Processing Eagle Application without signatures

[jark]

Hello all,

When a scout from another troop approached his SM about signing his Eagle application, the SM refused citing some issues with attendance at meetings and general participation in troop activities (I believe). (He was not told of these issues while he was finishing up his requirements, including his project and just suprised by it all when the SM refused to sign the application.) The CC also would not sign it so as not to counter the SM since he (the CC) still had a son in the troop. The family asked my advice on what to do with the application and I advised them to just send it on to council without the signatures. This was back in October. Since then they have tried to contact the District Advancement Chair to schedule his BOR. This kept getting put off and now he has been told to go to some meeting (in another district) where they would discuss his application. This is not his BOR. Also, now, due to the length of time since his application he is faced with having to appeal anything that needs to happen since he is passed the 180 time limit for local processing.

My basic question is, what is the proper process to follow when you have an Eagle application without signatures? My understanding was that it should be sent to council and then a BOR would be called and they would rule on the application as it stood.

Thanks for any help/advice on this.

 

[Beavah]

Yah, hi jark.

 

We seem to be havin' a rash of these lately . Or maybe it's just that da other thread on this has gone on so long.

 

Proper procedure when da SM refuses to sign is for the boy to appeal to the Troop Committee. That should not be just da CC, it should be the committee. If they deny the appeal, they should give their reasons in writing and tell the lad how to appeal to the district advancement committee. That's generally done by calling the district advancement chair and requesting an appeal.

 

Just sending an incomplete application to da council administrative offices is a surefire way to have it get lost, because da folks who open the mail aren't part of the process and aren't goin' to be able to figure out what to do with an incomplete application. So unfortunately, I think yeh didn't give 'em da best advice.

 

It sounds like there's something goin' on in terms of a district or council-level appeal. So the lad should show up to that! Since the boy is now outside da 180 day window past his 18th birthday, he does need permission from National to even sit a BOR, even if da appeal is approved.

 

Might very well be that his Eagle quest is over, and it's time to just move on to college.

 

B

 

[ScoutNut]

From the BSA Advancement Committee Policies and Procedures book - Page 33 -

 

"There are two sets of circumstances in which a Scout or his parent(s) or guardian(s), acting on his behalf, may appeal a decision."

 

"The first situation occurs when a unit leader or unit committee does not recommend a Scout for a board of review, or refuses to sign the Eagle Scout application. In such cases, the Scout or his parent(s) or guardian(s) may appeal the decision to the committee responsible for advancement at the next level, as described below. The committee hearing the appeal shall then grant the Scout a board of review and appoint its members. In such cases, the committee hearing the appeal shall decide to grant or not to grant a board of review."

 

"All requests for appeal shall be made in writing, signed by the Scout and/or his parent(s) or guardian(s), and shall set forth in detail the reasons for requesting an appeal."

 

"Upon initial receipt of an appeal, the district and the council advancement committee charged with hearing the initial appeal shall provide for a prompt review to determine the facts. All parties must be interviewed or written statements obtained. Confrontations between opposing parties must be avoided."

 

In the case of your friend in the other Troop, the written request for an appeal should have gone to the District Advancement Committee Chair.

 

By your 180 time limit comment, it sounds like the Scout was a "death-bed" Eagle, who turned in his paperwork for signatures on, or after, his 18th birthday? IF that was the case, he, and his parents should have gone up the chain of command to the Council Advancement Chair, and beyond, long ago.

 

However, in the quote above from BSA it states that the appeal review should be done PROMPTLY. In my opinion, SEVEN MONTHS is not even close to prompt, so the District shoulders some of the blame for this.

 

If it is over 6 months since his 18th birthday, he needs to let whoever is at this "meeting" know that he will be petitioning the National Boy Scout Committee.

[John-in-KC]

Beavah and ScoutNut have it spot-on.

 

I just cannot tell you whether a request for a late EBOR in conjunction with an appeal will even fly. I've never encountered that level of administrative running in the muck.

[jark]

From the 2008 printing of the ACP&P I see under Item 4 on page 31. "The application should be signed by the unit leader at the proper place. The unit

committee reviews and approves the record of the Eagle candidate before the application is submitted to the local council. If aunit leader or unit committee fails to sign or otherwise approve an application, the Eagle candidate may still be granted a board of review. The failure of a unit leader

or unit committee to sign an application may be considered by the board of review in determining the qualification of the Eagle candidate."

Based on this it would seem reasonable to send the application on to council for processing by the to be convened BOR. The troop is extremely small and he was doing this right before he turned 18, so trying to get the troop committee to rule on this would have most likely been in-effectual. The council didn't loose the paperwork and it is still in process. I'm just trying to figure out what this meeting would be about. The mom has a call into the DE to try and figure out what is going on. The district person appears to have sat on this application for all this time, since I had asked him about it before the year (2008) ended.

[Beavah]

Based on this it would seem reasonable to send the application on to council for processing by the to be convened BOR.

 

Yah, the part of this that you're missin' is that the council is not who convenes boards of review. The council office is where the administrative staff and executive staff work, but advancement reviews are a volunteer function that isn't performed by those folks, eh? I have no idea what da council staff would do with an incomplete Eagle app with no letter attached, and every reason to expect it would take 'em a while to figure out what it meant and follow-up.

 

It sounds like they've set up some sort of means of addressin' the issue and hearing an appeal. So my completely uninformed guess would be that they're considering whether to overrule the unit and proceed to schedule a BOR. I'd expect the lad to show up in uniform and make his case why they should do that. If they choose to do that, though, it's still goin' to get held up because of the need for permission from National to hold the BOR. Like extensions of time, those are fairly rare birds usually granted only do to circumstances way beyond the scout's control.

 

So it might just be over, eh?

 

Either way, I think yeh need to be a bit circumspect as a scouter from another unit gettin' mixed up in things. Better to simply encourage her to call and speak with your DAC directly.

 

Beavah

 

[jark]

They have tried to get a response from the DAC. It looks like he was the one that was partially at least holding things up. The other reason I'm trying to follow this along is that I'm planning on taking over for the DAC this summer so I want to understand how we got to this point in case this kind of thing happens under my watch. She's trying to get ahold of the DE now to see what he knows about all this. The family is not new to the general process. His older brother is an Eagle, but his application didn't get all messed up like this. She didn't know any better than to wait for the DAC to call the BOR since that was what happened before. They received no counsel from the unit or the district on how to proceed with this set of issues, so hey just waited and called every so often to see that was to happen. The DAC never mentioned any appeals being necessary.

[Beavah]

Yah, hmmm. Messy.

 

Some times I really think we need a unit of trainin' for DACs on how to navigate all these shoals.

 

Is your current DAC just gettin' tired/bored with the work? Distracted by other things in life? It happens. That might be why it seems the appeal is bein' taken up in a different district. Could be yeh don't have a functioning district advancement committee at all.

 

I think you've got the right of it. Before yeh take over the DAC this summer you want to have a sit-down with him/her and go over all the outstanding cases and whether yeh actually have a committee. Figure out the lay of the land before you agree to wade into a mess with no support.

 

B

 

[NeilLup]

It really is almost a broken record but here is what the circumstances commonly are in these situations:

 

1) Young Scout is active, advances promptly to Life Scout and begins working on Eagle Scout

2) At about age 15-16, Scout succumbs to the siren call of gasoline, perfume and perhaps athlete's foot powder. Remains on the Troop rolls but stops attending and participating much and possibly at all

3) Some months, weeks or even days before he turns 18, Scout or his parents want him to complete his Eagle. He likely finishes up his project, maybe earns a last MB or two, completes the application and turns it in to his SM

4) SM, possibly a different SM than when he was a young Scout, says to himself or herself "Who are you and why are you bothering me? Where have you been for the last few years. Your failure to plan ahead does not create an emergency for me."

5) SM refuses to sign application for someone he or she does not know and whom they believe has not shown Eagle Scout Spirit and character. Failure to attend recent activities is considered prima facie evidence of poor Scout Spirit and character

6) Scout doesn't know what to do, does something which is not in line with the official appeal procedure (which he has not been provided) or believes in good faith that the adults will treat matters objectively and fairly and that the adults are moving things along

7) Scout either passes his 18th birthday or is very close to it and realizes that nothing is happening or else that action is being taken actively to block his Eagle

8) Someone connected with Scout posts on these boards asking what to do

 

Each case is very fact specific and any appeals take into account the specific facts of that Scout's Eagle. In the case listed, I hope that a cover letter was sent with the unsigned Eagle application asking that it be processed, asking for a Board of Review or an appeal, etc. If so, the date on that letter can be important as it documents the request occurring significantly prior to the 18th birthday. If no letter was sent, hopefully his original unsigned application sent to the council can be found and was date/time stamped. Again, this will document the original date of the application

 

I would furnish the Scout and his parents a copy of the Eagle appeal material. I would suggest that they formally begin the request/appeal process paying particular attention to dates that earlier material was submitted. I would talk with the DAC to find out how long it is expected that action will require and would follow up and pursue.

 

One never knows on appeals to National but in a case like this, I believe that the request to National to hold a Board of Review will very likely be successful particularly if there is documentation that the Scout made his request for a BOR in October and there has been no action. That will very likely be considered to be a delay beyond his control.

 

jark, congratulations on becoming DAC. These situations are rare and should be rarer. I would only suggest that immediately upon learning of such a situation, furnish the Scout with a copy of the Board of Review and appeal procedures and counsel with them on how to proceed. Possibly you would want to have a standard appeal request drafted for the Scout to complete to get the ball rolling. I would probably scan the appropriate pages from the advancement manual as a .pdf file so you could e-mail the information to the Scout, his parents and his Scout leaders immediately upon learning of a potential problem.

[Twocubdad]

Clearly you are dealing with two issues: one is that the troop and seemingly the advancement committee has botched how they handled the denial of the Scout's application. I think you will find one of the main reasons for the appeal process is to make sure boys don't get burned by the adult's ineptness. That would seem to be the case here. If the troop can't provide a copy of the letter they wrote the boy advising him of the appeal process, I would think that is clear grounds for an extension. It would also be good if you can find some documentation for when the family submitted the application to the council.

 

Scouts and their parents don't know the appeals process. It's not something folks are routinely taught and I doubt the average parent has ever heard of the Advancement Policy Guidebook. That is why leaders are required to provide the appeals process to Scouts in writing if an advancement is denied.

 

As I mentioned in the other similar thread, I am concerned that your family has been invited to attend "some meeting." Likely this is part of the district/council's fact-finding process. If these folks go in thinking this is just a discussion but it turns out to be a quasi-hearing, they're probably not going to be in a position to present their case effectively. That's not fair to the Scout. Hopefully your involvement will help.

 

The second issue is the underlying question of Scout Spirit and attendance. Generally, those are tough for a troop to sustain. But I don't think you can resolve that problem until the first is addressed.