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If I had a choice between a mini medal and a plaque, I’d take the mini medal. But, how about an electronic medal in the form of a screen that scrolls all of your awards. Make it solar powered so that the wearer had to spend time outdoors to keep it blinging,

@Jmatt0613, yep. your in the big leagues. Like I said earlier, don’t treat your proposal as an end in itself. Treat it as a way to say there’s a problem. This is an opportunity for you to listen to other scouters in your troop and get the idea mill going. You’re scared because you think you have something important and you are uncertain if it will be accepted. In those situations I remove all doubt by assuming that my idea will be rejected outright. That way I have nothing to worry about. Don’t expect your idea to pass instantly. Don’t take it personally. In fact, I always worry when someone buys into my ideas hook line and sinker. That usually means I’m stuck with a lot of work to get it done! But, if someone is willing to mull over what they like or not about it, that may mean that that person is willing to help me make it work.

Hi @tc79. Welcome to the forums. Contact your district executive regarding this. Other packs must have encountered the same problem, and it would be a good round table topic.

Every adult in the troop should look in the mirror together. This is not necessarily about an intimidating adult. The MC and others in the board could be on even terms with the scout. But, in a formal process designed to get feedback on troop life, when a scout knows that two of the adults in the room don’t trust the SM … a “standard BoR question” can leave a scout thinking about how much his/her response will be used to indict the leader who is not in the room. When a brain starts running in that direction, it gives the mouth nothing to say. In a troop where the SM trusts the CC and MC, I would assure the scout that we have a bond of brotherly love even when we disagree, affirm that a sincere observation respectfully delivered matters, and encourage him to convey that to the board. (Yes, I’ve said that to scouts in my units.) This is not that environment. We both agree that something needs to be repaired between these caring adults. We don’t know if the SM is dodging the problem. She may be working on it, but she may think it would take more time than the scout deserved to wait to complete a personal growth conference. So, she phoned a friend. The “independent” boots on the ground thought it was a good idea in this case. If we truly had a deficient scout, he might have clammed up at the second board as well. But, the second board concluded that the boy in front of them was a life scout. I wouldn’t call that dodging the problem, I would call it keeping the youths’ personal growth from becoming a pawn in the adults’ problem. Could what happened be stressful for other scouts? From personal experience, I’ve observed that to be the case. But not every scout handles interpersonal stress the same way, and not every scout has their BoR at a time of peak stress. Let’s hope that both of those factors (along with resolution on the part of adults) come into play at future BoR’s.

“Trust issues” was repeated enough times to make it the real bottom line here. It’s astounding how quickly a teen will catch on to that stuff. It may even be why the scout was intimidated at this BoR. Youth who are trying to be loyal to every adult in their troop … their response when they perceive a loaded question is to freeze. And if you don’t think “What makes a good leader?” isn’t a loaded question in an environment where scouters have been at odds, it’s time to polish the mirror. Whatever ails your scouters needs to be fixed. In the meantime, I’d cut the SM a little slack. She’s trying to help the scout accomplish whit should at this point be a fairly minor task.

@mtgavin, welcome to the forums! Fred answered your two questions (in four parts). His and other replies were making assumptions in the negative. I’d like to frame things positively. As a crew advisor I had been put in similar situations. So, to help bring clarity for scouts, scouters and parents, this is how I describe how to proceed … A BoR can be suspended to give a scout time to rectify deficiencies. In this case, the board should promptly write a letter regarding the perceived deficiencies (i.e., reticence in answering questions) and give the scout an opportunity to complete the review (i.e., as soon as next week). If time is of the essence, a handwritten letter will do. Done is better than perfect. An SM or ASM would then be able to listen to the scout, and coach him/her in how to overcome the problem. What’s not clear is if the SM discussed this with the scout’s troop CC. Working between multiple units, I’ve found that communication on all fronts is necessary. So, in a case like this when different people constitute the reconvened board, I would want the chair of the reconvened board to have the letter that the suspended board sent to the scout. Let’s not assume there’s something interpersonal between MCs and scouts. Sometimes scouts have a bad day. Sometimes that day falls at exactly the wrong time for adults in one party to help in short order. Given multi-way communication between all parties, this is a great model to the scout on how thoughtful and caring adults can work together and provide opportunities for growth.

@Jmatt0613, I hope the code of conduct that you propose passes muster. But, the important thing for you to communicate is that beyond oath and law, you shouldn’t need a code of conduct but scouts’ and scouters’ recent behavior betrays that need. Even if the committee doesn’t pass it, you want them to understand that you’re seeing courteous, kind, and cheerful being left behind in the trail. That’s not a recipe for growth.

A flawed assumption goes off the rails … Aiming a weapon at another person hastens death. Aiming at an effigy gives a false sense of superiority and dehumanizes the other. Simulating the consequences of battle (i.e., sports, games, etc … followed by chats and fellowship) teaches to love opponents, eschew war, and forestall death. We need to learn the difference. And, we need online simulators of every scout camp … possibly every merit badge.

… and I thought I was being rebellious swiping left on the announcement in my inbox … you all are intense!

I’m doing my part. Two more applications will be dropped at council HQ next week. Y’all better start lifting. (Full disclosure, I have no clue why these boys are flocking to our troop.)

For the record, I was speculating that the parent wanted the scout to be isolated. From what in particular? We have no idea. I’ve had more than a few parents who became increasingly worried about who their child was befriending as he/she moved into adolescence. As a parent I’ve had the opposite experience in that kids from outside our local circle actually were the best people I could ever wish to have in my children’s life. The requirement as worded gives a tremendous amount of latitude. Maybe it does subvert the objective of the lesson. But, maybe for some scouts, a little step can be a big experience. Considering the parents’ views a little bit more deeply, I can imagine holding a belief that they shouldn’t see anyone as being different. Thus, connecting with someone on the basis that they are different may fly in the face of that.

@Eagle94-A1, the forces that motivate the MB are controversial. But, my first round of scouts who completed the requirements they found it to be an enjoyable opportunity. So, the challenge for us all is to focus on the youth. I'm pretty sure the parental permission clause has more to do with protection from abuse than honoring a parent's preference for isolation. But, let's just read the requirement as if it doesn't want us running afoul of parents' social strictures ... In this particular case, if nothing has transpired to change the opinion of the parents, the youth is in a catch 22 because his/her integrity is at play: Forgo requirement, say you did, and counselor signs anyway ... trust is broken. Talk to a stranger without parent's permission ... obedience is ignored. What's better for the scout? Earning a badge? Or, beingloyal to family? What's better for the SM? One more Eagle to his/her name? Or, accepting that this badge isn't right for every family? (It certainly isn't right for families who believe that scouts should have no duty to God.) However, I believe the SM/ASM should touch base with counselor, parents, and scout to see how they made this work. My reasoning: I think that there are more people in this country with different traits but same ideology than there are people with the same traits and same ideology. (Heck, it's really hard to find someone with all of the same traits as you!) Half the fun of life is hashing things out with a person who you'd think would have nothing in common with you. I'd like to think that the counselor was able to work with the scout and parents to help discover this. That's why I recommend making those inquiries with a positive attitude being prepared to hear good things.

@IronicallyNamed, welcome to the forums. There are multiple possibilities: The counselor glossed over the “parent permission” part. The father actually relented in this case, perhaps through the intervention of the counselor. The scout fooled someone either by claiming to have a conversation that didn’t transpire or claiming to have permission when none was given. (Yes, I’ve known 17 year olds to try this.) If this is nagging you, you need to get clarity from parent, counselor, and scout. That would be my first step. If indeed the scout succumbed to breaking trust for a patch then let’s not call it “penalizing the scout.” The scout earned lots of awards and will no doubt be worthy of many others. If the family wants to take some kind of moral stand on this, then the scout has an opportunity to make the same stand. (I mean, he/she could file for emancipation if this award is a be-all end-all in his/her mind.) There’s nothing wrong with aging out as a life scout on your integrity. If anyone should be penalized, it should be BSA. But even then, I wouldn’t call it a penalty. The Chief Scout Executive was compelled to make a stand knowing it would make Eagle an undesirable badge for some American scouts and their families.

Keep an open mind and see if you’d be useful on the Crew committee … especially if you are a good instructor. When I was an advisor, I leaned on my committee a lot, but one person at a time, because they had non-overlapping skills that together made for a solid general interest program.

@nolesrule, I am truly sorry. I've hated the multiple occasions when I've personally seen strong and good leaders clash over various parts of the program - especially advancement. IMHO, it's a complete waste of time, and your scout's troop is now down one capable and passionate leader. But, we (not just you and me, but all scouters who may in the future read this) must not back down from the truth written in the skies. The GTA is a well thought-out document covering most of the problems we scouters have had with this method, but man-hours hours spent parsing it could be better spent opening a youth to abundant opportunities to scout in the purest sense of the word. Regarding negotiating the future given the troop's decisions (and this really is from personal experience): the single most important thing a troop can offer is brotherly love. Obviously that's a lot harder to do when people are at loggerheads, so everyone will have to dig deep to make it happen. The good news is that I've seen that scouts have a far greater capacity for this than adults. If a scout feels cherished in a troop, he/she will stay. If not, he/she will move on. If the adults around him/her can manage to do the same over months or years, it will be worth their while to do so. Anyway there are a lot of topics by scouters who've had to negotiate their time volunteering after things like this happened. (In fact, that's why I started following.) I hope you can avail yourself of them.

I’ve been put in the middle of gripes like this before. It ended with multiple new units being spun off and years later merging back to the original. In the thick of it I had to have a heart-to-heart with Son #1 about the various adults in and around our program. Yes leaders can disagree sharply. Yes they can work together for good. I repeat: This happens because people want to give scouts unearned awards. I have no doubt that this high-minded CC is now on a rampage maligning @nolesrule using this incident as an example of how this bypassing of requirements could be the tip of the iceberg. I’m sure this is engendering a sense of indignation to the point of self-righteousness. I assure you that denying an award for lack of completing the requirements is not “harming the scout” … not nearly as much as adults failing to get on the same page in the midst of disagreement. This troop needs to take a chill pill and everyone start taking humble pie in small bites. It might be a good weekend to have a campfire with some friendly cups of coffee. October 1st is international observe the moon night.

@nolesrule, lacking a reply from the leaders, we have to play devil’s advocate. You are arguing that they proceeded on speculation. They put the scout in the position of feeling rejected rather than supported. And based on your description I agree. A direct-contact leader should have conferred his/her scouts who took the badge and removed all doubt about how the program was delivered to those scouts. Then as a team they could have decided on the most rewarding way to make up for any deficit (timed perhaps around international observe the moon night) and relayed that plan to the CC. That approach provides for a much more robust learning experience. Your troop’s leaders missed an opportunity. But … Were your leaders wrong? Did or did not your scout complete the requirement as written? A couple of us have posted that we are quite clear that in order to “explain the changes you observe” one must scout the sky with ones own vision and by one’s own hand render images that can later be decoded to report to some conclusion regarding planetary motion. If your scout did that, then the troop’s actions resulted in her being wrongly denied a completed blue card. If she did not, then she rightly received a partial. This happens more often than people recognize because the intersection between camp and the advancement method is complex. The current need to register MBCs and the urgency of youth protection makes completing partials a challenge. And, that ageist deadline for completion of rank advancement has made things worse over the decades. The GTA is very helpful, but it doesn’t cover every scenario perfectly. So, when scouters come to the right conclusion the wrong way, the best strategy, IMHO, is to encourage them to better prepare for a more helpful response going forward, and encourage the scout to rise to the standard exemplified in the handbook, fieldbook, and merit badge pamphlets.

When you have enough adults, you can schedule BoRs at/after any regular meeting. That gets tough when your committee and available parents dwindles to three or four. In my troop, the committee met upstairs monthly on a troop meeting night, and we went "up" for our BoR after our troop meeting. The other thing to do is invite folks who are active with your CO. You have to make clear the need, that scouting experience is not necessary, and you'll have a prepared list of questions that they may choose from to ask a scout. Obviously, you have to then have a schedule that the scouts can follow. Like @mrjohns2 suggested, I would also ask the parents and adult siblings in the boys' troop if any of them would volunteer. When I was a crew advisor, I encouraged parents on my committee to sit on BoRs at the troop so that they could learn what the boys were experiencing during advancement.

Yep, PA State Parks are supposedly dry. There are also quiet hours that supposedly begin earlier and end later than most summer camps …. https://www.dcnr.pa.gov/Recreation/WhatToDo/StayOvernight/RVandTentCampsites/Pages/default.aspx Most of us however will look the other way if there’s nothing to hear. They usually provide remote, primitive camping locations for scouts who are just about ready to play capture the flag at 9pm.

One of @fred8033's challenges stuck out to me ... Obviously, policing how every staff certifies MB's is a fool's errand. However, on the last day of camp a couple of years ago, I was reviewing a scout's camping log and realized that he hadn't sorted out which nights were under canvas and which were not. He needed a couple more weekends to earn the badge. So, I went back to the program hall and returned the "completed" blue card and requested a partial. This is no trivial task for a staff who is trying to close out the week because they wanted to make sure it was logged correctly in their system But, they were happy to do that. The scout understood the problem and was happy to come home with a partial. (It was 2020, they were happy to be camping at all!) The parent was happy when I explained the situation. Technically, a blue card had been issued because of a series of adult/staff errors (not the least of which includes training boys to read requirements for themselves or training the camp staff to interpret camping logs). But, none of those "adult errors" could obviate one simple fact: the scout had yet to complete the requirement. Well-meaning leaders punished the scout by not giving his camping log the attention that it deserved. I awarded him with the opportunity to rest easy under canvas or stars for a few more nights. Fred's posing a false dichotomy between hewing to a literal interpretation of requirements and respecting the vicissitudes of managing camp for hundreds of scouts. Based on my experience, there is no such dichotomy. I would say that It is disrespectful to turn a blind eye when camp MBC's replace requirements for the sake of claiming that their students completed the badge. That implies that we think they are somehow second-tier counselors. Most camps want to know that this happens. Most staff want to be thorough counselors. And, most camps want constructive feedback from SMs and other adults. Letting them know a valid partial is better than a sketchy blue card gives them the freedom to make trustworthy reports. It is disrespectful to fault adults' for poor procedure, then ignore the truth underlying their actions. It's easy to proceed efficiently and gloss over truth. It's hard when you realize that you have to draw the line, and no matter where you draw it, someone will be slighted. It is disrespectful to scouts to let them think that they can take someone else's observations as their own. That someone else may one day be an authoritarian leader who, showing that the moon has fallen in a mill pond, arranges a special military operation to save it. In my situation, even though the scout and parent are still happily engaged in our troop, I keep asking myself, "Can we do better?" We have a dozen very ambitious 1st year scouts (and a few who are in it for kicks), and everyone is trying to do right by them and set the proper tone. But I know that, with regard to the many moving parts of advancement, we are going to trip up somewhere. I'm just hoping that when we do, parents will be patient with us and expect the best from their scouts. ☀️FYI, a beautiful new moon lingered overhead until mid-morning today! 🌘 If only I could add the urban grape arbor that framed it!

I stand corrected. None of the 15 (or more?) boys who joined this year were Lions. About 10 were crossovers from one AoL den. Regarding "Family Scouting", esp. for pre-K and K ... When they were wee little, we took our kids camping regularly (much to Mrs. Q's chagrin). Babysitting cousins were paid in food and a weekend away from their parents! Even after adjusting for inflation, such an excursion was much less than the registration fee. One friend at church arranged a camping weekend with international families. Other organizations may do the same or similar. BSA is not going to crack that market share. In PA, they are running up against state parks who have excellent programs for families that age. That said, there were some state parks with impertinent neighbors, and we hadn't gained the maturity to know that park rangers are there for those of us who like peace and quiet late in the evening.

To amplify @Eagle1993’s observation, we were swarmed with crossovers in February, and very few were lions. Since then we have had roughly one new scout a month, some were never cubs, some quit while bears, some were waiting to cross over. Lions, while a nice service for parents who don’t know how to arrange play dates, is having little influence on retention of middle school youth.

That’s an okay protest. But I think she can do better. Here’s what I would do … Get some dark blue fabric and stitch into a “star chart” medallion. Sew/paint the local horizon around the edges, as if laying down looking up. Get some phosphorescent thread and sew images of the moon as observed unaided on four days in the same week. Sew this temporary insignia on the back of the sash as a memento of her scouting experience this year. Obviously, this is a suggestion that would have suited my talents at the time. She could whittle/3D print a neckerchief slide of her observations, stamp a leatherwork belt buckle, etc … The only way to protest being denied an award is to demonstrate having done the requirement as written and then refuse to complete the partial.

@nolesrule, I can respect how this feels like your scout caught the hot potato. But, if indeed other scouts were shortchanged of actual scouting for three years because of misguided intentions of very nice camp staff, she’s the one that’s coming out ahead in this. I wish her well in her observations of the moon (as soon as God grants her four clear nights/mornings in a week), and may it lead her to a lifetime of noting our sky’s wanderers!

Hope the interview went well. If I were you, I’d wear the pin and your square knot on your uniform for the parade. But, the parade organizers might have a specific “look” in mind. That might include your MB sash as well. Remember to not forget the most important part of a scout’s uniform: his smile!