starwolfmom

Evmori--two hour EBORs are pretty standard in our district. Matt's best friend's EBOR ran 2 1/2 hours. Yes, Matt's Scoutmaster was there. Matt is his first Eagle--he's been Scoutmaster about 3 months (although active with the troop for about 4 years). Ohio--I probably won't get to Eagle squared. My younger son quit the troop in January. He was tired of being bullied by kids who obviously don't take the Scout oath and law as seriously as his older brother. Elizabeth

Thanks, Ohio. I guess technically I'm now eaglestarmom, which just shows you how long I've been hanging around this forum. Elizabeth

Well, I thought the secrecy thing was kind of odd, too, although I heard the district advancement chair say it. I did find this on the eaglescout.org web site, in a document for people who are serving on an Eagle Board of Review: The contents of the Board of Review are confidential and the proceedings are not to be disclosed to any person who is not a member of the Board of Review. So I figured it must be an official policy, though why, I don't know. Elizabeth

Our troop typically doesn't provide anything for Eagle courts of honor--they are entirely planned by the family. They participate, of course, reading some parts of the ceremony, boys in the unit serving as color guard and whatnot, but it's really up to the parents and the boy to put the whole thing together. Fortunately, since Matt's best friend had his Court of Honor last spring, and his mom and I are friends, I can pick her brain for ideas and do's and don'ts. Matt doesn't really want an outdoor COH. Mid-May in Michigan can still be pretty iffy weather-wise. Elizabeth

Matt passed his EBOR on Saturday. I am the mom of an Eagle Scout (to go along with being the sister and the niece of an Eagle Scout). Matt's EBOR ran about 2 hours and 10 minutes. It was scheduled for 2 p.m., so I had him there at 1:45 p.m. as his Scoutmaster requested. I told him to call me when he was sent out of the room for the board to deliberate. I was called at 4:40 p.m. Turns out that the actual BOR didn't start until 2:30 p.m., after the board members met for pre-board stuff for half an hour. The actual board went from 2:30 to 4:40 p.m., then we were called in at about 4:55 p.m. Since nothing is supposed to leave the board room, Matt didn't share much about the board, except that they asked him a lot of questions, some of them seemingly "trick" questions, but that he felt he handled himself well. At one point, the district advancement chair asked Matt if he thought he deserved to be an Eagle if he couldn't follow directions (he forgot to include the chair's approval letter for his project in his project binder). Matt said that he did, because everyone makes mistakes and one small mistake shouldn't outweigh 12 years of positive Scouting performance. Another board member asked him which of the six lines of the Scout oath he felt was the most important. Matt said "to obey the Scout law" because that then embodied everything else. The board member said that he felt the most important was "on my honor" because without that, the rest was meaningless. However, he saw the validity in Matt's response. We're both just really glad that it's over. We probably won't have his court of honor until mid-May, after the spring semester of college is done. Elizabeth

Since you were all so supportive of my vent about the delays in my son's Eagle process, I wanted to let you know that his EBOR is this Saturday afternoon. I've been reading up on what Matt should expect and also how long some of the guidelines say an EBOR should be. One document said, "more than 15 minutes but less than an hour." Another, from the advancement chair for the NESA, says that they should be about 30 minutes. I talked to Matt's friend Andrew, and he said his was about 2 1/2 hours long. If Matt's goes that long, I think I'm going to show the NESA document to our district folks and ask why theirs are so long. It's just not fair to these young men. I'll let you know after the weekend if I have an Eagle Scout. Elizabeth

Well, Matt's employer (who is also a Scouter) got his letter in--again--yesterday. Thank goodness he had saved a copy. The assistant principal at the high school said that he had sent his in ages ago. However, he said that after school today he would go to the scout office in person, get the form, and fill it out right there and hand it to a live human being to ensure that it was received this time. Fortunately, the high school is less than a mile from the council office, so this is not a problem. Thank you all for your support. By the way, to answer a couple of questions: yes, OGE, I am the freelance writer, but I don't think I'd write about this. Narraticong, I live in Lansing. I'll let you know when Matt has his EBOR and earns his Eagle. Elizabeth

Thanks for listening. I found it strange that the council felt it needed all six letters in order to proceed; I'm glad to know it's not required, but is just something our council wants. (Our District Advancement Chair is also one of those guys who insists on a project proposal so detailed that "if the Scout was hit by a bus, anyone could pick up the book and proceed with the project.") Matt and I were told that it was only necessary to have the project done and paperwork in by his 18th birthday; that the EBOR could be done afterward. (that happens a lot in our district) But three months seems ridiculous. Our SM has said that Matt's Eagle process has been a learning experience for him; hopefully future Eagle candidates will benefit from this. I don't know whether to call them on the fact that they don't need all six letters to move forward; I'm afraid of jeopardizing Matt's chances somehow if I make a fuss. EBORs in our district are already traumatizing enough. I think that Matt's friend's EBOR was more than 3 hours long--and this was a kid who was gold-plated Eagle material, not somebody with iffy credentials. I'm almost glad my younger son has decided to quit Scouts. He has an anxiety disorder and I'm afraid he would have a breakdown trying to get through the process. Elizabeth

I'm a new Daisy leader (as you can probably tell from my user name, I've been a Boy Scout mom--although the Star in my name is almost an Eagle, and the Wolf is now Star). We're kind of combining our Daisy journey and Daisy petals. Gardening in Michigan in the winter is kind of tough--just finding potting soil and seeds in stores is a challenge. So, we're going to wait until closer to spring to begin gardening. Elizabeth

My oldest son just squeaked all of his paperwork in for Eagle hours before his 18th birthday. We knew from his friend's experience that it might be six weeks or so before we heard anything about when his EBOR would be set up. We received our packet from the council with the Eagle recommendation form for us as his parents to write our letter, and turned it back in by the October 28 deadline that was set. From some of the other people whom Matt had listed on his application, we heard that they had also turned in their letters. So we waited, and waited. Cut to Christmas break. Matt is home from college and we had really expected that he would be having his EBOR when he was home. But still, we've heard nothing. So, I asked our Scoutmaster (new to the position, but not to the troop), if he'd heard anything about Matt's application and Eagle process. He asked around and heard from somebody that maybe it had to do with his letters of recommendation. It took until yesterday for him to get a definitive answer that the council had received 4 of Matt's 6 letters and was waiting on those last two before moving forward. It's been 10 weeks since the letter deadline, so why has no one at the council office mentioned this to anyone yet???? Last night, Matt called one of his references, who said that he HAD sent the letter in weeks ago, but he had a copy and would send it again. He also contacted his other reference and left a message about the letter. I'm steamed and also confused. It's now nearly three months past Matt's 18th birthday. The district advancement chair told our SM (and he relayed it to me) that when EBORS are 1-3 months after the lad's 18th birthday, it's usually not a problem, but when it's 3-6 months after, people usually have questions and it becomes an "issue." Why would it be an "issue" if Matt had nothing to do with the delay? Is this common? I am less than thrilled right now and so is Matt. I know he wants his Eagle, even though he's said, "I know I did the work, Mom, even if I don't get the badge." End of vent. Elizabeth

I'm so glad to hear that I'm not the only one who had that reaction to Tom Brady on the cover. "Morally straight" he is not, and I don't consider him a role model for any of my children. I also felt the same about the Exxon exec who named Ayn Rand's book as his favorite. Not a philosophy compatible with Scouting. Elizabeth

re: the requirement "With the approval of your counselor and a parent, watch a movie that shows how the actions of one individual or group of individuals can have a positive effect on a community." In our troop's rather slap-dash way of doing merit badges, the group of boys working on this badge were merely asked, during a troop meeting during which they were working on the badge, to come up with the title of a movie that had watched (in the past) and talk about how it related to the requirement above. (I discovered this when my son told me he had finished the Citizenship in the Community badge and I inquired about the movie requirement--knowing he had never asked me about watching a movie in conjunction with the badge--and he told me, "Oh, we just had to tell about some movie we'd already seen that fit.") I asked him what movie he had picked and why. He chose "Newsies," a musical about a group of newsboys in New York in the late 1800s who successfully organized and went on strike to achieve better working conditions and fair pay for the kids who sold newspapers. I thought that was an excellent choice, actually, but I was none too happy about the lazy way that the MB counselor was going through the badge work with the kids. Elizabeth

My son is going through this now. He's been working on his project write-up and still isn't done. He thought he might be close, and showed it to a friend (and his mom) who went through this all about seven months ago. They gave him some pointers in hopes that it would "pass" the first time the district chair reviews it. Stupid stuff like when he says "screw the screws into the wood" they added in pencil "with a screwdriver." Well, duh? What would someone think otherwise--with a hammer? My son is three months away from turning 18, has wanted to be an Eagle since he was a Tiger, but the thought of all this bureaucratic hoop jumping is paralyzing him from even gettingthe workbook finished--much less the project (that will be a breeze). It's very discouraging. My mom (who is anxious for her grandson to make Eagle, like my older brother and her brother before him) says "your brother didn't have to go through anything like this." Well, yeah, mom, but he earned his Eagle 35 years ago; things have changed, and not for the better. Elizabeth

I am growing increasingly concerned with how my sons' troop is handling both merit badges and rank advancement. This involves my younger son, who crossed over a year ago February, and did not happen with my older son, who is nearly 18. Monday evening, at our spring COH, the Scoutmaster was holding a big handful of Personal Fitness merit badges. The boys had been working on the badge in troop meetings for a while (I know, don't even get me started about THAT!) and I knew that my younger son had told me that they had "finished all the questions." The SM came over to me and asked if my son had taken phys ed in school this year. I said, "yes, and he even earned the Presidential Physical Fitness Award." He said, "great, that's all I needed to know." The next thing I know, my son is getting his Personal Fitness badge, along with a half dozen other boys. He was thrilled, and a little surprised. I was surprised and not in a good way. I look at my almost-Eagle son, and he looked appalled. I looked at the SM, and he said, "it's okay. If he took gym, he's done everything for the badge." Um . . . I don't think so, but I'm not going to burst my kid's bubble. So, I went online and checked out the MB requirements. I know the boys did the initial fitness measurements, but I'm reasonably certain that they didn't develop a 12-week plan (I even asked my son--he didn't) and I know they didn't do the 2-week checks and measurements to see how far they came in 12 weeks. I also know that my son didn't research three careers in fitness and report on one of them. I asked him if he had done this and he looked confused. "No, that wasn't one of the questions." So, since we were all at the dinner table, we discussed various careers in fitness. I also asked my son who the MB counselor was for this badge. He wasn't certain, and said it might have been one of two of our ASMs, and named them. My older son reported to me that one night at Scouts, he witnessed the group of boys working on this badge, going through the questions and flipping through the book and answering them as a group--with no adult in sight. This isn't the only instance of shoddy work like this, but I dont want to write a novel here. What do I do? Who do I talk to about this? My son is having fun with this troop, but I'm upset by the shoddy, slapdash way that MBs are being done. Elizabeth

When I proposed an article to Scouting magazine back in 2006 about how troops/packs can help boys with autism and Asperger's be successful in their units, I had to lobby long and hard that it was a needed article. The editor didn't really think so, but eventually he assigned the story to me. This is it: http://www.scoutingmagazine.org/issues/0609/a-boys.html A month or so later, the editor contacted me, because that story generated more letters to the editor than just about any story they had ever run. A couple of those letters are here (scroll down): http://www.scoutingmagazine.org/issues/0611/d-lett.html Certainly not every unit or every district or council will have the resources to work with families of boys on the autism spectrum, but many are trying. Here are just two of several pages that came up when I googled "Scouts with autism": http://usscouts.org/netresources/autism.htm http://www.bsa-gwrc.org/district/wp/adult-trng/ADD_handout.html The troop to which my sons belong had very active Scout with autism and mental retardation. Everyone in the troop worked well with him and he was included in everything. In fact, he was often the one showing newer/younger Scouts the basics. He was with the troop until he was 21 or 22, and earned Eagle. My son with Asperger's is NOT a Scout, but that was his choice, and not the result of a poor Scouting experience. Elizabeth