Scholarship merit badge requirements for homeschoolers

[mmichrina]

My wife and I homeschool our son, who is an active Boy Scout. His fellow scouts have earned their scholarship merit badge this year in public school, and he is curious about earning it himself. Some of the requirements do not apply in our situation, for example:

 

1(a)average grade of 82 (we don't score our children on this type of scale)

 

1(b)improved grades over a previous period (again, we don't 'grade')

 

3) get a note from your school principle...

 

4) take part in an extracurricular school activity

 

Are there alternate requirements for a home schooler, or is it not possible for my son to earn this badge?

 

YIS,

Mark

[sctmom]

There are some home-schooling parents on this board that hopefully can answer this from prior experience. I don't homeschool but know some about it. This is my opinion only.

 

Does your son have a Merit Badge Counselor for this badge? It should be worth your time and your son's time to hunt down an "official" merit badge counselor for this badge.

 

In our state homeschooled children do have to take standarized test periodically. I think showing an improvement in those scores or those scores showing your child is in the upper 20% of children the same age would satisfy requirement #1.

 

Note from the principal -- I would think some proof from you of his work in the areas of scholarship, service, etc. Does he help siblings with schoolwork? How does he behave about doing his school work? Does he show leadership and service in the family, neigborhood, etc? Do you do things with other homeschooling families where you son shows leadership (helping other kids with work)?

 

School extracirricular -- has he done anything above and beyond standard homeschooling? Again, do you interact with other homeschoolers and do "extra" things? Does he play sports? I know that community sports is not normally extracirricular but I think the intent is that the student is involved in more than just basic academics ---sports, drama, band, clubs, etc.

 

Home schooled scouts aren't that unusual. The other night I heard that one of the scouts in our troop is about to "graduate" after 12 years of home schooling. His sister is already in college and he has a teenager brother a couple of years younger.