Eagle Required Merit Badges for Star and Life

[Mick Meyer]

Hi:

 

We're having a debate in our troop about the Eagle required merit badges for Star and Life.

 

The Boy Scout handbook states:

 

A Scout may choose ANY of the 15 required merit badges in the 12 categories to fulfill this requirement. See the Eagle rank requirements for a complete list of required badges for Eagle.

 

The list of 15 required merit badges are:

 

1. First Aid,

2. Citizenship in the Community,

3. Citizenship in the Nation,

4. Citizenship in the World,

5. Communications,

6. Personal Fitness,

7. Emergency Preparedness

8. Lifesaving,

9. Environmental Science,

10. Personal Management,

11. Swimming

12. Hiking

13. Cycling,

14. Camping

15. Family Life.

 

Then for Eagle, the additional restrictions are added:

 

g. Emergency Preparedness OR Lifesaving,

j. Swimming OR Hiking OR Cycling,

 

Does this mean that for Star and Life, ANY of the 15 Eagle required merit badges can be used to meet the requirements?

 

I've also heard that TroopMaster software will not allow Emergency Preparedness AND Lifesaving for Star and Life, although this sounds more life a software programming problem than an issue with the Eagle required merit badges.

 

Please advise.

YIS

Mick

 

[Bob White]

Mick Meyer,

The Advancement Committee Policies and Procedures manual can clarify the answer but YES, for Star and life any Eagle required MB can be counted.

 

It is not until you reach life that you must have a psecific amount from certain catagories. At that time you can only use one from certain sets of merit badge options.

 

An example would be for instance..for Star or Life ranks Hiking and Cycling count as two Eagle required merit badges. Once you achieve Life rank you can count either Hiking or Cycling toward your total, but not both.

 

Bob White(This message has been edited by Bob White)

[FScouter]

Agreeing with Bob, the "OR" restriction for Eagle rank is a restriction for Eagle, not for Star or Life. Sounds like someone in your troop wants to deny Star or Life rank based on what mix of the 15 badges a boy earned?

[OldGreyEagle]

Thats what I love about this place, always a challenge to what you thought you knew.

 

In looking at the scout handbook, the merit badge requirement statement for Star reads:

 

"Earn 6 merit badges, including any 4 from the required list for Eagle"

 

Doest say you can only earn 4 Eagle required, just that at least 4 are required. For Life the statement reads

 

"Earn 5 more merit badges (so that you have 11 in all), including any 3 more from the required list for Eagle"

 

Again, I guess all 5 could be Eagle required, so by the time a scout becomes Life, he could have all the Eagle (11)required badges earned and would then need 10 "elective badges"

 

Our Troop has been in the habit of filling in Eagle required badges on the spaces in the handbook that said Eagle required. I wonder if we have slowed down advancement that way. That a scout could have had 6 required badges earned, but because 2 were on the Life page, his advancement to Star was slowed. Will be something worth looking into.

[SagerScout]

 

 

 

We do this also. IMO while it is possible that advancements have been delayed for this reason, my experience in reviewing books has led me to believe that it will be a rare ocurrence, since in the troops we've been involved in the boys usually have plenty of non-Eagle required badges by the time they gut it up to do some of those tough ones. My son is already on the Eagle page for non-required badges but still lacks one "required" one for Star. He seems to be typical.

 

But you're right, it is worth looking into.

[eisely]

Thinking about eagle requirments g and J as described in the original post; if a scout earns swimming does that mean that cycling can't even be counted as an elective merit badge? What about the other mutually exclusive merit badges? I don't think this is the intent of the requirement.

[rlculver415]

It has been my understanding (as the assistant advancement chair) that when a boy reaches Life, those Eagle required badges in g and j that are extra are indeed counted as electives. We tell our boys that when the mandatory badges are earned to not overlook the other three for electives.

 

SagerScout - I have also observed the same as you. We have boys in our troop who already have the bronze palm MBs done while they are still Star. Some just love doing MB work!

[Bob White]

rlculver,

You are correct in how badges can shift from required to elective after the scout receives his Life rank.

 

We see the same trend as far as MBs being earned. I think it has a lot to do with the attitude presented by the adult leaders. In my son's troop we do not push Eagle required badges. We encourage the scout to follow his interests and treat all MBs the same. The scout will accumulate the required ones along the way. Because of this we have scouts with 12 or more merit badges by the time they get Star. We also have 5 Eagle Scouts (4 over the age of 16) who remain active in the troop because scouting is fun. They weren't pressured to get certain MBs, they were free to choose what interested them.

 

Bob White

[KoreaScouter]

One thing that may be reinforcing rolling over Eagle required MBs beyond four from Star Reqt's to Life Reqt's columns is the big laminated wall chart many troops (ours included) uses to graphically depict advancement status. That graphic aid has column headings that "require" the entry of four Eagle required badges and two electives for Star...ditto for the Life column.

 

KS