Completed Blue Cards? Maybe, maybe not.

[Eagledad]

1 hour ago, swilliams said:

Of course he is. 

I do think this has shown that it would be a good idea to have the SPL go over blue card procedures at an upcoming meeting.  In addition to this issue, I had a heck of a time trying to get one of the young scouts to understand it. I didn’t have a print-out of the most recent MB Counselor list with me (had come straight from work), and couldn’t get the document to load on my phone. He couldn’t understand why I wasn’t going to forward the list to him.  He wondered aloud why, if scouts were supposed to be responsible, he couldn’t have the list for himself, lol. 

The MB process is one of the first scouting processes we teach new scouts. We found they have full confidence with it by their 3rd MB. We even work out using the the process for summer camp. I expected new scouts to struggle with the process, but we found they don’t have much trouble. It’s a process like all the other processes they use in their life. Just teach it right first thing.

Barry

[FireStone]

4 hours ago, SSScout said:

Was the person who signed the Blue Card, Approved The Merit Badge,  a bona fide registered in the Council Merit Badge Counselor when the card was signed?  Make the phone call(s).  If the answer to the question is "Yes", shake the Scout's hand and wish him well.   If "No", then smile,  hand him some more Blue Cards and give him a list of approved/registered Merit Badge Counselors for his desired subjects.  

This pretty much gets to the heart of the matter. Simple steps, verify the MBC, and act accordingly.

My guess is that you're not going to be able to verify this MBC, though, not for all 9 badges. How many counselors cover at least 9 badges? And it would be extremely coincidental that this scout just happened to hit up the counselor for the exact 9 badges that he/she covers.

I'm not even faulting the scout here, this was probably all done on some poor advice from the "counselor", a parent, etc. Someone saying, "Hey, I can sign those for you, no problem," and the scout just figures it's all well and good.

[elitts]

On 1/24/2020 at 9:46 AM, SSScout said:

*sigh*  The ultimate question is:   Was the person who signed the Blue Card, Approved The Merit Badge,  a bona fide registered in the Council Merit Badge Counselor when the card was signed?  Make the phone call(s).  If the answer to the question is "Yes", shake the Scout's hand and wish him well.   If "No", then smile,  hand him some more Blue Cards and give him a list of approved/registered Merit Badge Counselors for his desired subjects.   

See you on the trail....

Well, that's not entirely true.  If the MBC and the scout had good reason to think the MBC was a bona fide, registered MBC, the cards must be accepted.  I just saw somethign on this somewhere, but I know it was an issue in my council a year or two ago because they suddenly decided MBCs needed to re-register annually without actually announcing it publicly.  So there were a bunch of concerned Eagle Candidates freaking out because I and a few other MBCs in my troop had signed off on Blue Cards for them not realizing our registrations as MBCs had been dropped.

They were later assured that if the MBC was previously registered, the lapsing of a registration (as opposed to a cancelling) would not cause the scouts any issue.

[ParkMan]

I seem to recall that we've seen a the concept from national of "we don't penalize Scouts for the mistakes of adults."  I wonder how that translates to a case like this?

[Thunderbird]

I don't know all of the details, but I would look here for guidance:

Guide to Advancement: The Merit Badge Program:

[swilliams]

I gave the blue cards to the Scoutmaster last night.  Will let you know how he decides to handle this/approach the scout.

On another note, our young-ish and very eager MC for the next COH is driving me up the wall, lol.  I told him Friday morning that I would send an advancement report later that afternoon so he could start working on the program.  He emailed a half-hour later telling me I "must have forgotten" to send the report "in the rush of things". 

[swilliams]

An update, of sorts.  The Scoutmaster gave me back the blue cards last week.  The scout will need to re-do all of them.  At that point (last Tuesday), the SM still hadn't had a conversation with the scout.  He said he would talk to the scout at this past weekend's camping trip, so I hope that actually happened.  I'm a little concerned that so much time has passed, with no conversation, from when the scout first turned in the cards.  If the SM didn't speak to the scout yesterday/Saturday, I'll ask that the SM let me talk to him at our weekly meeting tomorrow.  I'll admit to being cowardly when it comes to having to address this with the scout, but he needs to be given the time to re-do the merit badges, and it's been a month now.