eagle in their senior year. (My son was a sub-team captain.) And yes I realize that the robotics team is not necessarily a microcosm of the school, and not necessarily composed of the "most popular" kids anyway. And then again, leadership ability and popularity are not necessarily the same thing.

In theory, National could have left this up to each council. However, the documents that are linked in the various posts earlier in this thread suggest that this is a nationwide decision and is applicable to all councils. On the other hand, I am again pinging @@RichardB in hopes that he will stop by and clarify this situation.

I was thinking the same thing about my troop. Reducing our level of FOS donations would not be much of a threat.

As they say, a picture tells 1,000 words.

There may be more logic to the list than first appears. It is interesting that none of the countries on this list (Jordan, Qatar, Kuwait, Morocco, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkey) are on the "travel ban" list, and vice versa. I am going to make a wild guess that you can't get a direct commercial flight here from any of the "travel ban" countries anyway. So if you add all that up, if you're in Egypt (for example), you're surrounded (including over water) by countries that you either (probably) can't fly out of (Libya, Sudan), or are also on the list (Saudi Arabia), plus Israel. Try just driving over the border from Egypt to Israel and see how that works out. And even if you did get to an Israeli airport, and tried to get your explosive laptop past Israeli airport security, your day would probably not have a happy ending.

Apparently smartphones below a certain size are exempt from this, which I am not sure I understand. If you can turn a tablet into a weapon, you can turn a smartphone into a weapon. My wife has a small tablet and a large smartphone that are not very far apart in size. So I don't quite get it. To RS's point: The things we didn't have 50 years ago can still be brought on the airplane, in checked baggage, so you can have them before you leave and after you land. You just can't have access to them during the flight.

I don't think anyone would disagree with that second sentence. (There may be exceptions for individual Scouts here and there, but generally it is true.) But who cares? And did Stosh say the opposite? All I saw was him asking a question (post #25 in this thread), which I am not sure I understand, and it did not even specifically mention Scouting. I'm not even sure you and Stosh are talking about the same thing.

But the Guide to Advancement specifically says the EBOR can take place after the 18th birthday. (With no permission from anybody within 3 months, or with council permission between 3 and 6 months, or with national approval after that.) Some Eagle candidates rely on the fact that they can do the EBOR after their birthday. (Too many, and my son ended up being one of them, and yes, technically he was not a registered member of the BSA at the time he had his EBOR. Two of our troop's last three Eagles weren't either.) There is nothing magic in that rule. The BSA could just as easily decide that the EBOR must take place before the Scout is 18, but I think they would have the change take effect at some future date after announcing it, like 6 to 12 months. It would effectively shorten the time the Scout has to complete the other requirements, and it would affect different Scouts differently depending on how EBOR's are scheduled in their council. (Which are two of the reasons it probably will not be changed.)

One might think that National would have a standard way of distributing information like this. I think it's fine to put the info on both the National and council web sites since more people probably read the council sites than the National site. But in this case, it does not yet appear to be on the National web site (at least, it wasn't when I looked a few days ago) and it is on different councils' web sites in different ways, which creates confusion. Meanwhile, it does not seem to be on my own council's web page at all, at least it is not on the home page or the news page. And all this assumes that 100% percent of people are getting their Scouting information from the Internet, which is not the case.

I think it's worth noting that the Scout Law says a Scout "is" these 12 things. It does NOT say he is not necessarily other positive things, whether it be responsible, fair, self-reliant, careful, etc., all of which I think are implied in the Scouting program, if not in the words of the Oath and Law. It does not exclude "a Scout exercises critical thinking", which is something I might add if I were given the power (and if I could find a way to boil it down to one word.) But I agree with MattR, the Scout Law ain't broke so we don't need to fix it.

I would do the same as RS. The Scout must do the new requirements for First Class though.

I don't think it would necessarily be wrong to require approval of the plan, but I think the BSA was trying to strike a balance between "not enough" and "too much." Part of the problem was that some reviewers, unit leaders, etc. were requiring much more than others, and the BSA was trying to achieve some sort of standard that would be roughly equivalent for all Scouts in all councils.

That's what the process was until a few years ago. I believe the reason they changed it because there were Scouts doing detailed planning consuming many hours, only to be told the idea for the project did not meet the requirement and to choose another idea. The current edition of the workbook limits the amount of time and effort the Scout must expend before they know whether they are going to be able to proceed with the project in the first place. That seems reasonable to me.

That's right. As I said, most of them are not absolutes. You aren't going to be "helpful" to someone who is doing something wrong. For whatever it's worth, one of the examples I used was loyal, not trustworthy. I had difficulty coming up with a good example of when it's ok not to be trustworthy. I suppose if you agree to do something but then find out that your work is going to be used for evil purposes, and you decline to do whatever it is, you're not really being untrustworthy. When you agreed, you did not have all of the relevant information, so your agreement was invalid.

The Scout Law is a pretty good set of principles, but they vary in how "absolutely" they can or should be applied. For example, both "Obedient" and "Loyal" can produce bad results, even evil results, if one is obedient and/or loyal to the wrong person or persons. On the other hand, I am having a difficult time thinking of situations when it is bad to be "Cheerful" or "Kind" or "Courteous", even to someone who does not deserve it. Maybe the difference is that these three merely involve words and demeanor, while "Obedient" and "Loyal" involve actions.

I don't know where you are getting that idea from. It is not what the GTA says.

In my observations of how this is done in our district, it is for the Scout's benefit, both in theory and in practice. It is done to make sure there are no surprises at the EBOR - or in your phrase, to make sure nothing has gone "out-of-whack". The reviewer checks the completed workbook and makes sure things look in order. I think they also go through a checklist of non-project items (like blue cards), again, just to try to prevent an issue from coming up for the first time at the EBOR. They may also check the Application before it is submitted to Council (pre-EBOR), so it is always done before the Scout turns 18. The one Scout in our troop who I am aware of as NOT having had a "post review" was my son. He finished his project SO close to his birthday (I think the beneficiary signed off on Wednesday, two MB counselors signed off on required MB's on Thursday, and the last business day before his birthday was Friday), that there wasn't time. He did pass his EBOR, with flying colors I am told, so the record of passing without a "post review" is 100%, but "1" is a pretty small sample size.

Col. Flagg, I think we are going around and around here, but I will go around one more time. When the project beneficiary and unit leader sign the end of the "Project Report" (the third and final section of the workbook), here is what they are signing: "In my opinion, this Eagle Scout service project meets Eagle Scout requirement 5, as stated on page 4 of this workbook." "In my opinion". These are important opinions, and in the vast majority of cases they will effectively be the last word as to the satisfaction of Requirement # 5. But officially, they are not the last word. Compare this to the EBOR section on the Eagle Scout Application, and this isn't going to come out right, but here is what it says: "REQUIREMENT 7. Successfully complete an Eagle Scout board of review. The applicant appeared before the Eagle Scout board of review on this date, and this application was approved. Month Day Year Date ______________________________________________ Signature of Eagle Scout board of review chair ______________________________________________ Signature of council/district board representative (if applicable)" No opinions here. Just the approval of the application. The EBOR has the authority to decide that in carrying out the project, the candidate did not demonstrate planning or leadership. This should almost never happen. If the previous steps in the process are done properly, it should never happen. But, theoretically, it can happen.

@@bsaggcmom 's very helpful post reminded me of this thread from a few years ago: http://scouter.com/index.php/topic/26414-alaska-border-patrol-officer-pulls-handgun-on-scout-confiscates-camera-detains-group/ As I recall, there was never any clear "conclusion" about what happened in that case, and specifically no clear answer about whether the border agent actually pulled a gun. The government said no gun was pulled, which satisfied the Scouts' council, and some people here (including me) believed it, and others didn't. One thing that was clear in that case is that one or more Scouts were taking photos beyond the point where there was a big sign that warned against the taking of photos. (See #4 in bsaggcmom's post.) I did not re-read the entire thread but I seem to recall that this resulted in the agents inspecting one of the kids' phones and finding one or more photos that created a problem. I also seem to recall that one or more Scouts were (allegedly) not following the instructions of the officers, which created more of a problem.

That's a trip I have been on too many times. (As opposed to desert travel.)

And some of those same sections say that the EBOR can decide that Requirement 5 was not satisfied by the Scout, but that this would be very rare. I would say "extremely" rare would probably be more accurate.

That is not correct, based on the Guide to Advancement sections that have been cited and quoted.

The BSA says basically the same thing. The last paragraph of section 9.0.2.13 of the Guide to Advancement (which you mention) says: Additionally, section 9.0.2.1, paragraph # 4, says: So the EBOR has the final word, but given the steps that come before that, a rejection would be "very rare." I have sat on about 20 EBOR's and I have never seen it happen. I think the fact that our district adds an optional "post-project review" by the district project reviewer makes it even less likely that it would happen. But it is theoretically possible.

It appears that National is relying on the councils to distribute this information. All of the links that people have posted above have the same FAQ from National. In some cases the councils have posted the FAQ as their own Facebook post, in other cases they simply link to the document (with the "Updated 3/10/17 by RRB" still on it.) Why they are choosing to do it this way, I'm not sure.