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He told me one of the things he didn't like about the new scout group was that it seemed like they encouraged what he called "socialized badge earning" so that nobody earns more badges than the next person. He says this takes away any incentive for him to work hard on what he can do. They seem to want the kids to earn badges at the same time with the rest of the group (most of them at the camps) and not work on them on their own. The Boy Scouts requirement book says any boy scout can earn any merit badge at any time and you don't need to have had rank advancement to be eligible. So I know we need to talk to someone else in the group. But it may be that our local rules are different than some other groups because when he was a cub scout they wouldn't let him earn academic pins until he was in Webelos because they said it wouldn't be fair to the other kids.
That's not the way scouts is supposed to be run. Talk to the leaders and if it's not changed, take it higher, if you still don't get satisfaction, find a new troop.
