Court of Honor

[Greyfox]

You guys have probably beat this one to death but Bobwhite, on another thread, got me thinking about Courts of Honor, ie how do you make it significant if you give out the awards as soon as possible after the scouts have earned them?

[AdvanceOn]

We give the awards out immediately but then do the actual ceremony at the court of honor. For example, a Scout has earned Life. We do a special ceremony for Life. W do this for each rank. We also do any other special presentations (i.e., service project recognition, special training, adult leader recognition, etc.).

 

The other thing we are trying with our Courts of Honor is to find different places to hold them. Our charter organization isn't the nicest place to old them (it smells of beer and cigarettes). We have held a court of honor at our county courthouse, a local nursing home (did friendly visiting afterwards), a borough park, etc. The most impressive has been the court house.

[mk9750]

Great Question! I struggle all the time worrying about the same thing.

 

We give awards out immediately after earning them, except things earned at or immediately following summer camp, which we hold till the C of H in the fall, in late August (and we also have one in Feb.).

 

We give the boy any badges immediately, then give the cards for the badge in a more formal ceremony.

 

For 1st Class, we do a big ceremony giving each boy a fancy embroidered Troop neckercheif to replace the generic one we gave him when he crossed.

 

For Star and Life, we have an Honor Banner that each Scout (along with his parents) reveal his name added under the appropriate column for rank. This honor banner is one of the few things that has lasted for the entire charter of our Troop. It is a felt material, with cut out felt letters glued on, and has every Star, Life, and Eagle Scout our Troop has had since 1958. We also provide the Scout with a mother's pin for the ranks of Star and Life (and Eagle too)that the boys present their moms.

 

Each C of H is planned and MC'd by the ASPL. Because these often are diferent guys, the tone changes often. Sometimes these are pretty serious and solemn. Others are basically a roast, usually of the SM and / or some of the ASMs.

 

One thing I have tried to get the planners to include, but they just plain refuse, is to include a couple of skits (I am the adult mentor for these, as MCing a Court of Honor used to be a requirment for Communications MB, which I counsel) . These guys just don't like doing skits in front of families. I sure wish they would change their thinking about it. It's the thing I enjoy most about Courts of Honor!

 

Mark

[Glenn]

We do it similar to the above suggestions. We give out the merit badges and rank badges immediately after the scouts earn them. However, during the Court of Honor, we bring up in groups the boys that earned Tenderfoot, 2nd Class, etc. Also, if there were any special awards earned (like the religious awards), these boys are brought forward and congratulated.