For Scouters who were Scouts or Scouters when Cooking was Eagle Required

[John-in-KC]

First off, I'm assuming what BW said is true. As a consequence: Either with 2009 Requirements or 2010 Requirements, Cooking MB will return to the Eagle Required List.

 

This is for those, who like me, were either Scouts when Cooking had a silver border (think 1969 or so for me), or were Scouters before National took it off the list. My vision is we share experiences. My goal is we look at how we made sure the youth had opportunity to do the cooking needed.

 

I remember a lot of cooking: Scout Camp as well as 3 summers backpacking. So, cooking was in a way like Camping MB: You assembled the experiences you had.

 

For me, unit cooking is a way to lower the cost of camp, and to increase the quality of food delivered. Less staff to pay is the short version. Having the Cooking MB overcomes one of the really big objections to unit cooking: It's an elemental part of the program, again.

 

What do you think? What do you see? How did you do it years ago? How can we adapt if this change is real?(This message has been edited by John-in-KC)

[NJCubScouter]

I was a Scout at the time Cooking (and Camping) MB were taken off the required list (1972-3.) I have both with the silver border, although I ended up not making Eagle. Moving ahead 35 years, my son has earned Cooking MB as a non-required badge. One thing that I think has changed is that the cooking requirements that my son had to pass for Tenderfoot, Second Class and First Class seem much more intensive than they were when I was a Scout. If a Scout has passed the cooking requirements for those ranks, there is not much additional that they need to do for the merit badge. (I seem to recall that my son had to do one thing he hadn't done before, but I don't remember what it was.)

 

The point is that by the time a Scout is First Class, the BSA seems to expect that they have "know" cooking and have done it, more than once. In my son's troop, that is a natural outgrowth of the program anyway. If the boys are going on camping trips, they are getting experience in cooking, and these activities are signed off for the corresponding requirements of the "lower" ranks and the Cooking MB. I think most of the boys get the Cooking MB as a matter of course, as a non-required badge for Star or Life.

 

So, unless they make the requirements for Cooking MB considerably more difficult, putting it back on the required list probably would not make much difference, at least in our troop.

[John-in-KC]

Watching my own son do his T-2-1 cooking, I came to a different conclusion:

 

The inclusion of any cooking at Tenderfoot was a change.

 

The 2d class requirement was made different: I had to do my cooking without utensils.

 

First Class was about the same: Cook for a day.

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I'll have to recover my old MB pam and crosswalk then (1969-70) to now (2008) to see what differences are.

[Eagle69]

As a SM cooking is one of the things we have really tried to get the boys involved in and have them learn. We see the long term benefits of it even after they get out of scouts. I think bringing it back as a required Merit Badge is a great idea. You have to start out setting the example yourself by cooking good meals and hoping the boys look at what you are eating and what they are eating and think you eat better. This sets the hook where you can start teaching. You may have to monitor patrol menus and force the issue that way by vetoing canned chili, etc. As for the idea of cooking at Summer Camp instead of a chow hall, I think you have to offer both options. In our council they started out with Patrol/Troop cooking, but after numerous surveys showed the troops didn't want it they switched. Summer Camp is for having fun and getting needed advancement and most troops didn't want to have to fool with cooking. This week would be a horrible week here to be at camp and have to cook with temps hitting the 100 degree mark for real temperature and heat indexes higher than that.

[GKlose]

I joined in May '71, and earned the bulk of 1/C by that fall. Honestly, I don't remember the cooking requirements (I've ordered, for the sake of nostalgia, an old handbook via amazon.com). By the time I was working on Star+, I was on the new handbook, dressed with my red beret I don't know when Cooking MB was taken off the Eagle-required list, but I think it was gone by the '72 requirements.

[eagle90]

I earned my Eagle in 1964 when Cooking was required (along with Safety, Nature, Soil & water Conservation, Public Health) I have always thought cooking should be required, as it is a lifetime skill one will always need. At some point in your life, be it college, post college, on your own, widowed, divorced, etc. a boy will have to fend for himself and cook a meal. And for the most part, the scouts enjoy cooking a camp meal. I just did 17 SM conferences for rank advancements while at camp, and for at least a dozen of them, their favorite part of camp was the day they were head cook.

 

[Gonzo1]

John-in-KC,

I earned Eagle in 1980, and cooking was optional. But, we had Skill Awards and like you, nearly everyone earned Cooking MB by assembling the parts like Camping MB.

I wish they would bring back Skill Awards, it would mean more practice and instant recognition.

 

Gonzo

[GKlose]

I just ordered, and received, a couple of old handbooks via amazon.com. One of them is the 1969 printing of the 7th edition. In it, Cooking is a required MB. I also know from personal experience that the 1972 8th edition had removed it. I also remember that Environmental Science was added, in favor of Soil and Water Conservation, and options were added for some required MBs (e.g., Lifesaving or Emergency Preparedness).

 

Guy

[WAKWIB]

I suppose one of the big differences between Scout cooking in the '60s and '70s versus today is the difference in the primary cooking tool....heat. "Back in the day" it was all done with wood fires. I cannot recall a single campout meal prepared on a gas stove when I was a Scout. Now probably every troop uses stoves frequently. In some ways it is much easier and cleaner, but to me it seems like a fire offers a little more versatility. It's kind of hard for me to envision somebody roasting a chicken on a spit over a Coleman two-burner stove.

[NJCubScouter]

GKlose, you are correct. Cooking was required prior to the 1972 handbook but was taken off at that time. (As was Camping, but I believe Camping was made required again in the 1979 handbook.) I happen to have been looking at my Scout Progress Record Book (copyright 1972) the other day, so I have just pulled it out again and can tell you that the Eagle-required MB's were First Aid, the 3 Citizenships, Communications, Personal Management, Environmental Science, Safety, Emergency Preparedness or Lifesaving, and Personal Fitness or Swimming or Sports. So, since then they have added back Camping, added Family Life, deleted Safety, made Personal Fitness non-optional, and replaced Sports with Hiking or Cycling. I find it interesting that the 1972 handbook had 10 required MB's out of a total of 24 to make Eagle, while now it is 12 out of 21. It will also be interesting to see what changes they make in the near future (and personally it will be interesting for me to see how the changes affect a certain Life Scout I know, who has a year and a couple of months to get (as of now) 2 required MB's plus the little matter of a project which is not yet even a gleam in the eye.)

[Kudu]

If you look carefully at the 1972 handbook, you will see that ALL requirements that involve camping were made optional. In other words you could advance from Tenderfoot all the way to Eagle without ever once going camping.

 

It was in this context that the "Leadership Development Method" and its unholy spawn "Junior Leader Training" were invented:

 

In general, Patrol Leader training should concentrate on leadership skills rather than on Scoutcraft Skills. The Patrol will not rise and fall on the Patrol Leader's ability to cook, follow a map, or do first aid, but it very definitely depends on his leadership skill (1972 Scoutmaster's Handbook, page 155).

 

Kudu

 

[croushorn]

Fantastic news! This one act alone will cause much more planning and attention to cooking meals than we have encountered over the years. It will force older Scouts to come to actual campouts again! I am ecstatic to hear this! What reasons do we currently have to do patrol cooking vs. troop or adult cooking? or more sight-seeing trips with resturants versus actual camping! For many troops that is their 'normal' campout! Wonderful news.

I came up right after the '72 reqs but had to earn the Skill Awards. I don't know all the differences right now without really digging in, but we didn't have gas stoves or ever use charcoal, good old wood fires everytime. I am trying to get cooking MB added back to our summer camp program, it was a shame they don't offer it. This only give me more ammo! YAHOO!

[packsaddle]

I think it will be a good thing to add 'Cooking MB' back to the requirements. It was required back when I was a scout (Eagle in 1965) and I thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact I remember a friendly competition among our patrols for the best meals...and they were really good too. Perhaps the reinclusion will bring back some of that interest. One can only hope and work hard to set an example that will instruct the boys on how it's done.

[shortridge]

Forgive my skepticism, but just requiring the badge doesn't mean the program will improve.

 

Alas, for many car-camping troops, cooking is something done with giant coolers, propane tanks and big chunky two-burner Coleman stoves. Break out the canned foods - weight isn't a problem in a trailer, after all - and cook like you would on a range at home. Cooking over a campfire? Umm... hot dogs and foil dinners. Dutch oven cooking? Well, you've got to be at least Wood Badge-trained to touch the Scoutmaster's personal dutch oven for fear you'll mess it up, so just sit back and watch, sonny.

 

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Kudu,

 

I just lost my lunch when I read that. That quote's from the parody edition, right? Good grief.

 

(BTW, I love the use of the phrase "unholy spawn.")

 

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Gonzo1,

 

I recently read the 8th Edition handbook trying to understand how the skill awards worked and fit into the program, and ended up being utterly confused by the whole thing.

 

Is there also not concern that the skill awards are too similar to Cub Scout belt loops, and thus tend to make Boy Scouting just an extension of the Cub program, rather than something separate and different?

[GKlose]

I don't know this for sure, but my guess is that national was so enamored of the belt loop idea that when they dropped BS skill awards they made sure the concept was used somewhere else. To my knowledge, the CS belt loops didn't exist in the '67-'71 era (which is when I went through cubs).