Huh I was in boy scouts as well, interesting to see the differences in how my troop handled merit badges compared to yours.
Most of the scout dad’s in my troop would sign up to be merit badge counselors, basically we had most of the core badges covered and some extra depending on interest. The only time I had to seek an outside counselor that wasn’t a camp counselor was for the lifeguarding (I think it’s called that) badge.
Most of our weekly meetings were then focused on merit badges and rank advancement as well as planning for the next upcoming camping experience
But I had a lot of exposure to troops and scouts outside my own. I mean at it’s height our summer camp was running something like 60-70 troops a week, and when we were at capacity we were running something like 2500- 3000 scouts a week through program.
Our troop meetings were basically never for merit badge advancement. That would have been considered very inappropriate, since those are for individual boys to work on. It’s also not typical for you to be do merit badges with a counciler from your own troop. It might be a council / district level thing, but I don’t think I ever even heard of someone getting signed off on a merit badge from some one in their own troop. For example, as a counciler I wouldn’t be able to accept a blue card where a member of your troop had signed off on a requirement.
Our meetings were for basic skill building, and rank advancement, as well as for high adventure trip planning. This was the specific focus of the troop, high adventure. We did a low adventure outing and a high adventure outing every month. Meetings were mostly older boys teaching first aid skills, camping, knots, etc to groups of younger boys, basic rank advancement stuff. Each week it would be one patrols job to teach a specific skill to the troop. Then of course, always a game of capture the flag.
In fact I think of the boys had had their way the entirety of boy scouting would have been capture the flag.
Huh I was in boy scouts as well, interesting to see the differences in how my troop handled merit badges compared to yours.
Most of the scout dad’s in my troop would sign up to be merit badge counselors, basically we had most of the core badges covered and some extra depending on interest. The only time I had to seek an outside counselor that wasn’t a camp counselor was for the lifeguarding (I think it’s called that) badge.
Most of our weekly meetings were then focused on merit badges and rank advancement as well as planning for the next upcoming camping experience
How big was your troop?
at it’s largest I think maybe 120.
at it’s smallest maybe 30-40?
But I had a lot of exposure to troops and scouts outside my own. I mean at it’s height our summer camp was running something like 60-70 troops a week, and when we were at capacity we were running something like 2500- 3000 scouts a week through program.
Our troop meetings were basically never for merit badge advancement. That would have been considered very inappropriate, since those are for individual boys to work on. It’s also not typical for you to be do merit badges with a counciler from your own troop. It might be a council / district level thing, but I don’t think I ever even heard of someone getting signed off on a merit badge from some one in their own troop. For example, as a counciler I wouldn’t be able to accept a blue card where a member of your troop had signed off on a requirement.
Our meetings were for basic skill building, and rank advancement, as well as for high adventure trip planning. This was the specific focus of the troop, high adventure. We did a low adventure outing and a high adventure outing every month. Meetings were mostly older boys teaching first aid skills, camping, knots, etc to groups of younger boys, basic rank advancement stuff. Each week it would be one patrols job to teach a specific skill to the troop. Then of course, always a game of capture the flag.
In fact I think of the boys had had their way the entirety of boy scouting would have been capture the flag.