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I too used to, stress USED TO, do that. But was informed that unless the requirement specifically states you cannot use an activity for more than one requirement, you gotta accept it. I am waiting for the duel enrolled Girl Scout/Scouting America Scout to do one project for both their Gold Award and Eagle.

I had a pretty traditional Scouting experience that culminated in earning the Eagle Scout award after I had a lot of fun and finally got around to the paperwork. One of my best my friends could be described as a "Paper Eagle." He made it through the program with very little camping and had everything wrapped up by high school so he could focus more on academics. Today, he's a professor at a prestigious university and travels the world to present his research. He is absolutely someone we'd want to represent the program. Scouting just means different things to different people and we all have to be OK with that for the BSA to survive.

@Eagle94-A1 is right. For advancement, read BSA/SA Guide To Advancement. https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/pdf/33088.pdf Section 4.2.3.6 Fulfilling More Than One Requirement With a Single Activity "At times it may be appropriate for a Scout to apply what was done to meet one requirement toward the completion of another." Your situation is also explicitly answered. "Some requirements may have the appearance of aligning, but upon further examination differ. These seemingly similar requirements usually have nuances intended to create quite different experiences. The Communication and Citizenship in the Community merit badges are a good example. Each requires the Scout to attend a public meeting, but that is where the similarity ends. For Communication, the Scout is asked to practice active listening skills during the meeting and present an objective report that includes all points of view. For Citizenship in the Community, the Scout is asked to examine differences in opinions and then to defend one side. The Scout may attend the same public meeting, but to pass the requirements for both merit badges the Scout must actively listen and prepare a report, and also examine differences in opinion and defend one side."

The argument around this sort of thing is odd. The standard is the standard. 21 MB, so many camping nights, pass the swim test, etc ... right? This is sort of a like the old school adage that A's may pay, but C's get degrees. For the scout that goes above and beyond, fantastic, but it does not redefine the standard. The kid that does just the standard is just as much an eagle scout as any other eagle scout.

I LOVED Scouting as a youth and always figured I'd be a hands-on parent / leader - attending Roundtables, serving on committees, staffing district events, etc. I'm happy to be a Den Leader as long as my son and his friends are having fun. If he decides to continue with Scouts, I'll support the Troop, but don't have the enthusiasm I once had. I think the change comes down to three things: Scouting is in a death loop and I can feel it. Look no further than this message board. I used to lurk here 10 years ago and it felt like there was double the amount of activity (mods, can you confirm?). As a youth, I met a lot of neat people through Scouting. I always figured I'd see those people on the trail with their own kids, but many have either moved away from my mid-size city or don't have kids in the program. I'm terrified of liability and have no desire to attend overnight events with some of the poorly behaved kids in our Pack (even though most of the kids and families are great). My son loves basketball. Our town has recently won state championships in basketball, baseball, and hockey. These programs are pillars of our community. It's very different than when I was a kid and we played organized sports 1x per week at the YMCA. As for my local council, I know they have their challenges, but I've received sufficient support since re-joining as an adult. I even have a text chain with my DE. He's very responsive and makes me feel valued. I can only imagine how some of you feel when you're not getting ample support from your local professionals.

This is from a FB post...

Motorboating and Water Skiing merit badges have been around for a long time. They are part of the program because in many parts of the country they are things that kids *do* experience, and nation benefits from them learning to do it safely. But when a camp program tries to be all things to all people with limited staff, the aquatics director needs to dig heels in and limit the programs offered.

I just checked the national map of councils which appears to have been updated 4 Dec 2024 (but does not reflect the realignment of Bay Lakes in WI and MCC in Michigan). That map shows 244 councils. If the settlement documents are binding to any degree that means we're probably looking at a council reduction of at least 100, the low end is at the floor of expectations right? If we look at the cost savings, Scouting America saves anywhere between 18 million and 28 million a year just on council executive salaries (average salary seems to be around 200k) when they merge these councils. This is some EXTREMELY low hanging fruit to find money for program for the scouts. This is just CE money we would save, we don't have good visibility on what council registrars, camping directors, etc ... make those are also all de duplicated roles in a council merger.

This is allowed. It was brought up as an option for Cub Scouts units when I did BALOO, so I looked more into it. We did this on a campout this past fall. Stayed at a council camp and council provided archery range masters for us. Scouts loved it. Being at a council camp makes it a council event for G2SS purposes. Council also had kayaks at the camp, so was able to arrange for a day for Webelos and AOLs to go kayaking. I think these type of things makes Cub Scouting so much better.

I have heard from inside sources, that 2 large factors in Scout Executive pay are fundraising results and size of staff they manage. This creates a perfect self-fulfilling prophecy. You have to hire more people to fundraise the money that you want. Then when you fundraise enough, you can hire even more people. Then those people can go fundraise even more which repeats the cycle. Unfortunately, this cycle will break down, it is just a question which link breaks first.

The bad thing is that in some areas the paid scouters are running out the volunteers because they question what is going on. By the time they get to the 50+ years old with their kids out of the unit level stuff, they have seen enough of the districts and councils to ask "why do we do this like this?" Many times it's not a slam, just an honest question. The paid scouters get mad and see it as rebellion then they start over reacting to things.

You probably have three things working against you: 1. Memorabilia worth in dollars is cyclical, not linear. Councils have tended to over-produce patches. So there’s a glut. 2. People like me give old patches away to young scouts. We don’t care if you’d pay a grand for it. If you aren’t hiking and camping with us and we haven’t seen your Scout Spirit IRL, you ain’t getting it. 3. I personally invest time sharing my values to scouts. They grow up and become hard customers. (Just try selling anything to my adult children.) I’m sure others are like me. We work for smiles. If there’s an opportunity to put a smile on a face instead of a dollar in a pocket, I’m in.

One wonders with the membership loss trends, could you see the value of patches follow it. I don't mean recent trends, but the multi-decade trends. There used to be a patch dealer who had a page that did "industry year in review" over many years. I haven't seen it in a few, but that would be the way to see some real trends. Also, like baseball cards, once you get into the mid '80's, patches started to be made for the collector in mind vs. just being made and it becoming collectable.

What's up with the delay in Eagle Certificates? If they are waiting for the president's signature, why not use the one form the previous term? And if it is a design issue, why were they not updated when the medals and patches were updated. Those have been available for some time now.

I find it amusing that the stuff that cannot be easily made, i.e. patches and medals, have been done and out for a while, but the item that can be easily laser printed we are waiting on.

"If you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don't have integrity, nothing else matters." Senator Alan K. Simpson (1931-2025) Scout Salute and Farewell

It has never come up to me in conversation, but why not ? BUGLE as the instrument in the MUSIC Merit Badge req.#1. and #4b........

council: your troop has paying members, well "nothing to see here"

Agreed. I think BSA was hoist by its own petard on this one. The focus of Summer Camp is, generally, the merit badge program. This is a mistake, because it turned the focus to Advancement. And then, to do it on the cheap, camps hire 15 & 16 year olds to teach MBs, when this inherently violates the "spirit" of what the MB program is about. (This is where you can go down the rabbit hole of the responsibilities of unit leaders and "actual" merit badge counselors as well...) Summer Camp is a "pay your fee, get your degree." operation. On the whole, we have a huge integrity problem when it comes to Summer Camps and the Merit Badge program. Parents, Scouts staffs, unit leaders, paid professionals, National... all complicit. This is one of our biggest "dirty little secrets." I used to work with Scouts after camp to go through their MBs and ask them how they completed the requirements. Many, many times, I got the answer "Oh, we didn't do that one." or "My counselor said we didn't have to do that." or some such response. After working with Scouts to correct, I filed quite a few of these: https://filestore.scouting.org/filestore/pdf/512-800_WB.pdf Know what became of them? Nothing... ignored

One reason why my troop is still alive: we DO stuff. Except for 2 members, all of my Scouts transferred from other troops. And one of the 2 had brothers who transferred into the troop. Sad thing is this: it can be very, VERY (emphasis) discouraging for some Scouts who see the 'Paper Eagles" I cannot tell you how many times in the past few years I have seen Scouts discouraged and not want to earn Eagle, because of "paper Eagles." Sadly I have met too many folks that believe summer camp/ merit badge weekends/etc are "purchasing" MBs.

They know who the "academic" or "paper" Eagle Scouts are, too. "If the minimums weren't good enough, they wouldn't be the minimums." I do not like that way of doing business, but the world is full of folks who accept that currency.

They figure all of us that endured the ISP effort of the 70's have maybe forgotten. (We have not) Even as a youth we fully understood it was a fiasco. I got my Eagle (had to accelerate the process) under the "Old" requirements. On camp staff a few years later there were Old Eagles and New Eagles. Even though they camped and were actually on staff, there was still the pecking order. Scouts can easily read and understand requirements. They see that much of the advancement now is focused on classroom and less on experiential learning. Youth want action, not more school. Go and DO

Thank you. That was a nice video. I had to look up the membership numbers for myself: BLC membership has decreased from 22,600 in 2017 to 8,000 in 2023 (-65%). MCC membership has decreased from 57,000 in 2017 to 25,200 in 2023 (-56%). National membership has decreased from 2,167,800 in 2017 to 981,600 in 2023 (-65%). So while the MCC has lost fewer members on a relative basis, the BLC's situation appears no worse than what the rest of the country has experienced.

In the interview, based on info from former SE of Hiawathaland: - National forced them to merge as they believed small councils cannot succeed They joined Bay Lakes as it was in good shape Bay Lakes has been in decline since (membership & financials) They joined MCC Camp Hiawatha no longer in jeopardy due to scouting council realignment

My guess that if National funded councils 100% there would be a lot of DOGEing happening to reduce the number of councils. 😉

That is it 100% in our council. Waaay less Scouts and units, waaaaay more staff. There are districts that 40 years ago were massive, they broke those into 3 or 4 districts, overall same geography but far less scouts and 3 times the number of DE's. The structure is like IBM of the 70's, layer upon layer. DE reports to a senior DE who reports to a Field Director who reports to a Are Director who reports to some sort of Council Operations person who I think reports to the Deputy SE who then reports to the SE sorry CEO. The poor rangers at camp have like 5 professional from various levels / areas giving direction. Raise money and hire more people to raise money

Yep. That is basically what happened. It is my understanding they were cost neutral to the council. Not a drain. My guess was that someone was trying to simply Bay-Lakes to do another merger on the south side, but that doesn’t seem to be happening.

😬 I was terrified of the waterfront as a young scout because all of the counselors kept screaming at kids for simple things like switching seats in a rowboat or accidentally letting an old oar touch the ground. I'm surprised the BSA even allows motorboats - especially considering there are so many fun man-powered options that kids don't often get to experience (canoes, kayaks, row boats, pedal boats, inflatables, etc.).

In my council all of the donation haggling seems to be done by the DE's and BOD. Might be different in other councils. My council was a total burning ship 5ish years ago based on 990 numbers. I know my CE is good at getting donations in, but I don't think he's doing it himself, I think his method is work other people to work other people.

I don’t think merging councils reduces the work of the registrar. From a unit “customer service” standpoint, the registrar is the last place I’d look to save money. Now camping director, director of funding, etc, sure. Rangers, DEs, and registrars make my unit go round. The rest, I hope they are proving their value. I can’t tell as directly.

236 End of January

Do not know about staff size, but guarantee that fundraising is a factor.

Our Council got pretty tight about that stuff. They tried to hang some of our adults out to dry for having a multiple unit campout, (just like we had been having for YEARS) without the Council permission. They went right down the YPT route and accused leaders of violating YPT policies for something that NONE of us knew existed. They even used it as part of the grounds for why they revoked a member's registration. No incidents happened, they just wanted to prove a point that they could do that. Then they started getting pushback from others and they started doing "awareness" in the Council to make sure people knew about it. How convenient they left out the fact they used that as grounds to dismiss a member.

My council is a culture of cash is king. The professional motto is ABF - Always Be Fundraising. Everything the council puts out on any platform are the council sponsored events. If they are not able to monetize something (like promote a unit doing a cool outing or a unit providing good service) they do not care. Quite actually more than 1/2 of the paid employees in the council are "Development" or "Marketing" staff. Now you might think marketing is promoting the program, nope, it's about marketing fundraising. Any DE, when they are hired, the description of duties in the announcement first reads leading FOS, popcorn, and camp cards. Oh, maybe recruiting and unit growth, but that is waaaaaay down the list. My council operates with this question: "Do we raise money to have Scouting - OR - Do we have Scouting to be able to raise money?". They are 100% focused in the latter part of this question.

My issue is that they advertised it as a "winter camping experience"...and while I understand the risk, there is also preparation that goes into it and if a family couldn't prepare for the cold, I would think that common sense would tell them to come for the day and not the overnighter. Either way, for those units/families do did prepare (money spent on gear/food), there wasn't even an option to stay overnight. Small marines...that's a stretch. But I understand the exaggeration.

wind chills no zero possible on a webelow this is a Webelos event I am glad they canceled the overnight. Look at activity level differences between Webelos and scouts. While temp is not a directly listed thing, common sense comes in here. I would be questioning taking a new scout out also. One error in clothing , sleeping bag or a list of many things could cause one kid to become hypothermic it's putting kids at risk they are not small marines.

Yes. There is a document in the lawsuit that proposes a significant reduction in councils, something like 100-150. A small council that provides quality service will meet their finance goals. I know a council that is having membership issues, but they provide quality service to their members, and their financial goals are exceeded. Contrast to another council I know that has membership growth, but poor customer service. I cannot tell you how much they lost donations, but it is significant. One district's goal is 5.3% of what is was 20 years ago when adjusted for inflation.

I will absolutely not be participating in this phenomenon. Facts exist and they matter, period. You ignore them at your own peril. Pretending that things are one way (pravda) when they are plainly another (istina) is the root of the rot that always ruins whatever our (Swedish perspective) only remaining enemy to the east does. Just look at Karelia, and inversely the Baltic countries now compared to USSR times. If you want things to work in your country, citizens need to know what is actually happening in it and how things work on a nuts and bolts causal level, not what some high-level politician wants to be true or wants you to pretend to be the case so they can defraud your state. I can't control other people, but I will absolutely not pretend that the sky is green because it's inconvenient to someone else that it's blue. I don't care how out of touch or elitist that might seem to other people, for me that is a basic act of patriotism and cultural identity. I am of a people that doesn't operate on parallel political and factual truths. One of our defining cultural traits is that we operate on factual truth only. This might sound a little harsh, and in a sense it is but it's not directed towards you. I just grew up knowing that I would be the target of political propaganda and that a country that did not wish us well was trying to convince citizens that they should give up resistance so that they could take over our country and suck all the resources out of it too, like they already have the territory they control. I've thought about the importance of seeking and confirming truth for a very long time, in several political time periods and in different countries with and without political censorship and repression. In addition, I have a religious obligation to never give up trying to see reality as it is in order to help other people. If you give up truth and respect for the equal intrinsic value and dignity of each human being, it doesn't matter how slick your talk is, it's all going to go sideways in the end. Convincing other of something is all fine and good, but what's the point if you don't make sure to be right first?

@skeptic, with all due respect, Truth and Knowledge are not personal opinions. "Referring youth back to family" makes a lot of sense when it comes to religion, but not this fiasco. If the scout's parents are getting their news from X/TikTok/QAnon or any of a number of other worthless information sources then all you're doing is keeping the scouts confused. What makes for an informed opinion? A bit of skepticism is certainly good. So is humility. I'd say play the devil's advocate on any issue they're interested in and show them how to come to their own answers. The bigger problem I see is that fear is freezing people from doing the right thing. They're afraid they're the only one that isn't so sure, so to be safe they're just going to go along. That's the problem. Democracy doesn't work when a lot of people are afraid to speak their mind. Your job is to teach them about truth and knowledge as well as bravery, humility, and kindness. Unfortunately this isn't just scouts. The best example is that Congress is frozen. Half of them think they can't do anything because they don't have the votes and the other half think they can't do anything because they're afraid they'll be voted out. I suspect the truth is that there are a fair number of people that voted for this administration but didn't vote for what's going on. Those people are the ones that hold all the power, if only they'd find the confidence to talk about their concerns. If only Congress would talk to them then, who knows, Congress might become a third co-equal branch of the government. Novel idea, no? For all the others, a bunch are getting what they voted for and I have no sympathy for what's happening to them. For those that didn't vote for this administration it's time to play the cards that were dealt. You say you don't remember a time when things were this "muddled and frozen by blind opinion?" Sure you do. You grew up in one such period. Civil rights. Vietnam. A lot of people were really sure about things until they started asking questions. Even then, the complexity of what was going on was much more than people realized. How many decades did it take to quit blaming vets? Anyone that thinks history is simple is not paying attention. I think we shouldn't whitewash our history. Just like scouts growing from making mistakes and learning from them so does society.

So you you may have remembered I was depressed because it seemed one of my Scouts had given up. He had about 2 weeks before 18 and still needed a projected and 3 MBs. HE MADE IT! (And yes, I am shouting with joy!) He was able to get his project approved and completed within 10 days. Even had a nice write up about it too. As fro the MBs, he was able to find his paperwork from his old troop on one of them, one was finished at the meeting, and one was finished right before getting everything approved for BOR. He had the paperwork, but could not find it in time for the meeting. Just waiting for the EBOR. And we may be growing We had 2 Scouts visit this past month, and two more are scheduled to visit this week. Life is good.

Show me a Life Scout who cannot develop Eagle project ideas and I will show you a scout with limited community service. Consider 17 year old Life Scout Bowden Warren who is also a member of Newton Grove Fire and Rescue (NC) and his words to Newton Grove Town Board. “I’m here to propose my Eagle Scout project plan. This will be a significant enhancement to the Newton Grove emergency helicopter landing zone that we, the Newton Grove Fire and Rescue, use. This project is designed to help improve the safety, visibility and accessibility of the area, ensuring it meets modern standards for helicopter landings. Based on my experience as a member of Newton Grove Fire and Rescue, I’ve seen first hand the need to improve this existing location, which at this time, is just an open grass lot that we have to use. There are some safety concerns that are due to limited lighting and unmarked power lines. There have been some close calls when landing helicopters. In the last 12 months, per last year’s call volume, we averaged more than one Life Flight per month from the Newton Grove emergency landing zone, which has increased. The logistics of Newton Grove, as each of you know, we’re an agriculture community. We have a major interstate with highways that intersect, and we are growing an industrial area as well. I believe this validates the need of having a more permanent and upgraded emergency landing zone. If you support this plan, the construction would include land preparation, electrical work and pouring a concrete pad that would be encased by a decorative perimeter. It would also have a sidewalk to access the service road, which is located off of Mount Olive Highway on East Weeksdale Street. Based on the projected expenses of this project being around $40,000, I plan to reach out to the Newton Grove community as well as local businesses to help with funding for this project. I hope each of you see this project as a major asset to the town and surrounding communities, as much as I do.” Response from Mayor and more at source: https://www.clintonnc.com/news/103506/n-grove-helipad-gets-green-light

I sure wish it did because I would submit a FOYA request to see the data used to restructure the whole organization from American Indian Activities to allowing young ladies to become Boy Scouts to all of this DEI boulderdash.

I got an email on Friday titled Monthly Renewal Information with a list of everyone whose is scheduled to expire on August 31. Those parents should have also received notification on Friday, and I will be contacting them individually to be sure they did receive it and to confirm their status for the upcoming pack year.

Admittedly, the online Den Resources Guide looks good, but I did have to chuckle at the "no printed book because that is a cost to bear to deliver the program and we're trying to remove these barriers", and yet, if your pack requires the full uniform for each Cub: Lion $74 (tshirt, cap, belt, neckerchief, slide) Tiger $130+ (field uniform, socks, council patch, pack numbers, world scouting movement patch, cap, neckerchief, slide - extra if you want standalone shorts, new Cub needs belt etc, slightly less for girls as the girls roll-up pants or skort are cheaper than the switchback pants) Wolf $44 (cap, neckerchief, slide) + field uniform if required Bear $44 (cap, neckerchief, slide) + field uniform if required Webelos $54 (cap, neckerchief, slide, adventure colors) + field uniform if required Arrow of Light $138 (field uniform, belt, shoulder loops, non-Webelos slide - $171 if green shorts also wanted) assuming Webelos hat, neckerchief, colors, and shirt patches can be carried over from blue field uniform) So, if your cub needs the entire uniform for all 6 years, you're looking at a minimum of nearly $500 in outfitting costs, plus extra for when they grow out of the field uniform shirt and pants along the way... Plus new handbooks every year. A scout is thrifty 🤪

@MaleficentStitchSounds like a council run activity to me. Even if it is "designed" for a single troop, it sounds like you are good. Now, if you rented the camp / range and provided the properly trained people, it would be a bit more on the line for me. Since they staff it, seems pretty clear you are still good.

Definitely Council staffed. We have to pay council in advance for shooting sports so they can make sure to have qualified staff on hand.

I don't know about staff size either. Based on my council the staff size is very small but the pay is high (on par for an executive in the area though). I will say that DE to CE pay gap is huge though, my understanding is that our newest DE in the council is only getting like 40k while the CE is getting 200k.

Well, National discontinued this medal after all. No announcement, no community feedback, no phasing it out so as to allow Scouts actively working on it to complete it. What a shame.