James6

@PACAN, I hope I didn't offend you. As I said, you might well be completely right. It's just hard to know how much weight to give opinions on forums like this—even among scouters! By the same token, I encourage everyone not to come to firm conclusions about our case. Although we think we are in the right (of course!), I intentionally didn't tell enough for an informed opinion. Because I don't want to go there. I just thought it was fair turn-about to let y'all know what sort of appeal it is. I do think that it is unfortunate that the appeal process takes so long, considering the Guide to Advancement's exhortations to be prompt with the EBOR. I also understand that national advancement may be swamped, and are volunteers; sometimes the unfortunate isn't avoidable. But, I would think national administration could manage a brief acknowledgement like, "We have received your appeal. We expect to consider the case in X months."

Thanks all for quick reply, sorry I've been very slow to respond. The required process is first to appeal to the Council Advancement Committee, and then (if denied) to appeal to the National level via the Council. @fred8033, as far as I know it's not possible to directly appeal to national; I don't mean not allowed, but literally there is no place to directly send an appeal. @InquisitiveScouter, Council did not copy us, but they have confirmed verbally that it was sent fairly promptly. I can well believe that this delay is normal, but it sure would be nice to have some hint as to how long we should expect to wait. Thanks, @PACAN, for the information that up to twelve months is possible. @PACAN, that's quite some cynicism in your last sentence. Maybe it's justified, I have no way to know. But it may encourage you to know that in this case the boards of review and appeal affirmed that my son did complete all requirements. @InquisitiveScouter, I'm not interested in litigating the situation in this forum. But, I'm willing to satisfy the curious to this extent: My son made some bad choices about 2 years prior to the Eagle application which led to a one-week school suspension. The boards misconstrued this into a fundamental character failing, their poor judgement exacerbated by about a dozen ways in which they failed to follow the Guide to Advancement. This description, of course, leaves out many details and is In our opinion.

My son had to appeal a negative Eagle Scout rank decision to the national level. It has now been four months since it was sent (through our Council, as per the Guide to Advancement), and we haven't heard anything. Our Council doesn't seem to be able to provide any information at all. Does anyone here have any experience with this sort of situation, to provide insight into how long National Advancement usually takes to address it? Thanks, James