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Trail to First Class


SN95GT50

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Interesting analogy, John. I'll continue it and note that the fellow driving 90 as well as the guy driving 30 are both endangering the rest of us who are going with the general flow.

 

I got you beat, UC. I was an Eagle at 13 and a half. Then did much of the same stuff you list -- Philmont, jamboree, OA officer, religious emblem, palms -- rolled over to ASM at 18, attended troop meetings during breaks from college and served a year or so as a real ASM after college. My SM had to pry my fingers from the scout hut door jamb the night of my last troop meeting before I moved away to take a new job.

 

But you and I were the exception then, and that track is a great exception now. Most 14-y.o. Eagles may hang on for a year or two through middle school and maybe a year of high school before moving on to other things. Many are gone the day you hand their mom the medal. Some guys will stick with the program because a particular element has a strong appeal to them (OA, high adventure, general camping). But except for OA, a 15- or 16-y.o. Eagle Scout can do bigger and better on his own with his family and/or friends than he can in Scouts -- and without two dozen 11 and 12 year-olds tagging along.

 

The Scouting program requires a lot of moving parts to keep older guys interested -- fun outings, challenging adventure, leadership opportunities, big events like jamboree or NOAC and a critical mass of same-age friends. Advancement is a key component and one of the few boys can't find outside Scouting. If they grab that carrot too early, you've lost one of your prime tools for keeping older boys engaged in the troop.

 

Yeah, everyone has guys they can point to that are exceptions, like the fellows you and I look at in the mirror. But the big numbers are in the boys who don't eat, sleep and breath scouting with parents who don't really get it and see the program as just another resume building check list activity to push their son through.

 

Scouting is -- or should be -- an experience, not a process. Experience takes time. The longer you are in the program, the more you get out of it. By definition, a young man will experience more if he takes 18 to 24 months to earn First Class than if he does it in four. The fellow who earns Eagle at 16 or 17 and takes an elder statesman role in the troop will experience far more than the guy who eagles at 14 and drops out shortly there after.

 

Part of my job as SM is to help the boys get the most out of Scouting they can. One element of that is helping the scout find the right pace and helping him maximize his scouting career. Sometimes that means a kick in the pants to get him going; sometimes that means a hand on the shoulder to slow him down. We don't place artificial obstacles in the way of advancement (such as one local troop which has a set of prescribed age limits for each rank). There is more art and finesse to mentoring boys than that. The goal is to temper but not smother their enthusiasm to last seven years.

 

I have one new scout, Davie, now who has his book out for me to sign something every time I see him. The kid is a very enthusiastic Scout backed up by a rather pushy helicopter mom. After his second campout with the troop, Davie came to me to sign off on his First Class cooking requirements. He had, on the surface, been responsible for the patrol cooking for the weekend. The patrol agreed on a menu and he did the shopping. For breakfast they had pancakes and bacon. Davie was in the middle of things but so were several other guys with the troop guide there to show them when to flip each pancake. Lunch was sandwiches for which Davie laid out the fixin's but everyone made their own, and dinner was burgers, again Davie held the spatula, but the TG told him when they were ready.

 

Did he meet the requirement? By the letter of requirement, yes. Did he learn anything? Maybe how to cook pancakes, but I don't really know since he didn't do it without help. Has he mastered camp cooking? Not close. Did I sign the requirement? Not a chance.

 

Rather I referred him to Mr. Steve, an ASM who is a master outdoors chef, does all the cooking for the adults and counsels cooking MB and supervises First Class cooking. He's the only one in the troop authorized to sign-off that requirement. He doesn't have a set, one size fits all program, but he works with the Scouts based on their interest and abilities. He will probably discuss what the Scout has cooked with his patrol already and why he thinks he's ready to serve as patrol cook for a weekend. He will help the Scout develop a balanced, challenging menu, which the Scout then has to run by his patrol. He may suggest the scout cook his menu at home a time or two. If Steve is cooking something similar for the adults, he may invite the Scout to work with him. Maybe the boy cooks one of his meals for the patrol one weekend before serving as patrol cook.

 

Ultimately, what we tell our Scouts is the campout on which they complete the cooking requirement shouldn't be the first time the cook for their patrol; it should be the best time the cook for their patrol. We try to apply some variation of that to most requirements.

 

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Twocub

 

A very excellent summation of what scouting is supposed to be versus what it is becoming in too many troops today. I agree with you and commend you for your methodology in making sure your boys have the very best scouting experience possible.

 

I am sure years from now your boys will tell their kids just how much fun they had and how much they learned in scouting thanks to your efforts. Well done.

 

Oak Tree- Twocub has answered your question to me for me. I would sum it up with making sure the boys have throughly learned their scouting skills at a pace of their choosing and ability, and have had the time to enjoy all the opportunities scouting has to offer them. Not in a classroom environment, or in a MB/Eagle Mill setting which is all about the quantity and contains little quality in a just sign the boy off ASAP and who cares if he really learned the skills/badge or not and get him through Eagle.

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BadenP, thanks, I like TwoCub's post as well.

 

Your definition is pretty good, although it's not what I would think of as a "standard". Nor is it anything like what National would try to enforce if they did try to enforce something - it's a great vision of a program. Troops that don't live up to that vision, though, aren't necessarily "abusing" the requirements. There are undoubtedly troops that do the things you say, but it's one thing to say a troop isn't creating a great Scouting experience, and something else to say that they are taking the standard of "has the boy completed the requirement" and saying that that "one standard for Eagle has been altered, fudged, reinterpreted, ignored, and abused for years by troop leaders."

 

I was just curious - are there particular requirements where you see troop leaders often fudge? Some of the requirements are pretty straightforward, while others might lend themselves to creative interpretations.

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Oak Tree

 

In my past boy scout leader experience I have seen leaders sign off boys at camporees who simply put could not demonstrate the skill, a knot that was continually tied wrong, a cooking fiasco "burnt offering" that the leader signed off and said thats okay just keep practicing, etc, etc. The biggest fudging going on IMO is the Eagle Project, where boys show NO leadership, show little organizational skills, the projects themselves are sub par, and yet with mommy and daddy and a troop leader within a week a detailed project outline, an organized work force, a focused project all seem to miraculously appear out of nowhere and the boy is signed off, EBORed and submitted to council in record time.

 

The sad part is that this is becoming all too common a practice these days from what my boy scout leader friends tell me.

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