All good points. My son is a Star scout with 22 merit badges so we are familiar with the drill. He has never counseled with his father before,or me, all others being different counselors. The situation came up when my husband, took my son to work to learn about metalwork. He took the requirements with him and they made the two projects. They completed the badge together and my son had a great time with his dad. Nothing wrong with alittle dad and son time
In our troop, this is a much desired badge for the boys. My husband has agreed to come and put together some projects and let the boys weld something and complete the badge with all 17 boys.
Our Scoutmaster has also worked on some badges with her son; Family Life and Camping. So this has just come up in our troop when we discovered this rule in our bylaws.
I understand that it is good for the troop to use our resources, and we do. I think we can encourage a counselor to give a class but can we hold a badge because he hasn't done it yet??
I am the Advancement Chair in our troop. Which by the way is a great troop, I would not consider leaving over this. I am just trying to figure out if we can keep this rule in our bylaws. It does sound like other troops do the same thing. I can understand why, I just didn't know if the national boyscouts were in agreement (whoever they are!) Does it contradict or have we just added to the rule? From what I hear other troops are doing it.
Thanks so much for all the feedback.(This message has been edited by Michdlew5)