Oak Tree

Our pack meetings are 1.5 hours, and we try to keep them moving. We do many of the things that Jens3sons' pack does - we have an overhead with photos/clip art, we get all the dens to have a turn up in front doing something, and we break up the awards. We'll often have a guest speaker - park ranger, policeman, heart transplant recipient, etc. We usually have a game, although since my boys didn't like relay races, I usually aimed for games where more people could participate at once. Cheers, applause, having the Cubmaster act goofy, getting some adults up front to make them perform, you can let your creative side have free reign. Run-ons, acting like pirates, having the boys all participate in things like stories, or Scout sign practice ("everyone scream as loud as you can until I put up the sign") can all be fun. We usually threw in some brief announcements/reminders, but I always told people to talk to the boys, not to the parents. And I was always able to jump in and say "if you have any more questions about XXX, see Mr. Schwindenhammer after the meeting." Oak Tree

Lovely. I think we can all agree that this is wildly insensitive and inappropriate on oh so many levels. Oak Tree

The official text from the Insignia Guide is this: *BSA Lifeguard, cloth, No. 00132, Boy Scout, right side of swim trunks. The star indicates that the item is also available to Venturers. There's a typo here, because it should say "Boy Scout and Scouter", the same way the 50-miler and Historic Trails Award do, but that doesn't affect the answer to your question. Maybe you could just be Uniform Licensee and wear it on the right pocket. Oak Tree

Hunt, I've often heard the Eagle percentage given as a testimony to the perseverance of those who earned it. So all those who drop out, for whatever reason, are evidence that only a small percentage have the perseverance to make it to the end. You could be right that one reason the percentage went up was because there were fewer casual Scouts, but one argument against this explanation is that the number of total Eagles is rising, and significantly. It's not just that the number of Scouts is falling. And any explanation we give would pretty much be anecdotal, as SSScout suggests. But hey, we don't have grant money to do a real study, so we can hypothesize away. I'm betting that parents are paying more attention to their sons' advancement nowadays. Oak Tree

On the parent thread was the statement "Im really troubled that various Scouters feel the need to dispute a simple statement by our national organization." So let me ask this in a different context. If some Scouts came to you questioning the accuracy of some statement by some legitimate authority, would you encourage them or discourage them? Would it trouble you that they were questioning authority? As an adult leader, do you expect Scouts to believe what you tell them? Or do you suggest that they should challenge you if they think you are mistaken? Oak Tree

Miki101 posts, "Is it really that big of a deal?" Well, I guess that depends on how big of a deal something has to be in order to merit discussion on these forums. I figure this is like a big campfire where we're all sitting around, throwing out topics about Scouting and occasionally about other things, and we see where the conversation takes us. I've seen times where Scouting makes a big deal about this number. "So many boys fail, but this boy has beaten all the odds and made Eagle, while 95% of the other Scouts don't make it this far, etc, etc." There are a vast number of Scouting topics we could and do discuss. This one seemed interesting to me. I've found Miki101's official numbers very interesting, and I'd be happy to see more. Oak Tree

I'm assuming that you have the list from council, so you can see how many people are signed up as counselors for each merit badge. Ideally, I'd think you'd sign up where you could do the most good. That would mean signing up for those badges that have the fewest counselors per interested Scout. Your council might have information on how many of each merit badge has been earned in the last year in the council, but if not, you could use the national statistics as a rough guide. http://www.scouting.org/factsheets/02-500.html - Just divide the number earned by the number of available counselors, and the highest numbers are your target zone. If there's a badge where you're the only counselor signed up, though, I might keep that one anyway, just to make sure a boy would have the opportunity if interested. If there are so many counselors that none are getting very many calls, though, it may not matter much. Oak Tree

SSScout, One other possibility in your category #3 is that the merit badges are objectively easier, i.e. the requirements are less demanding. Here are a few examples, comparing the 1949 requirements to today's: Bird Study 1949 - Identify 40 species of birds 2006 - Identify 20 species of birds Camping 1949 - Camp out 50 days and nights 2006 - Camp out 20 days and nights Cycling 1949 - Six 25-mile trips and one 50-miler. 2006 - Two 10-mile trips, two 15-mile trips, two 25-mile trips, and one 50-miler Dog Care 1949 - Take care of your dog for six months 2006 - Take care of your dog for two months Reading 1949 - Read 12 books 2006 - Read 6 books Rocks and Minerals/Geology 1949 - Collect 25 specimens 2006 - Collect 10 specimens I've heard from people that the marksmanship requirements are much easier as well. I'm not sure how much effect each of the things you mention has on the overall process, but I'd guess that they all play a part. In general there seems to be a desire to make it easier for boys to advance so that they'll stay with the program longer. I'm not sure whether this really has the desired effect. Oak Tree

I must admit, I've been treating the percent as a current figure. On the web site it says, "Not every boy who joins a troop earns the Eagle Scout rank, only about 5 percent of all Boys Scouts do so." To me, the word 'joins' sort of implies that a boy joining now would expect to have a 5 percent success rate, although I'm sure a lawyer could parse it otherwise. When about 2% of registered Scouts were earning Eagle in a given year, I heard that 2% of all Scouts will earn Eagle. When it was 3%, I heard that 3% of all Scouts will earn Eagle. When it was 4% of registered Scouts who earned Eagle, I heard that 4% of all Scouts will earn Eagle. Now 5% of registered Scouts are earning Eagle in a given year, and National says that 5% of all Scouts will earn Eagle. It has always seemed relatively clear to me that this statement was derived by dividing the number of Eagles by the number of registered Scouts. And I felt that misrepresented the real likelihood of making Eagle. Miki does provide an interesting alternate interpretation, though. Those numbers show a 3% historical average. Since 1981 they show a 12% average. If we had the list (I presume it's not available on-line anywhere), I'll bet we'd see an even higher percentage for the last 5 years. One interesting thing about that 3% number is that it is not what National is currently claiming, either. If they were using this methodology, it would still be misleading if they used it to represent the current likelihood of getting Eagle, but they could argue the historical basis. I also had Beavah's initial reaction to the numbers. That total membership number seems high for 1910 to 1981. According to that statistic, there were over 46 million unique members in the first 71 years, so BSA was signing up an average of 650,000 boys per year over the entire period. Then from 1981 to 2004, we added 4.9 million over 23 years, for an average of 213,000 per year. Now I know Scouts was more popular in the past, but that seems pretty high. The number of births in the U.S. from 1910 to 1945 was under 3 million per year, and half those were girls. From '45 on, it ballpark averaged around 4 million. So BSA signed up around 35% of all boys born in the U.S. for 71 years. Maybe so. But that's the average - there would have to be a number of years where it was above average. I'd love to see the entire table of number of new members by year, total membership by year, and the number of Eagles by year. There were decades where the number of Eagles was under 10,000 per year - 20's, 30's, 40's, I'm guessing. Miki can probably fill in for sure. But that would suggest that there were indeed many years where the percentage of registered Scouts who earned Eagle would have been well below 1%. I still hold that BSA is misrepresenting the likelihood of current boys earning Eagle, but I'll keep the historical interpretation in mind. And when I see articles (every Eagle article, just about) that says somewhere between 2-5% of boys earn Eagle, I'll just remind myself that that hasn't been true for at least a generation (25 yrs). And I'm not sure it's all that reassuring to know that it's now 10-20x more likely for a boy to get Eagle. Oak Tree (This message has been edited by Oak Tree)

Right, we can't get the exact percentage without knowing the total number of boys who join in a year (or some other period). On the other thread, Miki gives us the number of 221,670 since March of this year, based on numbers from the National Scouting Museum. If that's for eight months, it would suggest a full year number of around 330,000. There are 667,000 Webelos IIs. That would suggest that about 330,000 boys would cross over and join Boy Scouts each year. There are about 2 million boys born each year in the U.S. How many join Boy Scouts? Maybe 15%? That would be about 300,000 per year. How long does an average boy stay in Scouts? Three years? Four years? So take the total membership and divide by three or four to see how many new boys are joining each year. What's that - 250,000 to 330,000? So while we don't yet know exactly how many boys join in a year, we can get a pretty good estimate. Oak Tree

OGE used the title phrase in the parent thread. I have no reason whatsoever to doubt it. I've heard it a number of times, so I'm convinced that it's either true or else it is another one of the many Scouting 'facts' (i.e. urban legends) that get handed down as true. My money is with OGE, and that he's right. My question is, where would that be documented? I don't see it in the Insignia Guide or in the Handbook. And then some people add regulations about whether you can mix valid uniform parts in invalid ways. More facts? Is there a whole library of secret (or not-so-secret) controlling documents? I'd have thought that the Insignia Guide would have been the official word, but I get the sense that there's more out there somewhere. Oak Tree

Miki, That's a pretty useful number. It seems like it's in line with what I'd expect, based on national Webelos membership. Is there someplace on-line where we can see the data you used to get that number? Is that March thru November? If the data's not on-line, can you describe what the data is? And would you happen to have the data for any recent 12-month period? I'd expect there might be a big bump in February as boys cross over. Thanks, Oak Tree

I'd have no problem if national stuck with the simple math and said "Each year 5.0% of Scouts earn Eagle." But that's not what they say - they talk about the percentage of boys who join Scouts who go on to earn Eagle. All you need to calculate this is two numbers - the number of boys who join, and the number who earn Eagle. That's pretty simple too. It wouldn't be an exact percentage for 2005 - the Eagles in 2005 didn't come from the boys who joined in 2005 - but both the number of new boys and the number of Eagles are relatively consistent from year to year. And heck, they could get an exact percentage for 1996, say. Of all the boys who joined for the first time in 1996, how many earned Eagle by the time they left? Oak Tree

What? We have to be trying to show something in order to post on the forum? Well, shoot. That would take out a lot of posts. I'd miss all of OGE's puns. Brent said the NESA row reminds him of his stupidity every time he sees it. For me, I have a similar reaction every time I hear someone repeat this incorrect information on Eagle percentage. Whenever I hear it, I don't think, "Yes, Eagle is really hard to earn and is a great accomplishment." I think, "There's the BSA incorrectly reporting those numbers again." It's just one of those minor irritants in life, and I don't see any good reason for the BSA not to state the information correctly. It's just like the membership numbers - I don't think the BSA should distort them. And also, I'll say that even if it's 15% of Scouts who earn Eagle, that's still a pretty noteworthy accomplishment. And Miki, I still don't see how I could interpolate the numbers of numbers of boys joining and leaving from the gross membership statistics. Can you give me an example? How many new boys joined in 2006? Thanks, Oak Tree

Miki101, I'm not close enough to Texas to make that a real option (-: And at any rate, just knowing the membership numbers isn't enough. We'd need to know how many boys left and how many new boys joined during any period for this exercise. Does the museum include those numbers? They would have to distinguish between new applications and those who are renewing their membership. Oak Tree

Packsaddle - yes, I agree with you that math problems aren't really up for a vote. That's one of the things I always loved about math. I was just trying to suggest that I'm not all alone out on a limb, and maybe if you and others seem some merit to the argument, there might be some. But as I also said, I'll be happy to admit I'm wrong if someone can just show me the math. I do think it would be great if BSA would just say how many new Scouts there were each year. They don't, as FScouter says, so it means we can't get an exact percentage. But we do know a few things. First, in order for the 5% number to be accurate, we know that there would need to be one million new Scouts each year. We know that because we do know how many Scouts earn Eagle - around 50,000 or so each year (49,895 in 2005). Since there are just under one million total Scouts, it's clear that they aren't signing up one million new ones every year. And it seems obvious to me that BSA is getting the 5% number by dividing total Eagles by the total number of current Scouts, which isn't the right way to do it. There are 667,000 current Webelos (as of 12/31/05). If we assume that half of these are Webelos IIs, and that they all cross over, there would be 334,000 or so new Scouts each year. That estimate may not be exact, but it's got to be in the ballpark. 50,000 / 334,000 is 15%. So FScouter, while you're right that I don't know exactly what the correct number is, I do *know* that it's not 5%. Show me some way that the 5% could possibly be true and I'll listen. Oak Tree P.S. If it was actually only 1/8th of the Scouts that were new each year, the percentage would be even higher. About 50,000/125,000, or 40%.

Brent, FScouter is right, this can be a pretty simple thing if you just consider the two numbers. I'll look at your example a bit more in a second, but could you take a second and consider ours? With 50,000 Eagles per year, and (our assumption of) 250,000 new Scouts per year, how can it be that only 5% of Scouts earn Eagle? It has to be that on average, out of each new class of 250,000, 20% will earn Eagle. Let me try one more thing. FScouter is making a point. I'm making a point. Packsaddle agrees with my point. Beavah calls the national statistics bogus. Are you sure we're all wrong? Really? We're not secretly colluding on this. I don't want to back you into a corner here...could you just think for a second about the other point of view and see if maybe we've got something? And let me take your example one more time, just to see how it applies if you're not just talking purely about the averages, but want to get into specific examples. You have 1 14 y.o., 1 15 y.o., 2 16 y.o., and 1 17 y.o. earning Eagle each year. I agree that these came from four different entering classes, for a total of 100 boys. Of those 100 boys, 25 now age out. The next year, out of those same boys, we again have 1 15 y.o., 2 16 y.o., and 1 17 y.o. earn Eagle. We're now up to 9 Eagles total out of those 100 boys. Another 25 age out. Again 2 16 y.o. earn Eagle the next year, as does 1 17 y.o. Another 25 age out, and the last year one more boy earns Eagle, for a total of 13. And that only counts the ones that earn Eagle after your year in question. There would also have been 7 boys out of those 100 who earned Eagle before the year in question, and that makes 20 out of 100. You say there is "some overlap", but in fact 75 out of 100 of your boys are overlap from one year to the next. That's the crux of the problem. Here's your example in more detail. Let's say 25 boys join at age 11 in 2001. 2001 - no Eagles 2002 - no Eagles 2003 - none 2004 - 1 2005 - +1 = 2 2006 - +2 = 4 2007 - +1 = 5 Another 25 boys join at age 11 in 2002. 2002 - no Eagles from this group 2003 - none 2004 - none 2005 - 1 2006 - +1 = 2 2007 - +2 = 4 2008 - +1 = 5 Another 25 boys in 2003 2003 - no Eagles 2004 - none 2005 - none 2006 - 1 2007 - +1 = 2 2008 - +2 = 4 2009 - +1 = 5 Another 25 boys in 2004 2004 - no Eagles 2005 - none 2006 - none 2007 - 1 2008 - +1 = 2 2009 - +2 = 4 2010 - +1 = 5 Assume it keeps going that way. By 2007 we hit a steady state. There will be 5 Eagles that year, and every year thereafter, and they will be one 14 y.o., one 15 y.o., two 16 y.o., and one 17 y.o. And out of each group of 25 that start, 5 will earn Eagle. Oak Tree

Scoutingagain, I know what you mean about merit badge universities. But I'll leave you to tilt at that windmill while I continue to tilt at my own. Your troop sounds pretty typical. If the national site statistics were to include Cub Scouts, then the five percent number would be more believable. But the direct quote from the current web site is "Not every boy who joins a Boy Scout troop earns the Eagle Scout rank; only about 5 percent of all Boy Scouts do so." jr56 - while this may be more advanced mathematics than usually appears on the forum, this is nothing. Google the life table analysis that packsaddle suggests, and you'll find some serious math. Oak Tree

Why are we arguing about this? ... to quote another well-known question ... Why do people climb mountains? ...or a more recent question from the forum... Why do kids do what they do? Isn't that what we do on the forum? Discuss Scouting things? I'm discussing it because someone asked the question of what percentage of Scouts that join eventually earn Eagle, and I answered. And I furthered the discussion because it's a pet peeve of mine that the BSA seems to over-exaggerate the actual number. Brent, I don't have to count all the boys that joined and dropped out during those four years in your example. If I did that, I'd also have to count all the boys that got Eagle during that time. In your example, which I like, you have 4 marbles out of 100 registered marbles who make it and earn Eagle. In any given year you have 4 marbles earning Eagle, and 21 dropping out. That means of all the boys who leave Scouting, 4/25 have earned Eagle, or 16%. If you follow any set of 25 marbles through the system, you'll see that 4/25 eventually earn Eagle. And that's the real question - out of every 100 boys who join Scouting, how many earn Eagle? You can check out this thread: http://www.scouter.com/forums/viewThread.asp?threadID=120663&p=1 where Hopewell indicates they have about 13-17% Eagles (1 out of every 6-8), and OldEagle indicates they have about 33%. Most of the rest of the troops on that thread indicate a reasonable number of Eagles every year, mostly between 1 and 3. Since they don't generally give their recruiting class sizes, it's not possible to get an exact percentage - but it sounds reasonable from that thread that an average troop would have two Eagles per year and 12 recruits - for about a 17% success rate. It's certainly not the case that the average troop on that thread has a recruiting class of 40 Webelos - which is what it would take to have a 5% success rate if there are about 2 Eagles per year. Oak Tree

Brent, Ok, let's use your numbers. There are 250,000 new Scouts each year. Each year 50,000 Scouts earn Eagle. That means that 20% of Scouts are earning Eagle. Look at it long-term - over 10 years that would be 2.5 million Scouts, and 500,000 Eagles. Or over 100 years it would be 25 million Scouts, and 5 million Eagles. If I should happen to have my math wrong, I'll gladly admit it. But trust me on this one - I don't very often have my math wrong. The flaw in your argument is that the 2 million boys you mention joined over a period of 8 years. But you only count the number of Eagles earned in 1 of those years. If you counted the Eagles from all 8 years as well, you'd have 400,000 Eagles earned, which is 20% of the 2 million. It's not all the same boys - some of the Eagles came from boys who joined before the period in question - but some of the boys who joined will go on to earn Eagle in a later period. It will all balance out to 20%. I do not assume that BSA is "lying about everything." I do think that they are lying about this, and I wish they wouldn't. For symbolic purposes, I know that they can't just change the wording to make it sound all that much easier - but they could state something like "Only 5% of Scouts earn Eagle each year." There are previous threads on this topic. If you were to search them (I can't get search to work right now) I can assure you that you'd find that I'm not the only one who sees a problem with the stated numbers. Just my pet peeve. Oak Tree

Oh good grief. I was going to ignore the comment about Hunt being a uniform-hater on the grounds that it was patently ridiculous - but I guess I shouldn't really assume that. When other threads are being closed on the grounds that they are essentially personal attacks, it's disappointing to see one of the moderators call another forum member a 'uniform-hater' - especially when the thread seemed to be set up from the beginning to indicate that there was an entire class of people that took too many liberties with the uniform. Which is not the attitude of a uniform-hater in my book. But I may be wrong...after all, we're just trying to have a little fun here, while making a point at the same time. Seems like most any humor can be taken as an offense by someone. So, back to the main discussion...Hunt, do you any thoughts about your libertine terminology and what point do you actually become a uniform libertine? It seems like most Scouters have several obvious unintentional errors on their uniform...if I have no unintentional errors but one intentional tweak, am I a libertine? Oak Tree

We've done ski trips at Winterplace. They do all the things you mention. Some councils do their own council ski days there. You can see Buckskin council (http://www.buckskin.org/Programs/Forms/Ski%20Sign%20up%20Information.pdf) and Occoneechee Council (http://www.doubleknot.com/openrosters/DocDownload.asp?orgkey=382&id=17552), and I'm sure there are more. Our Scouts liked it enough that they voted to put it on the troop calendar again. Oak Tree

I'd count the time as a POR unless you have actively counseled them that they are not meeting the expectations of the position. The best way to do that is to make sure you agree at the beginning of the term on what the expectations are for serving actively in the position. And then check up on it every so often. If the boy thinks he has the position, and no one has told him he's not doing it well enough, I think it would be fair for him to think that he's met the requirement. The best way to avoid confrontations is to make sure expectations are set correctly up front. Oak Tree

So what's the difference between a Uniform Libertine and a Uniform Licensee? Is it all in the mind of the wearer? Where do we draw the line? For example, John-in-KC is wearing numerals on his RT shirt, but he seems to be fitting Hunt's definition of a libertine, since he is wearing an incorrect uniform despite full knowledge. Is an adult who wears a patrol emblem (old goat, rocking chair) a libertine? Or are they modeling the patrol method? How about an adult who switches positions three weeks before the new training...if he leaves the Trained strip on for the interim, is he a libertine or a licensee? Oooh, I can see all kinds of good pointless discussions here. I actually think both terms work. But I think we need to add some definition around the libertine concept. At what point do you cross the line? Oak Tree

There is a 100 nights of camping award. I've never heard of a 25 nights award. According to the Scoutmaster Handbook - "Individual Scouts and Scouters may qualify for a National Camping Award patch, provided that the required cumulative number of days and nights of camping has been met. This total can include any combination of camping experiences with the Scout's family, patrol, or troop. 100 days and nights of camping - patch 250 days and nights of camping - patch 500 days and nights of camping - patch 1,000 days and nights of camping - patch To earn this award, a Scout must keep track of his campouts and have them approved by his Scoutmaster or assistant Scoutmaster. The patch may be worn on the right pocket of the uniform shirt or placed on the pocket of a backpack or in another appropriate place. Both the unit and cumulative awards are retroactive to January 1, 1991." The document Our Camping Log appears to be the official place to record your camping. It says "Individual Scouts and Scouters may qualify for the cumulative patch by participating in campouts with their families, patrols, or other groups." I've seen other places on the web with more defined requirements about what counts as camping, but those all appear to be added to the National requirements. It looks like it's Scoutmaster's discretion. If you actually do have a 25 night award, it's probably a local troop (or possibly council) thing. You should ask them. Oak Tree