Eagle Scouting
 

Our 12-year-old has been asked to join a troop that produces Eagles left and right. It's an outstanding group that starts them on the Eagle track right off.

My question-to those of you who are Eagles--how did it benefit you down the line? Of course it made you a better man, but did it lead to scholarships or anything else concrete?

Sorry this sounds so blunt and crass but if he wants to join something else, we need to know stuff like this! We have a huge family and if this is going to take a lot of money and/or time, we're not sure if he should do it...BlazerCheer and Ballerina received the Gold Award in Girl Scouting and college admissions and financial aid reps could not have cared less. They were more excited that they cheered.

I was a Boy Scout only briefly (the troop disbanded) before I joined Civil Air Patrol as a cadet. The CAP equivalent to the Eagle Scout award is the General Carl A. Spaatz award; cadets who earn this award wear the rank of cadet colonel. (I only rose as high as cadet major and the Amelia Earhart award.)

CAP cadets wear Air Force uniforms with distinctive CAP grade insiginia, which can be either purchased from the BX (base exchange -- CAP members are allowed on base to purchase items from the military clothing sales store) or furnished by the squadron. The cadet program is much like Air Force Junior ROTC but CAP also performs ground search and rescue and flying.

I've always disliked any group (Boy Scout troop or CAP squadron) that are nothing but "award factories" -- IMHO, it cheapens the prestige of the award and once you get to the top, what's next?

More info on CAP at www.capnhq.gov .

My little brother almost got his Eagle award but dropped out before he finished it. He was in the middle of working on it when the boy scouts had the scandal where they wouldn't allow gays to serve as scout masters. The prejudice views of the boy scouts headquarters and his own troop's scout master (who made some homophobic jokes in front of the troop) turned him off scouting and he quit before he finished his eagle scout award.

As far as cost, stuff like going camping may be expensive but I seem to remember my brother's troop working to raise money so that no one would be excluded because of money.

The financial aid forms for the colleges that he applied for mentioned scholarships for eagle scouts. In that way he wishes he had earned the award but he is glad that he stood up for what he felt was right.

My bf is an Eagle Scout. I believe he rec'd scholarships and other awards towards his education. In fact, while at University of Dayton, he founded an honorary fraternity for Eagle Scouts, Epsilon Tau Pi. They are currently chartering their second chapter at Ohio State.

http://www.epsilontaupi.org/

GPBoy was an Eagle Scout as well as in Order of the Arrow. I know he thought it was very worthwhile - it opened a few doors for him in job interviews because he won a lot of state awards for it. About 40% of the SigEp chapter he was in are Eagle Scouts. A lot of men in my family are also Eagles. I think it is something definitely worth doing and don't believe it is very costly - it gives them a LOT of useful knowledge and I know it's something Lee took pride in - he wore his Eagle Scout tie tack all the time and had his awards framed and displayed.

I received my Eagle Scout a few months before I turned 18. I really had to work hard to get it, because I was so involved in sports and activities in high school. It was tough, but very worthwhile. I'd also agree that it didn't get me into college, or anything like that, but it has always come up in job interviews and it is definitely a point of pride.

An interesting note for those who may be unaware of it:

A Eagle Scout or a Girl Scouts Gold Award Holder is eligible for advanced enlistment into the U.S. Armed Forces at the rank of E-2. (Private, Airman, Seaman-Apprentice).

Someone who has successfully earned the CAP Billy Mitchell, Carl A. Spaatz, or Amelia Earhart award is eligible for advanced enlistment into the U.S. Air Force at the rank of E-3 (Airman First Class) or into another branch of service at the rank of E-2.

By all means, support him and help him go for it!! It is a big deal.

No, it probably won't get him college or grad school (although you never know whether it might be the thing that makes a difference between him and the other guy), but it will help if he's up for scholarships or the like. It will tell others (like scholarship committees) that he has integrity, is not afraid of hard work, understands the need to be involved in the community, is well-rounded and has interests beyond the books, and can plan a project, direct others in carrying it out, and can see it through to completion.

And those are just the "tangible" benefits. The "intangible" benefits -- the self-confidence, life-skills and experiences -- are, as the ad says, "priceless."

Yes, I agree that "award factories" can be off-putting. But the reality is that a very small percentage of Boy Scouts make Eagle. (I think it may be less than 5%.) While this troop may turn out lots of Eagles, that certainly is not the case nationwide.

And it may be a terrible thing to say, but in my experience, Eagle Scout is treated as a class all on its own -- you're right when you say the Gold Award in Girl Scouting isn't considered on a par with Eagle. Pop Quiz: Ask twenty random people what the Gold Award is. Then ask twenty random people what the Eagle Scout award is. I'm willing to be you'll get lots more correct answers from the second group than from the first. May not be fair, but its true.

Let me put it this way: Just two days ago, my brother-in-law, whose nephew is about to earn his Eagle, commented (without any prompting from me ;)) that I should be proud of earning my Eagle. Its not the first time I've gotten comments like that. I've known men in their sixties and seventies (including my father) who have commented that they still regretted not earning their Eagle. It's the only twenty-some year old honor that I would even think of putting on a resume. And in my office, I have only two "certificatey" kinds of things other than diplomas and a law license: my Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia shingle and my Eagle Scout certificate.

Rhetorical question: if he were in college and wanted to join a fraternity, would you ask "Of course it made him a better man, but will it lead to job opportunities or anything else concrete? "


Like I said, by all means help him go for it!!!

One of my friends was an Eagle Scout and he ended up getting a scholarship for it. I can't tell you much more than that, though.

I think it's also true that the Eagle Scout award is more known than the Gold Award and so it will tend to up his chances with a college admissions committee (or in similar situations) -- the majority of whom probably don't know what the "Gold Award" is.

I had a friend in high school who was an Eagle Scout. It was a huge deal--there was a write-up in the paper about him and everything. I don't know if being an Eagle Scout will get you scholarship money (but as others have said, it's possible!), but it is a thing of prestige and I definitely don't think it would be time wasted earning it.

Attaining the rank of Eagle is one of my most proud accomplishments. Becoming an Eagle Scout isn't just about reaching the "top" - it's about all the experiences along the way. I wouldn't trade those experiences or memories for anything.

I was very active in scouting from when I was 11 until around the time I started college. I was also quite active in school activities as well - clubs, sports, prez of the honor society, etc. In my opinion, being active in scouting and being active in extracurricular activities didn't really compare. In the long run, scouting has benefited me far more than anything else I was involved in at the time. I believe that the man I have become is in large part due to the experiences and values that I learned as a scout. Scouting has truely had a big impact on my life.

Expense-wise it isn't too bad. But I suppose that depends on a few things. Class A uniform along with several scouting related t-shirts for when only a class B uniform is needed. You'll need to buy those a few times as your son grows out of the clothes. Camping equipment - the sleeping bag & backpack will probably be most costly of all the equipment. Good hiking boots if the troop does any long hiking trips. Cost for summer camp & weekend camping trips. Depending on the size of the troop there will probably be older kids who already grew out of some uniforms, so you can get them for free. Some troops can cover the cost of dues (I believe it was $1 a week), the weekend camping trips and a good portion of summer camp expenses for the scouts with fundraisers.

Significance / recognition: I don't know much about how things are in girl scouting or the differences between girl scouting & boy scouting, but back when I was a scout a number of people had told me that being an Eagle Scout was given significant consideration by college admissions staff. My personal example of this, not related to college admissions: I accomplished quite a bit in high school - high grades, honors classes, president of the honor society, varsity scholar, a distinguished scholars award.... none of that seemed to garner much recognition from the community "higher ups" such as the mayor, etc. On the night of my Eagle Scout court of honor I received letters & certificates of recognition from all kinds of people including the mayor, state senators, local organizations (such as the VFW), local business executives and even from Bill & Hillary Clinton. I have a filing cabinet drawer full of this stuff.

Now for something more directly related to college admissions - at one point I was seriously considering an application to the Air Force Academy. I did a lot of research into it and ultimately decided that was not what I wanted to do. But while I was still considering the possibility, through scouting contacts it took only a few days to secure my congressional nomination to the Air Force Academy "just in case" I decided to apply.

Aside from all that & more about scouting in general - not all troops are the same. I feel as though I was fortunate to be in a very active & successful troop. The troop put out a good number of Eagle Scouts, we won top awards at scouting events - but more important than all of that, we had the best times. I've seen troops which were run like military units, or like schools outside of school - our troop was not like that. Along with summer camp for a week in the summers we also spent another week camping in west virginia, we went skiing in the winter, the troop spent a weekend camping on an aircraft carrier, one halloween weekend we spent in Salem, MA (what better place to spend halloween?), we met and served as honor guard at an event for Henry Kissenger. Myself and a friend from my troop went to the 1989 national scout jamboree, with our council's jamboree troop, where during one of the events Steven Spielberg told a huge audience about the "movie" he made while working on a scout merit badge - how scouting influenced his life and how when he became an Eagle Scout was one of the proudest moments in his life. We camped on an airforce base (for around $1 a day, not per person but for the entire troop!) for about a week while hiking around Washington, DC, and we can't forget about the co-ed camping trips with the girl scouts - they were always fun times... and the list goes on...

I have never once heard from anyone I know or knew that they regretted the time they spent in scouting. I have heard many times from friends who weren't in scouting that they wished they had joined.

Becoming an Eagle Scout may not be the determining factor that gets your son into college, or earns him financial-aid/scholarships. But it can be a significant help. And not only could your son list being an Eagle Scout on his college applications, future job applications, scholarship applications - there are also scholarships specifically for Eagle Scouts.

But regardless of all that and whatever other life benefits the rank of Eagle may bring -- the scouting experience in an of itself is enough to say that getting involved in scouting is a great thing to do.

I was a Brownie, and I loved it. It was so much fun. I earned some merit badges which I still have. I now wish that I had flown up to Juniors as my sister did. The Juniors had even more fun.

I really don't know about Eagle Scouts, but it seems like many successful people earned that distinction. I'm not sure if they are successful because of the skills they learned as Eagle Scouts, or if they had those skills and applied them to becoming Eagle Scouts. Either way, it seems to be a wonderful accomplishment.

I'm an Eagle Scout as well. I never regretted the time I spent in the troop. I earned mine when I was 14, and I had been in Scouting since I was in elementary school through Cub Scouts. As far as the benefits I derived from it , it made me a better man, but it really helped me develop my leadership qualities, since a requirement for the upper level ranks is to hold a position of leadership for 6 months or a year.

The most important lesson it taught me is personal responsibility and time management. That's cool your kids cheered - I cheered too, and got a full scholarship for it (which unfortunately didn't include housing, but covered tuition, including out of state, and books). Well, I guess I'm not saying that being an Eagle Scout made me a better cheerleader even if I did end up being a Div IA athlete on scholarship. But through my membership in NESA (National Eagle Scout Association) I was awarded a scholarship that helped pay for my housing. So that's a concrete benefit I enjoyed. :D

In my chapter there were a handful of other Eagles and I guess we kind of "flocked together," since we had that other bond in addition to our brotherhood. The biggest thing about Eagle is it is considered a big accomplishment and can open doors in terms of jobs, it tells you a lot about the strength of someone's character that they can stick to an arduous and at times, time-consuming task and in the end they can finish what they start.

I've never heard anyone say that they regretted being a Boy Scout--not even Mr Munchkin, who quit his troop because the guys there would say virulently racist and homophobic things, and it appeared to be getting worse. His predecessor, however, was an Eagle Scout--he wasn't the nicest guy, essentially he was a jerk, but the Eagle Scout thing was the best thing he had done during the time that I knew him.

As far as money, it depends on the troop. Boy Scouts as a whole tended to be a lot lower maintentance than the Girl Scouts. :D

Omigosh! Carnation, your question actually brought the mysterious John Hammell out of the woodwork. For that alone, you better get your son into the troop!

LOL, FuzzieAlum!

Thank you, John, and thank you all for the great responses y'all are giving us. It's a big decision for us due to time commitments--our son is such an Eagle Scout type but he's already got football and band and church and that doesn't even begin to figure in all his siblings' commitments.

I knew if I just bluntly put the question out there, it was going to sound like, "What's in it for him and to heck with the intangibles"...we just got so frustrated when maybe 1 in 6 college admissions officers even knew what the Gold Award was. Or cared. We'd love for him (and his brothers) to go back into Scouting but it would be sad if all that came from his Eagle was a handful of certificates, which is about all the girls got from the Gold. I want it to be something special for him like you guys have described--both tangibly and intangibly!

As someone who had 7 (yes 7!) of his best friends from elementary school earn their Eagles, I can say this: make sure he is doing it for himself. When I look at my friends who didn't have pressure on them from parents, they enjoyed the process a lot more than those who did it because their parents pushed them to do it (those guys hated Scouts but their parents wouldn't let them quit, it was a constant battle, and while looking back they enjoyed the camps and stuff, there still is a lot of resentment about being made to do something). Now I doubt Carnation the master mom is a pushy parent, but if your son joins a troop where the Eagle is the rule rather than the goal it might make him feel that he is doign it just because everyone else around him is doing it.

I say let him join, but make sure he realizes that the only expectation is for him to have fun.

Just what I was thinking - when John makes a post that's not related to GCAdmin-ing, that means something is important!

Chop chop, carnation! ;)

I'm an eagle scout. It was a blast and is something that you can be really proud of i mean only 2% of all the boys who join scouts will ever make eagle.

Some advice that i would give is to take your time, it's not a race to get the award ASAP. You have until you are 18 to get it and I think that you should definatly enjoy yourself and go at a moderate pace. All too often boys feel pressured into getting badge after badge, end up getting totally burned out and lose intrest.

I just remembered this thread because last night, our son was inducted into the Order of the Arrow! (As a Pi Phi, I was thrilled by all the "arrow" items he was given!) :D Anyway, he's well on his way to Eagle rank and his younger brother is right behind him.

Congrats on the Order of the Arrow :)

Eagle with Two Palms.

It is not what I gained from being and Eagle Scout, but the leassons that I learned. :)

I still have all of My Items and I look at them Lovingly!:cool:

Pat on the Back for sure!!!!:cool:

Gold Award
 

My daughter earned her Gold Award during her rising sophomore summer. Both Mr. Alum and I encouraged her to complete the prerequisites and the actual Gold Award project earlier in the hs years for several reasons.
1. School gets harder in the later hs years. APs start in sophomore year if you are super advanced.
2. Multiple extracurriculars: varsity sports, school clubs, religious activities
3. What else is there to do in the summer when you are too young to work?
4. Very application/resume-enhancing especially as a teenager when the resume is relatively sparse.


Hopefully the son will emulate his sister. He's only in 6th grade so who knows? He will be promoted to 1st class at the next Board.

Neither my spouse or I were Scouts. I admire both organizations although having a GS first, I prefer the way they run things. I'm sure I'll get used to the Boys after a while.

Carnation, How big are your troops where you live? My daughter's troop is an older girl (7th-12th grade ) troop that has roughly 65 girls. The BS Troop has about 80 Boys. These sound huge to me, but there are always multiple IPPs and merit badges to choose.

Re: Gold Award
 

Both of my kids are in scouting and I have to say that I prefer the way Cub Scouts runs compared to Girl Scouts, at least so far. My daughter is in her first year of Cadettes, but here, each troop is by grade. I believe there are two troops for her 6th grade class and there are about 10 girls in her troop. I don't know how many the other troop has. The two orgs have very different philosophies and it is understandable why they do, but GS is much harder to stay involved with because they do not want other family around. My daughter is able to attend any Cub Scout event we have. Most events are designed around the family and she helps out with the boys meetings sometimes. Now that she's old enough to stay home alone, she doesn't have to come to all of our meetings, but she earns service hours for Girl Scouts by attending so many Cub Scout things. Examples: She assists with our annual Can Do food drive and park clean up day. GS says "Our girls don't beg for food or pick up trash". I don't see the emphasis with community service with GSUSA that BSA has. Our GS leader is always begging for drivers to go on field trips, but I am not allowed to let my son tag along, so I can't drive. He's too young to leave home alone.

The philosophy is that GSUSA needs to focus on the girls and their own personal growth and development because girls were ignored in our society for so long. I do understand that. However, in our changing world, they need to understand that they aren't going to get parental assistance if other siblings can't tag along sometimes. The neighborhoods are poorly structured and kids get lost if a leader decides she can't do it anymore. A troop just disbands and the girls aren't notified or put into a different troop. My daughter missed her second year of brownies because of this. I didn't go to Girl Scout sign up night because I thought she was already in a troop from the year before. Perhaps it's just our area, but they're very disorganized. There is no real structure to advancement, awards, badges, etc.

Cub Scouts (no experience with Boy Scouts yet) focuses on the family and has a stronger structure with a large Pack and several smaller dens. There is a committee that runs the pack which helps avoid the issues noted above if a leader quits. The pack committee can find someone new, get those boys in a new den, etc. The pack events are whole family oriented and many of the advancements/awards depend on family involvement. I like that, but have also seen how it adversely affects boys whose families don't get involved. Advancement in Cub Scouting is very structured, with some flexibility built in too to account for varied interests. Cub Scouts puts less work on the leaders also (as a leader myself).

Anyway, two different orgs with two different philosophies and structures. Each has it's advantages and disadvantages. Cub Scouts is definitely more expensive and it's harder to sell that darn popcorn than it is to sell Girl Scout cookies!

Following up on an earlier post on this thread:

I rejoined CAP as a senior member in October after a 17-year break in membership; my Amelia Earhart award (second highest (at the time) milestone award in CAP's cadet program) earned as a cadet got me advanced to the grade of first lieutenant as a senior member.

As of this date, less than 1600 cadets have earned the General Carl A. Spaatz Award (since its inception in 1964), an award even tougher to earn than Eagle Scout.

A huge congratulations to Your Son.:cool:

It is an auspicious occassion to be sure.

In striving to become and Eagle Scout, it was not the award alone, but the working, learning, and training that it took to get there.

It always looks good on initiatl resumes, but again, it is what is learned that really counts.

Thank you , Tom!

alum--the Boy Scout troops around here are very large. They tend to be based at churches with membership from many schools. They have so many regional and city activities! The Girl Scouts have smaller troops, mostly school-based, and they work on their own. You don't see troops banding together to work on joint projects.

About 12 years ago, I moved my Girl Scout troop from a Georgia council to an Alabama one--we could do that because we're so close to the state line. I much prefer the Alabama council..much less drama, a lot less grabbing for power.

AGDee, I hear you about the tagalongs but I think that was done for 2 reasons--the first being, of course, liability issues. The other was issues with bad behavior of younger siblings. Once I took my Brownie troop to a pet store and 4 girls' little brothers came along with their moms, who made no effort to control them. One kid climbed into the tarantula enclosure, one was playing with scorpions, one made a mess with bird seed, and I forget what the 4th did but the whole trip was a wreck. I've heard a ton of similar stories and some much worse. It seems as if bad behavior of tagalongs is the rule rather than the exception.

Service Units
 

What usually happens in our area that all the girls from a service unit switch in 7th grade to the SU older girl troop. There are some leaders that keep their troop separate, but most are happy to step in the role of an assistant adult leader and take a bit of a break until the current troop leader is ready to "retire." My daughter's troop leader from 7-10th grade had run the troop for 10 years. A older GS troop of 65 members must have a lot of assistant leaders and a head leader who is not a micromanager. Both the past senior leader and the current one have been excellent. The current one had four years of "training" as an assistant adult leader.

In terms of the GS vs. the BS I really wish the Boy Scouts focused on career development a bit more. Our GS Council places senior Girl Scouts on Capitol Hill as volunteer Congressional Aides. The area BS Council does not have a similar program for teen boys.

There is a list on GSUSA for Gold Award Scholarship information. It's mostly women's colleges that issue automatic GA scholarships but there are a couple of co-ed schools. A Gold Award recipient in our council is getting an automatic $5000 scholarship to Randolph-Macon Women's College due to her GA. That plus academic $ will reduce the cost of that school to less than instate at William and Mary (public Virginia school).

Even if my daughter gets no specific $ due to her GA, it has led to her selection in several programs that hopefully will get her into the college of her choice. Again, hoping this will be the same for the younger child.

One thing I love about the Girl Scout camp where our girls have gone through counselor-in-training and wrangler-in-training programs, and have then become counselors and wranglers: all this led to career decisions for 2 of our daughters. Because of their camp experiences, our oldest got 2 degrees in recreation management and our fifth is majoring in equine science. Our others have had good jobs working there that look great on resumes!

Yay for the GS. My daughter never was a counselor but enjoyed being a camper both overnight and day. By the time she was old enough to CIT and Program Aide, she was selected for Governor's School which used up most of the summer. When that was over she was a Congressional Aide on the Senate side, did a mini-internship for an international NGO, and finished up council hours for some awards. Somehow she squeezed in August Cross-Country Practice and babysitting. I don't know where this child came from!

Now my son LOVED BS Camp! He wants to go on one of the High Adventure Camps when he is older. The 14+ boys are doing the Northern Tier trip this summer.

YEA!! Congrats (and a hearty W.W.W.) to your son! That's a real honor for him. I still think back on my Ordeal weekend -- it's not an exagerration to say that it was one of the most meaningful experiences of my life.

You know, I was wondering about you and your son just a few days ago -- even wondered if I should PM you about it. Glad to know he's well along the Eagle trail. None of you will regret it. As I think I said before, the only "momento" from High School days that I have in my office is my Eagle certificate.

Re: Re: Gold Award
 

My daughter (5) has a "Cub Scout Lil' Buddy" tee-shirt she loves to wear, and we have an "honorary" den member -- the little brother who comes to everything. We actually gave him an honorary award at Blue and Gold last year. He'll be a Tiger next year.

We've really enjoyed the family aspect to Cub Scouts. It wasn't so much like that when I was a Cub.

I took the family to Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico for a week this past summer. Absolutely awesome!

I was there for some training, but they had programs for the whole family, from the (then-) 4-year-old. Interestingly, it was Ms. MysticCat who came away the most impressed. Having had no brothers, she had little experience with BSA except through me and my family. She came away ready to get involved and really sold on the program.

We were across the road from where the crews left for treks in the back country. Ms. MysticCat wanted to make sure my son got to see all of that so he would know what he had to look forward to when he's old enough.

Re: Re: Re: Gold Award
 

Is your daughter a Daisy? I never liked pack meetings. Too chaotic. Den meetings were okay.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Gold Award
 

Not yet. Around here, girls seem to start with Girl Scouts when they start kindergarten, which will be in the Fall for her.

Quote:

I never liked pack meetings. Too chaotic. Den meetings were okay.

You need to come to our pack meetings. We never have a plain old meeting, and usually the only times we meet at the sponsoring church for the pack meeting is for the Pinewood Derby (this month), Blue and Gold (February), and Graduation (May or June). Otherwise, we go do something -- go bowling or swimming as a Pack (and earn the beltloops), go on a nature hike, do a service project, go to a museum or planetarium, go on a hayride, or the like. The actual meeting part is short and usually held in the parking lot of wherever we have gone (we pull flags out in the parking lot and everything), followed by the activity. We try to keep it fun and, as one of our leaders says, "keep the 'outing' in 'Scouting.'" As a result the boys (and their families) look forward to Pack Meetings, and it's never the same thing over and over.

My 7th grader was elected (not inducted until Ordeal) into OA a couple of nights ago. He also earned his Life Scout rank, one of the youngest in his troop to do so. He needs to slow down so he doesn't get earn his Eagle until high school.

As a Kappa myself and as a mother of a Pi Phi, I am really noticing all the Monmouth Duo symbols in BSA.

Boy Scouts are awesome...it's such a good, CLEAN way to have fun. My dad thinks he is still one (he's an assistant scout master, but he gets more excited about finding new campsites or mapping trails on his GPS than my brothers do...he has an outdoors obsession) and he made my brothers stay involved. Some of their best friends were from boy scouts and both will have about all the awards you can get to put on their resume (one has never missed a campout in three years, the other has missed a very few for health reasons) and I know it'll help in college. Eagle Scouts have built some really cool things for their projects around my home town.

On the other hand, I hated Brownies because all we did was fake-sew, decorate cookies, and watch the little mermaid. I wish now, though, that I hadn't been such a stubborn tomboy, because staying in Girl Scouts might've been a really good thing for me.

I can update now too. My son earned his Arrow of Light at Blue & Gold in February and crossed over to Boy Scouts last week. I didn't think he was going to cross over. He's been fighting me about going to Cub Scouts for the last several years, but then always decided to do it again for one more year. Every year, I gave him the option to quit at the end of the year, with the understanding that if he committed to another year, he had to finish out that year (finish what you start philosophy).

I really didn't think he'd cross over. So, we went to our first Boy Scout Troop meeting on Monday, which was their semi-annual Court of Honor. I thought my son would find it incredibly boring, but he was excited about going and said it was a lot better than Cub Scouts. He liked being around the older boys. He's in 5th grade now. He never wanted to camp with the Cub Scouts after a couple bad day camp experiences and has never spent a weekend away from home without a parent around, but now he can't wait to camp. Go figure. I'm going into Boy Scouts determined not to take a leadership role. I'm not going to fight with him if he doesn't want to go to stuff then. I'm quite relieved to be free of my Assistant Den Leader and Advancement Chair duties. QUITE RELIEVED. I will support him if he wants to continue with Boy Scouts, but am not going to push him. The troop he joined also produces an amazing number of Eagles.

My daughter is now in 7th grade and is working on her Girl Scout Silver Award. She has unwavering dedication to Scouts.

This might be more a question of the type of kid drawn to both, rather than an actual direct benefit, but I've noticed that a lot of the guy students at the high school where I teach who get nominations to national service academies are also Eagle Scouts. I don't hear as much about the Gold Awards, so I don't know if this applies to the girls who go as well.