Successfully complete your Board of Review for the ### Rank

[MrBob]

Given the following excepts from the Guide to Advancement - http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/GuideToAdvancement

 

8.0.0.1 Purpose and Timeliness of Boards of Review

After a Scout has completed the requirements for any rank or Eagle Palm, he appears before a board of review. Its purpose is to determine the quality of his experience and decide whether he has fulfilled the requirements for the rank

 

8.0.0.2 Boards of Review Must Be Granted When Requirements Are Met

A Scout shall not be denied this opportunity. When he believes he has completed all the requirements for a rank, including a Scoutmaster conference, a board of review must be granted.

 

8.0.1.1 Not a Retest or "Examination"

Though one reason for a board of review is to help ensure the Scout did what he was supposed to do to meet the requirements, it shall become neither a retest or “examination,†nor a challenge of his knowledge.

 

8.0.1.5 After the Review

If a board does not approve, the candidate must be so informed and told what he can do to improve. Most Scouts accept responsibility for their behavior or for not completing requirements properly.

 

4.2.1.2 The Scout Is Tested (sidebar)

Once a Scout has been tested and signed off by someone approved to do so, the requirement has been met. 

 

 

 

... then ASSUMING that all listed requirements for a Scout's rank advancement have been signed-off by an appropriate party (f.ex. by the Scoutmaster), under what circumstances would a Scout not "successfully complete" his Board of Review (aside from simply not showing up)?

 

 

Curious what your thoughts are.

 

 

edit: formatting

Edited July 3, 2016 by MrBob

[Sentinel947]

Given the following excepts from the Guide to Advancement - http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/GuideToAdvancement

 

8.0.0.1 Purpose and Timeliness of Boards of Review

After a Scout has completed the requirements for any rank or Eagle Palm, he appears before a board of review. Its purpose is to determine the quality of his experience and decide whether he has fulfilled the requirements for the rank

 

8.0.0.2 Boards of Review Must Be Granted When Requirements Are Met

A Scout shall not be denied this opportunity. When he believes he has completed all the requirements for a rank, including a Scoutmaster conference, a board of review must be granted.

 

8.0.1.1 Not a Retest or "Examination"

Though one reason for a board of review is to help ensure the Scout did what he was supposed to do to meet the requirements, it shall become neither a retest or “examination,†nor a challenge of his knowledge.

 

8.0.1.5 After the Review

If a board does not approve, the candidate must be so informed and told what he can do to improve. Most Scouts accept responsibility for their behavior or for not completing requirements properly.

 

4.2.1.2 The Scout Is Tested (sidebar)

Once a Scout has been tested and signed off by someone approved to do so, the requirement has been met. 

 

 

 

... then ASSUMING that all listed requirements for a Scout's rank advancement have been signed-off by an appropriate party (f.ex. by the Scoutmaster), under what circumstances would a Scout not "successfully complete" his Board of Review (aside from simply not showing up)?

 

 

Curious what your thoughts are.

 

 

edit: formatting

If the Board became aware of unaddressed severely unscoutlike behavior like drinking underage or drug use or some kind of criminal conviction. 

[NJCubScouter]

In our troop, a Scout who showed up for a BOR without a uniform would be asked to come back on another day.

 

And before everybody goes and finds the section of the G2A that says you can't do it, you don't need to, I know that's what it says. It says the Scout must be "neat in appearance" or something like that but specifically says they do NOT have to be in uniform. In our troop they do. (And this is not an issue of someone not being able to purchase a uniform. We have a "uniform bank" and if that was not sufficient due to size issues or whatever, if the Scout was truly poverty-stricken to the point where all earnings from lawnmowing, etc. had to go to the parents to put food on the table (which we have had once or twice), we have enough resources and available benefactors that a uniform would appear out of nowhere for the Scout. Every Scout in our troop, every single one, has had a uniform, whether they actually owned it or not. If it is not being worn at the BOR, it is not because it doesn't exist, it is because it is on the floor of the kid's bedroom underneath other stuff, or in the wash due to poor planning, or they couldn't take 5 minutes to change out of their sports uniform before coming to the meeting, or any of the 100 other reasons an 11 to 17 year old boy can find for not doing what he is supposed to. In that case, there is always next week. And that is another reason why I think our "policy" is ok and we don't get challenged on it: We don't have quarterly or even monthly BOR's, we will have them every week if needed, on demand, and I think in one case where time was critical (Star Scout was about to turn 17-and-a-half) we got together and did it on a weekend. We meet the Scouts more than halfway, so they can be in uniform.)

Edited July 4, 2016 by NJCubScouter

[Oldscout448]

I did once "fail" a scout for star rank. To this day I don't know what the problem was. The scout was so scared/nervous/whatever he couldn't speak to answer a single question. Although he did manage to nod his head in the beginning, after a few minutes he was shaking and crying. After 15 minutes of gently trying to get any response the board regretfully asked him to come back another time.

 

A fellow scouter once failed without regret a scout who was attempting to use his older brothers doctored merit badges cards. But I suppose that would fall into "not completing requirements b

Edited July 4, 2016 by Oldscout448

[Stosh]

Any troop that requires the boys to wear a uniform for a BOR can go to a different troop and get that requirement passed.    If I had committee members that insisted on that, I'd find 3 different people to run the BOR's in our troop.  This is definitely a power-game played by adults to over ride the intent of the BOR and advancement requirements.

 

Sorry, but the boys deserve better than that when they have earned their rank.

[TAHAWK]

Council websites get this wrong, which is fairly amazing since the rule has been unchanged for a long, long time:

 

"If wearing all or part of the uniform is impractical for whatever reason, the candidate should be clean and neat in his appearance and dressed appropriately, according to his means, for the milestone marked by the occasion. Regardless of unit, district, or council expectations or rules, boards of review shall not reject candidates solely for reasons related to uniforming or attire, as long as they are dressed to the above description."

 

A Board of Review might discover that the candidate has not met the requirements for the rank.  I know for a fact that it has happened, including an Eagle candidate who, upon extermination, had earned twenty Merit Badges.

[Beavah]

If the Board became aware of unaddressed severely unscoutlike behavior like drinking underage or drug use or some kind of criminal conviction. 

 

Yah, forget a Board of Review, eh?   Shouldn't this be grounds for suspension or dismissal?

 

Why would yeh even worry about rank?  Yeh have to address da behavior directly.

 

Never mix Advancement up with discipline.   They're two very different things, with different methods, goals, and purposes.  Advancement will never work as a method to inspire and build character if we turn it into a method for disciplining kids.

 

Beavah

Edited July 4, 2016 by Beavah

[Beavah]

Any troop that requires the boys to wear a uniform for a BOR can go to a different troop and get that requirement passed.  

 

Perhaps, but only if they want to join a different troop, eh?   

 

They might like their troop, and respect its adults, and enjoy da friends in their patrol.   They might have seen Mr. I'll-Give-You-Your-Badge at summer camp or the most recent camporee and decided they'd die before ever joining his troop.  

 

Either way, I reckon they'll come back da next week with a uniform, and proudly earn their patch, and then start planning for their next outing with their friends.  

 

It's only adults who get their knickers all in a twist over Advancement, not the boys.   Show me a rigid by-the-book Advancement troop that quotes da Guide to Advancement regularly, and I'll show yeh an adult-run troop that hasn't really figured out Youth Leadership method. 

 

Beavah

Edited July 4, 2016 by Beavah

[qwazse]

Scouts must show up with their books to their BoR in our troop. If they don't, it's a nonstarter.

[Stosh]

Scouts must show up with their books to their BoR in our troop. If they don't, it's a nonstarter.

But of course, it's his only proof he is entitled to a BOR.

[blw2]

Any troop that requires the boys to wear a uniform for a BOR can go to a different troop and get that requirement passed.    If I had committee members that insisted on that, I'd find 3 different people to run the BOR's in our troop.  This is definitely a power-game played by adults to over ride the intent of the BOR and advancement requirements.

 

Sorry, but the boys deserve better than that when they have earned their rank.

 

 

Council websites get this wrong, which is fairly amazing since the rule has been unchanged for a long, long time:

 

"If wearing all or part of the uniform is impractical for whatever reason, the candidate should be clean and neat in his appearance and dressed appropriately, according to his means, for the milestone marked by the occasion. Regardless of unit, district, or council expectations or rules, boards of review shall not reject candidates solely for reasons related to uniforming or attire, as long as they are dressed to the above description."

 

A Board of Review might discover that the candidate has not met the requirements for the rank.  I know for a fact that it has happened, including an Eagle candidate who, upon extermination, had earned twenty Merit Badges.

 

 

great topic/thread @@MrBob!

 

I've only sat in on one board of review so far as committee member.  It was right after I started and I was honestly blindsided by it.... nobody asked me before hand, I was there, and they needed another member, so it happened.

 

I have to say it seemed like a very confused issue to me.

 

The CC sortof coached the boy to stand front and center, stand up straight, etc....

and asked him to recite the law, the oath, the outdoor code

and then the adults barraged the scout with a mix of questions while he stood at "attention"

reciting the law + many of the questions, in my thinking were a re-test

and if they weren't were demanded for no other reason than to make the scout nervous.

 

some of the questions asked ( a few from me, and some by others) were more along the lines of exploratory to find out

what the scout liked or didn't about the rank

liked or doesn't about the troop

were more along the lines of associating with the scout, getting to know him and more importantly getting him more comfortable in talking to adults.

etc...

oh, and just a minor amount of time spent reviewing the paperwork sign offs.... treated more like a formality.

 

I have to say that i really did not like the tone of the thing

and that whole re-test thing is a HUGE trip-up that folks didn't seem to get.

I suspect that this is very common.

[Eagle94-A1]

^{We had a situation recently where we had a Scout pass his Second Class and First Class ranks in 1 BOR. After the fact, we discovered that Mom was signing off on the requirements, and parents that attended the orientation meeting, which she did not, were told that the Scouts are no longer Cubs. We also told the Scouts on several occasions that parents could no longer sign off. Again after the BOR, when the adult in charge of the records went to update the troop's records book, one signature didn't seem right. We asked the Scout 2 times who signed it off and he "can't remember." When it was recognized as his mom's, we asked him a 3rd time if mom signed off, and he said yes.}

 

^{Unfortunately we could not revoke his Second Class and First Class ranks. And we didn't have time to work with him to get the skills up to par since he missed meetings between that night and when he moved. I feel for the troop he will be transferring to.}

[BamBam]

^{We had a situation recently where we had a Scout pass his Second Class and First Class ranks in 1 BOR. After the fact, we discovered that Mom was signing off on the requirements, and parents that attended the orientation meeting, which she did not, were told that the Scouts are no longer Cubs. We also told the Scouts on several occasions that parents could no longer sign off. Again after the BOR, when the adult in charge of the records went to update the troop's records book, one signature didn't seem right. We asked the Scout 2 times who signed it off and he "can't remember." When it was recognized as his mom's, we asked him a 3rd time if mom signed off, and he said yes.}

 

^{Unfortunately we could not revoke his Second Class and First Class ranks. And we didn't have time to work with him to get the skills up to par since he missed meetings between that night and when he moved. I feel for the troop he will be transferring to.}

 

Why wasn't this caught at the Scoutmaster's Conference?

[Stosh]

@@BamBam is correct, the SM wasn't doing his/her job.  He's responsible for the boys and their advancement.  If they are not following the procedure correctly, it needs to be corrected long before it gets to the BOR.  How does one get all the way to FC without someone noticing that mom is still in Cub Scout mode?  Not the kid's fault!

[Eagle94-A1]

Why wasn't this caught at the Scoutmaster's Conference?

 

 

I agree, SM should have caught it prior to the SM's conference. So some responsibility is on him,as well as the rest of us who signed off in his book.

 

 How does one get all the way to FC without someone noticing that mom is still in Cub Scout mode? 

 

Easy. Because of family situation, Scout is at meetings and outings 1/2 the time. And instead of going to summer camp with the troop, he went provisional. He did First Year camper at a different camp than the one we went to. The SM thought the FYC director was the signatory, when he was reminded that one of the ASMs signed off on what was done at camp based upon the paperwork sent from the camp.

 

Not the kid's fault!

 

Yes, the adults do bear responsibility for this fiasco. But I do blame the Scout for some of this. He was told several times that parents do not sign off. And when asked, he deliberately lied about it when asked. It was only when he was asked if his mom signed the book that he admitted she did.

 

An aside, I honestly believe the Scouts would have caught this if THEY (emphasis) had the ability to sign off in my troop.