Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Scouting

I am a frequent reader of college confidential. I enjoy reading both students and their parent's posts. A lot of kids post their stats online asking if they are good enough for the school of their dreams. One thing that I have noticed, a curious thing, is the fact that in the extrs they rarely put eagle scout.
I have heard that only 3% of the boys that ever tried scouting become eagle scouts, on the other hand apparently 90% of people who work in leadership positions (government, CEO etc.) do have eagle scout badge under their belt. One of the physicians that I work with it considers the fact that he is an eagle scout a deciding factor in his admission into med school - the interviewer was also an eagle and they talked mostly about scouting :-)
Do you think being an eagle matters when it comes to your extras? Are your sons on the path to become eagles? Why yes and why no?
My DS has been is Scouting since first grade, he enjoys it tremendously. I don't know if he has it in him to go all the way, but I sure like it when he hikes up the steep waterfall canyon with all the gear on his back and doesn't complain at all :-)
Ania

My sons have all done scouting, but the two oldest lost interest, one at the Webelos level and one at about first class level of Boy Scouts. Perhaps with more encouragement from parents they would have continued, I don't know. My youngest son is now a Cub Scout. My daughter was also a girl scout. I think they get a lot out of it, if the group you are in is run well.

As for Eagle Scout, I think that it is not necessarily an advantage on your resume, if the person interviewing you has NO idea what it takes to become one. As for the boys who "make it", I think that there is something qualitatively different about them. The boys I know who have made Eagle Scout rank, friends and extended family members, are young men who have a certain self-motivated drive. They are able to choose a path and stick with it. I have never met an Eagle Scout who did it only because their parents pushed or someone else told them to do it. I think that's why so many of the higher ups in leadership are Eagles. It takes a lot of self-directed intrinsic motivation to succeed in the work world. It isn't necessarily the smart ones who make Eagle, but it is definitely the achievers. I think it's the personality that makes the Eagle. Some have it, some don't. No judgement, just the way it is. My oldest is such an underachiever there is NO WAY he was going to stick with Scouts. Just no interest. I think Eagle Scout appeals to the boy who is driven intrinsically to challenge himself and feel that pride in personal accomplishment. And I think that's what makes a great leader - that internal drive. So to me it makes sense that so many leaders are Eagles.

I have tried to figure out how I feel about scouts for several years. Three of my boys have been through cubscouts and I've been either den leader or den co-leader. My husband refuses to get involved, so it's been entirely me--He does so many of the scout-like activities with his 4 boys (almost like having his own den) but doesn't want commitment of when and where and how, etc.--it has to be on his own terms. Maybe scouts is better for boys from smaller families, but it is really not a good fit for mine with 4 boys--if we're going on an outing, we all go. Completely impractical that they have different dens, different activities. I can't drive them to everything individually--They need to have families going through tiger, wolf, bear, etc.

As an ex-leader of cubs, I think it was too much work for too little gaim for me. I would prepare ahead of time and the boys didn't seem interested, preferring to have conversations while I was trying to talk to them. My older boys steadfastly declined to join boy scouts, even though the leader is a good friend and a great guy. I quit leading/co-leading cubs recently and now I have one little son (5 yr old) that if I sign up, I want nothing to do with it.

I've been told that boys scouts is entirely different and they are independent and parental involvement is much lower. But my older boys decline.

I don't know too much about Boy or Girl Scout. My two daughters are both in-door girls. But they have done some other type leadership related ECs such as debate team, Model UN, Junior Statesmen (JSA). There are so many activities that young people can engage these days. The trick becomes how to choose the best ones for your kids.

I really believe that the best ones should be the activities that they truely love and can do well on. What the college admin officers think is more secondary. If a kid has a shot at Harvard but does not get in, it is not the end of the world. I am sure that he will have a great future in other universities that provide equally great education.

Boy scout sounds like a great activity. If your kids enjoy it, then go for it. Otherwise, you can also choose something else.

I'm resurrecting this topic but with a different spin. My DD is gifted and dysgraphia; straight As, no behavioral problems, extremely easy-going and makes friends easy. She's been in Brownies 2 years now and just finished attending her first week long Brownie resident camp. She said she missed us at night but not during the day. She wants to go back; loved riding the horses. ["Well, at least until I'm old enough for Space Camp," she says.]

She had loved Brownies... until around Jan of this year. She wanted to quit: "it's just like school". I didn't understand until I actually attended a meeting. It seems to obvious to me now. I know the leaders have to work and talk and deal with these girls at their age level...meaning their school-grade level as well. Some barely read at grade level - which is ok - but slows down my daughter's mind that moves 9th-grade gast. When they answer questions, the "quality of the answers" is frighteningly "at grade level".

For example, they are going over "How do animals communicate?" for a portion of their Mammals badge. There are 12 girls in the troop. Over half say, animals don't communicate until the leader gives hints. Then they go around the group one-by-one and each girl gives and example: my cat meows when hungry, dog barks at the door.

They get to my daughter: "The mother mouse takes lots of paper or bark or bedding and pulls it all into one corner and won't come out. She does this to tell you that she's ready to give birth and wants to be left alone." She got it from a library book she checked out the year before.

Has anyone ever heard of a girl "moving up" a troop? This particular Brownie troop is "paired" with a Junior troop (because the leader has girls in both). When they go on a nighttime cookout, my daughter impresses the 5th graders with her knowledge of the stars, constellations, and planets and really doesn't even speak to the girls her age who are too busy complaining they are cold. *sigh*

I know troops in rural areas can have members of all ages. There can even be "Juliette" Scouts who are individuals who pay their dues, do activities on their own, etc. [She could still attend summer camps this way?? Hmm...]

Hi Jen,
Seems like asking the leader if your daughter can attend the older girls meetings is worth a try. If you want to be sneaky about it, try having a few of the girls over for playdates, one at a time, so that if the swap happens, the other girls will be enthusiastic about it. If the higher-up don't agree, then perhaps your leader would be willing to "register" her with the troup she is in now, but "invite" her to participate with the older girls. My son has always enjoyed having a range of boys for playdates, from his age up to about 3 years older.

funny story:
I was driving DS in the car with a boy, 3 years older who happened to have a speech impediment. Somehow the conversation got around to speech therapy and occupational therapy, and my son said: "You have a Stutter."
friend: "H-H-How did you know?" ((Meaning how did you know the name of my problem? Apparently the other Middle School kids he knows did not know the word for it.))
my son: Um, ((turning red in the face, and perplexed)) It's because I can hear you do it.

it took a few minutes to get the missunderstanding sorted out. The friend was "so impressed" with what I thought every kid would know. That's part of how I got my impression that kids are much more tuned in to varying development than adults are -
what must it be like to "amaze your friends" with almost every utterance, over and over, day after day?

BTW - I love your "Mother Mouse story." The way you tell it reminds me that I am always thinking "Oh, I remember what book he got that from," and giving less credit then if he had "thought of it himself." Realistically, it is very impressive that our children would listen well, understand, and retain that level of knowledge all by itself.

((Big Smiles))
Trinity

My DD is in scouts and she loves it.
To recap my story in one short sentence: my kids used to go to the most elite elementary school in town and now they are both at charter that serves very mixed population (lots of minority kids, some blue colar families, but also some doctors and investmenet bankers).
She goes to scouts back at her old "elite" school. She loves it, because while she likes her new school, she left some really good friends back at the "private". For my daughter it is all about socializing. Her previous troop was very,very blue collar and the girls were , how to put it, very uncomplicated, but my daughter managed to find a couple that she liked and she has formed her own , small circle of friends. My daughter is quite mature emotionaly, she probably has high emotional IQ :-)
What I am trying to say is that scouting has worked for her in two very different situations.
From what I understand about girl scouting, it is very closely related to age and grade level, you do not have to progress in rank (ex. you do not have to be a brownie to become a junior),while boy scouts are totally unrelated to age, they progress in ranking.

I believe scouting value will vary greatly based on the troop leader and other troop members.

I was not impressed by the Boy Scout group in our area. It seemed to be more about the dads than the boys. The leaders (beyond troop level) were extremely rigid and some quite weird.

In contrast, my daughter has been in Girl Scouts since her second year of K. (Public schools made her repeat after a very successful year in private K because she missed the age requirement by six weeks.) She had a very large and active troop at public school. When we moved her to Catholic school for a grade advance, her troop put on a single bridge ceremony just for her. Her present troop (last 5 years) is also extremely active. I could not have hand-picked a better group of friends for her. They are centered, charitable and high achieving thirteen year olds (she and another girl are twelve).

They just returned from an extended trip that included a few sites in Chicago, camping in Michigan and an overnight stay and tour of Norte Dame. The troop co-leaders were gushing about the fact that there was no bickering, or posturing or exclusion. I am extremely glad that she has stayed with scouting. I think it has helped shape her.

My son has been involved in Cub Scouting since the earliest entry level, the Tiger Scouts, in 1st grade. First of all, I do believe that the experience is very den and pack dependent, as I can imagine girl scouting is. I did NOT put him in the pack from his school at that time because I had heard scuttlebutt that it was poorly led and just worthless.I knew another parent (from a sports team) who was going to lead a den from a different elementary school and joined that pack. What a great decision!

This leader was terrific.She understood DS was different than other kids and allowed him to be "the expert" sometimes to get him involved. DS switched schools a few times, was homeschooled for a spell, and was accelerated twice. This does not make a big difference to the other boys...he was never in their class. Sometimes he feels a bit out of the group due to their being in the same classes over the years but he really is different enough from them that this may be for the better.

Cub and Boy Scout is also age and grade related, although I can imagine them making exceptions. We offered our son the chance to accelerate to Boy Scouts after the second grade skip but he did not feel that it was HONORABLE to skip key parts of the Scouting path since his ultimate goal is Eagle Scout (and he didn't want to miss "crossing over the bridge" next year to Boy Scouts).Because he is going into 7th grade and his den mates are going into 5th the after school meetings have been hard to make but the leaders understand and encourage him to make up the group work as needed...that will probably continue this year. He does many more electives on his own than his denmates.

I believe that there are MANY leaders in life who have been Eagle Scouts but that is really due to the fact that they have the determination, initiative, and citizenship key to making it all the way through. As Chenchuan noted, I think that it needs to be a child's passion that leads them, however. There are "hot" and "cold" times with my son's involvement in Scouting and we would never force him to do it but I think that it is the presence of any long-term goal that makes people leaders in society.Parents pulling a kid through Scouting is not going to do it.