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Eagle Scout Letters of Recomendation


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Hi there, maybe someone can help me out.

 

I am currently working towards Eagle, I have the ES workbook completed with all of my signatures and photos for my project that was completed about 5 months ago apprasied at $300,000. I have the final paperwork to do before my EBoR and my best friend who is my SM's son finished his project last year and then started working on the letters of recomendation. He printed a form out that was in the letter form and sent them out. My question is on the workbook (pg.16 ver.2008) the 12 steps to Eagle (number six)"The council advancement comittee or its designee contacts the references on the ESRA by letter,form, or telephone checklist." and to include the refences on your application. So who is right and then is there a specific form letter that I need to send out or is the Council Advancement Comittee going to contact my references????

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The project was a retaining wall made of keystone blocks that protected the rear of a restroom facility at our local state park that would get flooded when the monsoonal storms came in and flooded the inner building. They were stacked in a stair fashion from 3ft to 5 ft and then with the help of my friend who is a welder put together a guardrailing using 2in aluminum railing with paint and primer that then had to be reinforced with re-bar about 13in down into the block itself. Then the front of the building was a steep slope of dirt rising to meet the concrete slab the bathroom facility was built on. With the help of my contracter who donated all of his time helping me finish the project leveled off the slope in a terrace and then placed keystone block at the start of the landing and backfilled the rest with river rock and cement (6 steps). At the end of the project I ended up using 300 keystone blocks, 45 ft. of railing, over 8 tons of bedding sand and 1,500lbs of mortar cement with a total of 213 hours of work. The Arizona State Park that the project was completed had a county appraisor come out along with the building inspector for the state parks and had the addition to the bathroom facilities apprasied at $300,000.00

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That is an awesome project.

 

As for your question, there is a bit more than what you have listed on the Life to Eagle workbook:

 

When the completed application is received at the council service center, its contents will be verified and the references contacted. The Scout shall have listed six references (five if no employer, and parent if no organized religious association). The council advancement committee or its designee contacts the references on the Eagle Scout Rank Application by letter, form, or telephone checklist. (The council determines the method or methods to be used.) The candidate should have contacted those individuals listed as references before including their names on the application. If desired by the council, the candidate may be asked to deliver a blank reference form and envelopes to the listed references. The candidates should not be involved personally in transmitting any correspondence between persons listed as references and the council service center or advancement committee. If the initial reference letter or form is not returned to the council in a timely manner, the council advancement committee must make direct contact with the reference(s) listed on the Eagle Scout Rank Application on its own, by follow-up letter, phone contact, or other methods as it chooses. The candidate shall not be required to make a follow-up contact with the reference or submit other reference names. A Scout cannot have a board of review denied or postponed because the council office or council advancement committee does not

receive the reference letter forms he delivered.

 

The key point in your case is- "the candidate may be asked to deliver a blank reference form and envelopes to the listed references. The candidates should not be involved personally in transmitting any correspondence between persons listed as references and the council service center or advancement committee."

 

So you could use his template, and give it along with a envelop address to who ever your EBoR wishes. You are to have no contact with the completed references, and you need to ask the people who want to give the references if they are willing to.

 

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lierazs,

 

Welcome to the forum.

 

I'd have you and your SM talk to your local District Advancement Chairman. We can tell you what BSA says, and how our own Councils/Districts implement, but you need what is local to you!

 

I would, though, get the following people working on at least deciding what they want to say or write:

- Parents.

- Pastor or faith leader.

- Academic (EagleSon used his band director, who'd had daily contact with him for 4 years)

- Scoutmaster.

- Employer if you have one.

 

Beyond that, go to the NESA website; pull down the current Eagle app. Sadly, they don't let you save the material (one of the bigger boners imho). You may want to snapshot the app and paste it onto Publisher or powerpoint as an underlayer, then use text boxes to fill in.

 

Good hunting, let us know how you get there.

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liperazs,

I assume you are in the Grand Canyon Council. They do ask that you provide the letters of recomendation. Providing the letters makes the District Advancement Committee's job much simpler. In the GCC most of the work on the Eagle application process is handled at the district level. Use the forms they have on their Eagle Process webpage, it includes form letters of reference. Also their Excel spreadsheet Eagle Application is helpful and checks for some of the errors that are common on Eagle Applications. I highly recommend it over the PDF application on NESA. If you can, provide them a copy of the application on a CD along with a copy of your workbook. Being able to print out extra copies for the EBOR helps them.

So, do you need to do all of this? No. But a scout is helpful. You will find that whether it is an Eagle Scout Application, college application or a job application the more of the ground work you handle the more likely you will be successful. Right or wrong, submitting an Eagle packet to the District Advancement Committee with the attitude that "Checking the references is your job" may result in a more rigorous EBOR than you desire.(This message has been edited by jet526)

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Providing the letters makes the District Advancement Committee's job much simpler.

 

A true statement. But I find it annoying that the committee needs their job simplified by piling a task that is truly the committee's responsibility on the Scout.

 

Ed Mori

1 Peter 4:10

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Ed,

 

I've been around a day too long to ever say never.

 

This young man dug his own hole; he properly should make a supreme effort to get out of it, now and forever. Will he? That's totally up to him. Can he do fantastic things without being an Eagle Scout? Yes, but again, that's totally up to him.

 

The cautionary here to youth is we expect you to walk the walk.

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