If The Requirement Isn't Completed

[evmori]

If if comes to light that a requirement for a merit badge was never done and it was marked complete and the blue card is has been signed by the MB counselor as completed, is it actually completed or should it be considered a partial since it is a fact a requirement was never done?

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[Eamonn]

Of course if we strongly believe that a Scout is to be trusted, the Scout will point out that an error has been made.

The same as a Scouter would never take change for a $20.00 when he only gave a $5.00

If the Scout didn't know that the error had been made? I have to wonder how it would come to light?

Eamonn.

[evmori]

If the Scout didn't know that the error had been made? I have to wonder how it would come to light?

 

At a BOR. Or when the Scout was asked to do something he should have learned in a MB. It really makes no difference how if comes to light. Is the badge earned or is it a partial?

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[scoutldr]

If the MBC has signed off as "completed", then it's completed. The MBC is the final authority. Why is a scout being retested on a "completed" requirement?

[Eamonn]

"At a BOR. Or when the Scout was asked to do something he should have learned"

This smells a little like re-testing to me.

In the other thread a Mom posted that she found out from her son that some requirements were not met.

I think we would all agree that this isn't a good thing and everything should be done to ensure that it doesn't happen.

Still we have a system in place and we either trust the system, trust the people who have been entrusted to do the job and trust the Scout to do the right thing.

If we resort to re-testing at BOR and retesting MB's why go to all the bother of having a system and having MBC's?

 

A counselor who doesn't do what is supposed to be done, can't be trusted and is not acting like a Scout. He or She is in fact cheating the Boy the opportunity to do what he signed up for.

No blame or shame can be put on the Lad.

If the Scout finds out that he has been cheated, it then becomes his choice what to do about it.

He has the right to do nothing and take what he was given. After all what went wrong was not his doing and not his fault.

However as we are trying to help Scouts make ethical choices (Yes choices) I would hope that someone would in a very nice and friendly way point out that the Badge is not really representing what it should. That nice friendly person might want to remind the Scout that by wearing the Badge he is in fact making a statement. The statement being "I met all the requirements for this Badge." They might ask if the Scout thinks he should wear the Badge?

We spend a lot of time talking about uniforms in this forum, very often we forget that our uniform is also a method of communication.

The Scout can if he chooses wear the Badge, but if he knows that he didn't meet the requirements it's just a badge with no merit.

Eamonn.

 

[evmori]

So if a MB requirement was never done by a Scout but the MB card was signed as completed by a MB counselor the MB is considered completed? Is that fair to all the other Scouts who did all the requirements for the MB? Is that fair to the Scout who didn't complete the requirement?

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[Lisabob]

Dealing in hypotheticals is so tough. Here's a couple of real-life situations. My son got a bunch of bogus completions at camp as I mentioned in the other thread. Some of the blue cards were returned to the scouts in the morning after check-out, on our way out of camp (not much time to rectify errors at that point, though in some cases I certainly did try). Several other blue cards were mailed after camp was over and just recently arrived, marked "complete."

 

For one badge where he did receive a blue card at camp, archery, he came to me later in the day scratching his head and saying, gee, I don't understand how this could be right since I never did make that arrow ...

 

For the others, which just arrived in the mail, well I knew right away that something was wrong because I knew, more or less, what they did at camp that week. And it was my job to help the whole troop choose MBs to work on at camp, and then to register them, so I became quite familiar with the requirements for many of the badges. To be honest, I think half the boys were less aware of the requirements than I was - some took a rather laissez faire approach ("the MB counselor will spoon-feed me whatever I need to know") and others just had a million things buzzing around in their brains and didn't seem to recall the requirements in any detail.

 

So, knowing what I did about their experiences and the actual requirements, I asked my son, did you know that you were supposed to do x, y, or z for this MB? Son's answer: no I didn't know that - I never did that and the MBC signed it anyway. We then had a harder look, together, at the requirements and he can't recall doing quite a few of them. These are not ambiguous items either - they included obvious stuff like jumping into the lake fully clothed (swimming), cleaning and cooking a fish (fishing), working on a conservation project (fish & wildlife management), writing 12 bars of music (music), having a rock collection (geology), etc. There are others that they might - or might not - have done together in a group demonstration, or sit & listen session. He can't remember.

 

So how'd this come to light? "Mom" asked him about it. He acknowledged it. (My real question is, what to do about it now? Is this a "mom" thing or a SM/scout thing? Even though, as "mom" I'm also active as an adult leader...) But if I hadn't been involved and we had simply trusted the camp staff's records, he'd blithely receive 5 mbs for which he did not truly meet the requirements. As much as I like to think otherwise, I believe he wasn't paying sufficient attention to the actual requirements to realize, on his own, that he hadn't met them. I know it wasn't a desire to cheat the system, just a matter of being a kid with an attention span to match, and also the (natural) desire to take the easy road and accept what's given to you.

 

By the way, there was another young man who somehow ended up with signed cards for MBs (eagle-required!) he never took at camp - and he was indiscrete enough to brag about it to some of the other boys and adult leaders. Though it likely would've come to light anyway since he "earned" 8 mbs even though there were only 6 mb sessions in a day.

 

So here are two situations, neither of which included any "retesting," where Ed's question applies. Personally my gut instinct is to say there's a difference between a kid in my son's position, who did attend the classes and who did do the work that the MBCs asked for, on one hand, and a kid who gamed the system and managed to snag some completed blue cards for MBs he never even took, on the other hand. In the first case, I'd say ok, let the boy have the badge but encourage him to finish the requirements on his own. In the second case it feels like a complete lie to even give the boy the badge, and I'd also have a real, real hard time sitting on that boy's BOR for Life or Eagle if he was given those badges without earning them.

 

But then too, I'm the mom in the first case and don't know if that kind of approach would look like favoritism to others.

 

Lisa'bob

[LongHaul]

First let us remember that a Blue Card is an "APPLICATION for merit badge". In order to qualify to apply for the badge a scout must present a completed merit badge application (Blue Card). As SM, I sign the cards when they are first issued and again when they are returned completed, before I forward them to my advancement chair. If I have a problem with how or why a MBC signed a card as complete I don't sign the card the second time and the APPLICATION halts right there. A scout has the option of appealing to the troop committee, and/or the district advancement board to over ride my action. Giving a scout credit for a badge he knows he did not earn, IMO, is a greater evil than possibly breaking the rule against adding or altering a requirement. My answer to Ed would be to not list the badge on an advancement report until completed properly. The other solution is to wait till the boy comes up for a BOR and then reject him because he didn't complete the badge. We have discussed at length the responsibility of the BOR to assure that all requirements have been completed. The only issue I can see is credibility, am I sure he did not complete the requirements as written? In Lisas case if the system is set up to limit the badges earned to 6 per session applying for 8 should be enough to hold up an application. We take people at their word but when we know that their word can not be taken as valid we have a responsibility to the youth we serve. On my honor should never mean as long as I dont get caught or as long as I can beat it in court.

LongHaul

 

[Hunt]

There are two sides to this: the first is the side of ethics--where I think it is clear to all that a scout should not be satisfied with accepting a MB he hasn't earned, and at the very least he should complete the requirements after the fact.

The second side is the side of authority--who has the authority to question the validity of a merit badge that has been signed by a registered MBC as complete? The official answer seems to be that nobody has that authority, except perhaps for the scout himself. There may be recourse against the MBC, but not, we have been told, against the scout. I am OK with this at the margins, when somebody is complaining that the scouts didn't swim with a strong enough stroke, or where the MBC allowed family camping to count. In such cases, I feel strongly that the MBC's decisions should control.

However, I do have a problem when important requirements--or even all the requirements--were not done. It seems to me that there may be places in the process where leaders can legitimately react. To me, the key one is the preparation of the advancement report, on which a leader must sign his name and certify that the record "meets the standards and requirements" of the BSA. Personally, I couldn't sign such a report if I knew that a MB was bogus. The other point I think something could be done is at a Scoutmaster conference, at which a SM might decline to sign off Scout Spirit until a problem of this kind was corrected.

[CalicoPenn]

Short answer: It is completed

 

Long Answer: Interesting diversion in ethics aside: It is completed. In the BSA program, the Merit Badge Counselor is the ultimate and only authority on when a merit badge is completed - if the Merit Badge Counselor has signed the application as complete, the badge is complete and the boy has officially earned the badge - no matter what our second guesses are.

 

The Scoutmaster's role in this process is three-fold. First, to provide intitial guidance on finding a Merit Badge Counselor, thus knowing that a Scout is working on a particular merit badge. And second, to acknowledge that a Merit Badge Counselor-signed application has been turned in by the Scout, thus knowing that a Scout has completed a particular merit badge. Third, to hand the Scout his merit badge at the next available opportunity and hand him his card at the next Court of Honor. That's it - there is no other role for the Scoutmaster in the process - there is no Scoutmaster Conference, no Board of Review, no retesting.

 

If you learn that the Merit Badge Counselor's work is suspect or sloppy, bring that up with the District Advancement Chairman. If it is a summer camp issue, bring it up at the council camping committee and let them know you're going to find a new summer camp if you can't rely on their counselors and record keeping.

 

Does this mean that there will be some that slip through? Yes - and it's an imperfect world in the first place.

 

We can express our disappointment if the lad has knowingly received a badge not earned but in this part of the program, it is up to one person and one person only to re-do the badge - and that is the Scout himself. We don't have to like it, but we also don't get to choose which policies and procedures to follow and which to ignore.

 

CalicoPenn(This message has been edited by CalicoPenn)

[LongHaul]

CalicoPenn, then exactly what is the purpose of a BOR at levels above First Class? To second guess the SM? If we can't assure ourselves that the merit badges have indeed been earned then the signatures of the troop personel who attest to the tenure, service and sirit of this scout are the only things which come into question? If we can deny an Application for Eagle why not an APPLICATION for merit badge?

LongHaul

 

P.S. First you say that if an MBC signes the card as complete that the boy EARNED the badge but in closing you say that we can express our dissappointment if a lad recieves a badge he didn't earn. Which is it? I think you realize that just getting an MBC to sign doesn;t mean you earned the badge.(This message has been edited by LongHaul)

[FireKat]

When it comes to my son, if I feel he did not complete the work I will make sure he does more or I will not put the MBP on. If he cannot look at the patch and explain to someone what it is and what he learned I don't want him to wear it.

 I hear this grumble all over. IMO I think National needs to address this. Time to put the values back into scouts.

[evmori]

"At a BOR. Or when the Scout was asked to do something he should have learned"

This smells a little like re-testing to me.

 

No retesting involved.

 

At a BOR the Scout is asked what he thought the hardest part of the swimming MB was he says "The inflating the pants part. We didn't do it but it seemed hard."

 

On a campout, the SPL instructs a Scout who has the Pioneering MB to move a log using a timber hitch & the Scout states "I was never taught how to tie a timber hitch. Would you help me?" Naturally, the SPL does providing he can.

 

No retesting involved. We aren't allowed to retest. We are, however, allowed to expect a Scout to be able to use what he was taught.

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[Hunt]

CalicoPenn, I understand the idea that the MB is "completed" when signed by the MBC, even if no actual work was done...but would you really sign an advancement report including such a MB if you actually knew that no work was actually done? If I did so, I would be making a false statement--that the record met the "standards and requirements" of the BSA.

[GernBlansten]

There is a difference between not being taught the skill and retention. The case of the scout with the Pioneering MB not being able to do a timber hitch is troubling but not unexpected. I have taught scouts obscure knots like the timber hitch and watched them demonstrate it to me, thus completing the requirement. Then at the next camp out, they could not repeat the task. They did not store it in long term memory. Being a sailor for 25 years and a climber for 40, I can tie a bowline, one handed, in a driving rain, with both eyes closed and someone yelling at me. Its a universal knot for boating and climbing. However, I have to review the book every time I need to tie a taut line hitch. I rarely use the knot and never relegated it to long term memory.