Yesterday during SM the bishopric was congratulating the wards newest Eagle Scout. He had over 100 merit badges!!If the morg followed the BSA correctly wouldn't they more likely get their Eagle at 17-18 years old?? Or is this case of the morg's "merit badge mills"? When I was his age I was First Class not Eagle Scout!

But then in the 1980's we didn't have any merit badge mills run by the morg either!!

My husband was a scoutmaster, bleck!!!! Anyhow the former scoutmaster's son was an eagle by 14. His dad pushed him to get all the merit badges. Honestly though I think it's because the badges really are easy to get. And some of the eagle projects now are really lame. So it's possible to be an eagle young, you just have to want to do it. Personally my teens would rather hang out with their friends or play video games, scouting has never appealed to them even when their dad was a scoutmaster. Although they do love camping but not boy scout camping.

I have noticed they are getting younger and younger. My dh gets angry about it because he feels the kids should definitely be at least a junior in high school.

The merit badges are likely done half-assed.

Exactly! Most Mormon troops are a joke. The leaders don't know what they're doing. The boys do not "earn" their badges, rank advancements, etc... I don't know how it is in Utah, but the council folks that did the eagle reviews where I grew up were very strict...they turned down young scouts if they couldn't prove they had put in the work and knew their stuff.

That's how I felt it was supposed to be too. I always pictured Eagle Scouts as mature young men, not a 13 year old. Besides are employers still looking for Eagle Scouts in today's world!!?

I was 16 when I got my eagle. Or I should say I was 16 when my scout leader decided I was close enough and just signed the rest of my stuff off.

I did hardly any work besides just showing up to scouts on a weekly basis and going to scout camp. People would just give me merit badges although I rarely passed off all the requirements.

"Oh you didn't track your progress for three months? well how about I just sign this off and you promise to track it in the future."

Mormonism is more about giving you an award to make you look good rather than making you learn anything and making you a better person.

Isn't it about growing and maturing as you move along? I agree-your Eagle doesn't mean jack crap on a resume these days..plus by the time said 13 yr old would need a resume his eagle's will be like 7 years old. :/. This is a classic case of "I, the parent need to show up the rest of the ward". Grrr..

Welll TBM Dadddy does own a local electronics and TV store.. maybe he's trying to rise up in the morg ranks!!??

You can get Eagle Scout for putting away a few chairs at stake conference.

As a scout leader for 30+ years (Eagle Scout, Silver Beaver, OA Vigil Honor), I never met a Mormon Eagle Scout that I felt earned his Eagle. I was on many Board of Reviews for them and they couldn't answer the simplest scouting question or explain how they got the nights camping to earn their camping MB. The powers that be wouldn't let us reject candidates, so I finally quit being on the boards. I've never seen a morg troop that was worth their charter. My Tenderfoots knew more scouting than their Eagles.

The worst thing that ever happened to the Boy Scouts is the Mormon Church.

Actually, around here they had the merit badge mill working by 1980. ALL LDS scouts were expected to get their Eagle badge. Like everything else, scouting was not considered a simple fun activity, but as work and goal oriented. No fooling around. It was serious business.

My father became a scout back in 1913. I don't think there was a single eagle by then. He had trouble even making Second Class. I at least did better, reaching First Class. Sons made Eagle. But in TSCC it was pushed.

rhgc Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Actually, around here they had the merit badge
> mill working by 1980. ALL LDS scouts were expected
> to get their Eagle badge. Like everything else,
> scouting was not considered a simple fun activity,
> but as work and goal oriented. No fooling around.
> It was serious business.
>
> My father became a scout back in 1913. I don't
> think there was a single eagle by then. He had
> trouble even making Second Class. I at least did
> better, reaching First Class. Sons made Eagle. But
> in TSCC it was pushed.

I think it was pushed on my younger nephews. One is now a RM , married and the other is on a mission during this surge. In the real world I doubt that either one of them would made eagle.

Eagle at 15.

I worked hard for my eagle, spending two full summers getting the merit badges, and then another summer rejuvenating a park in a north western suburb of Dallas. I hate that I put so much effort into an award from such a vile organization.

As I recall, Tenderfoot, First Class and Second Class have no time requirements. If you work your butt off you can get all three in a month or two. Star, Life and Eagle all have a time requirement of 6 months each I believe (maybe Star is only 4 months, but it's been a long time so I can't be sure). So in theory it's possible to go all the way in just over a year and a half. Some scouts who start when they're 12 get their Eagle before they turn 14.

They did in the 1980's. You had to be in each one for 4-5 months a piece.

You can get it done in a weekend. Most scout camps have a "1st year scout program" you go to one of these and you are guaranteed to have your Tenderfoot, 2nd and 1st class in an afternoon.

That's correct. The 11 year old scouts try to have their 1st class rank by the time they turn 12. There is no "waiting period" for these advancements. None of the requirements are that time consuming, except you need a couple campouts, need to track fitness improvement over a month, keep a budget, etc... They could all be done in a few months if you spent the time. There is a 6 month wait between BS rank advancements, so 13 is the earliest you could get your eagle. That would really be pushing it considering the project, review, etc...

It can be done. The tricky part is filling time in "leadership" roles in the troop. But an on the ball scoutmaster can make it happen. Or an average Scoutmaster driven by an annoying parent.

You can start earning merit badges at 11 now. And depending on the troop, some camps too. I had mine at 14 and I started at 12. These early awards are mostly about the parents hounding the kid though as was mine.

My stake does a 3 week merit badge series in February every year. You can "earn" 5-10 merit badges in that. They focus on the boring required ones like the three citizenship badges, and such.

Modern Scout Camp is very much a merit badge mill. In my time, earning more than 3 badges in a week at Summer Camp was hard. Now earning less than 5 means you goofed around.

Environmental Science is much easier than it used to be for example.

I live in the Morg.

There is not a week go by that I don't get a notice on my door for "help Nephi, Brigham, Moroni....etc. collect (table scraps, toothpaste, egg cartons) for their EAGLE SCOUT project.

My kids and I love to attempt to read through the "needed items" on the flyer. Normally they appear to be written by someone educated at a kindergarten level. The "project" itself sounds to take all of 15 minutes.

When I hear the term "EAgle Scout" it basically equates to a JOKE in Utah. HOPEFULLY other states have some requirements before this is handed out......

Makes me wonder if possibly the scout recording the famous rock tumbling incident in Southern Utah got awarded "Eagle" for his work...............would not surprise me.

I got my Eagle at 13 in the 1980s. My father had told me very firmly that I would be grounded in my bedroom for the entire 2 months between courts of honor if I did not advance as fast as humanly possible. I was scared of him so I managed to pull it off.

I actually put a lot of work in my Eagle Scout project which not only included writing a grant to get money from the state of Montana, bit also took nearly a full summer of my life.

In addition, after the project was completed, it was rejected for not involving enough leadership of other people.

I have since returned my Eagle badge to the BSA in protest of their treatment of gay leaders.

The relationship between the BSA and LDS inc is not a good thing for young people. The lowering of standards for the Eagle badge is not a good thing.

It is somewhat like the online Phd degrees now offered, that can be obtained in an afternoon.

The church needs to get them while they are young.

Young eagle scouts....

Young missionaries....

Young married couples.....

Young Women attending meetings....

Young bishops.....

It is all part of the indoctrination practices of a very controlling religious group.

I was a life scout and heard how important the eagle award was to everyone else's view of my value or their value as a leader. It made me not want to get it (I didn't). I saw others get their eagle who didn't like scouting or camping and I saw it as a bunch of hype. Then again I also was able to see the church as a whole as a bunch of hype. I guess it is just my personality.

I have seen troops that appear to be well staffed and attended outside the church and know that the other troops see the mormon troops as less than stellar, but I think they tolerated us as a necessary evil to keep the scouting alive. Every ward in the church pays for a troop and every young man whether they attend scouts or not. That is a lot of money and bodies to support a cause.

I think the scouts is an outdated concept, like the church, that doesn't fit into the mainstream thinking of today's society and will need to change or be left behind.

I know a guy that got it at 12. His dad had been a scout master forever, so he knew exactly how to work the system. Got all of the timed requirements started as early as anyone would allow, and hit everything rapid fire. It can be done, but it kind of defeats the purpose. He didn't seem any more prepared than I was as a scout dropout.

I got my eagle at 17, but I could have had it at 14 because that's when I had all the merit badges done, I just needed the project.

I should never have been made an eagle though. I never gave a damn about scouting and I still don't. But my parents wanted me to do it and I wanted to please them, so I did it.

I know jack about scouting and I can only tie a granny knot. Still, I tell people I am an Eagle because scouting was HELL for me, and I feel like I suffered enough to get the rank.

Eagle Rank Requirements

http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/BoyScouts/AdvancementandAwards/eagle.aspx

Here's the current requirments. It looks like they have tinkered with the program since the 1980's... Of course the morg could have "doctored" with it as well..

Looks the same as when I went through, late 90's.

Not for the ranks of Tenderfoot ,Second Class and First class it's not the same!!

Here's my $0.02:


Yes, it's possible. Technically, one can knock out almost all of the Tenderfoot, 2nd Class, and 1st Class requirements in a weekend, but I would SERIOUSLY question whether the scout actually LEARNED them.

(one of the requirements requires 10 outings that aren't regular troop meetings, so that one can take a bit of time unless it's summer and there are lots of extra-curricular scouting activities around)

The requirements for Star, Life and Eagle basically come down to time in a leadership position, merit badges, and service hours/projects. The time requirement for these three is 1 year and 4 months.

If a boy starts at age 11 (like TSCC does) and has a late spring birthday in an area with lots of scouting things (i.e., Wasatch Front) and finishes his first 3 ranks in a couple months and the last 3 in the minimum time, it's entirely possible to even have a 12-year-old Eagle Scout.

Again, when boys earn it before age 16, I really, really doubt he retains the information/skills and has truly demonstrated leadership abilities.

In Cub Scouts, requirements are signed off pretty easily and the boys learn that they don't have to remember how to do this stuff from week to week, just do it once with a lot of help and it will be signed off. Boy Scouts is supposed to be different, but usually isn't.



I can agree with Magic823 that the Eagle Boards of Review are a joke. I sat on one where the boy DIDN'T EVEN SHOW UP TO HIS OWN PROJECT. His mom organized the whole thing, and the boy would rather have gone to work. Then he shows up to the board and acts like he was there.

I brought up my concern that he didn't actually organize it, and wasn't there, and was being deceitful for omitting that information, but I was overruled and he got it.

Disgraceful.

I loved scouting, I thought it rocked. I loved to go camping and cooking around a fire. I worked for a summer at the East Fork of the Bear Scout Camp where I taught canoeing and rowing, I had the time of my life and only earned enough merit badges to make "Life". I choked on the Citizenship in the World merit badge and never went further....I had a wonderful time though and loved it every step of the way. I don't regret not getting the Eagle though, I was in it just for the fun.

It used to mean something to be an Eagle Scout. "Everyone" didn't achieve it. A concrete example of the change in perception is in college admissions. Used to be an Eagle Scout would be very likely to gain acceptance to any college. We've been visiting colleges recently with my older daughter, and this question comes up at each school's info session: "what about Eagle Scouts?" And the answer is always the same: "Scouting is just another extra curricular activity." Mormons have ruined scouting because the group think says that every kid has to be an Eagle Scout to demonstrate mormon superiority, so they just make it easy for every kid to get it.

I agree, scouts is ruined in mormonism, instead of being an awesome achievement when a scout obtains eagle, they are a dismal failure if they can't pass the easy test of obtaining eagle rank.

certainly not the development of the individual.

Somewhere some mucky-muck is giving a fireside saying "there are clues to where to find God's true church, and the purpose of this life is to find the treasure...one clue is that 90% of Mormon scouts achieve Eagle Scout. What does that tell you about the caliber of our young men?

Jesus said you could tell his followers by their fruits and I am here to bear witness that the Scouting program, which is designed by non-Mormons, has borne witness that this church...blah, blah, blah.


And behind the scenes, the magician's assistant is rigging the deck. It's still a con, folks.



Kathleen Waters