While working towards their Eagles Scout ranking, the boy scouts also help out their community with their projects that are required to become an Eagle Scout.
Eagle Scout is the final rank that someone can get as a boy scout.
Scouts get this rank using skills taught to them throughout their Scouting career.
It usually takes Scouts seven years to achieve the rank.
Scouts who are looking to become Eagle Scouts first need to go through six other ranks, which takes a long time.
Scout leader Andrew Martin has helped many youth go through the program and is an Eagle Scout himself, wanting to help the young scouts.
“It takes five or six years before you can even start working on your Eagle badge,” Martin said.
The Eagle Scout project is one of the requirements for being an Eagle Scout, and there are many ways someone can complete this requirement.
Most Scouts build something, some Scouts destroy something and a few Scouts do things that help a charity or non-profit organization.
According to Martin, there are many projects, each with their own benefits and different objectives, and he calls each one “unique.”
There are many aspects of being an Eagle Scout that are helpful to the Scout after they have aged out.
For example, resumes and college applications look better when including an Eagle Scout certification.
When looking at the resumes of people Martin knows that scouts are reliable.
“I know that there are certain skills that they’re going to have that give them a little bit of a leg up: leadership skills, communications, stuff like that,” Martin said.
Oftentimes, a Scout will become an Eagle Scout for two reasons: their parents or other family members became an Eagle Scout, or they know the benefits of becoming one as well.
According to Eagle Scout John Updike, he became an Eagle Scout because his brother and uncles were Eagle Scouts.
“We have a long history of Eagle Scouts,” Updike said.
When looking for a job or going to college, an Eagle Scout may have some soft skills that are important to have at any job.
According to Scoutmaster Gunter Weach, these skills include being hardworking, honest and trustworthy.
Most of these are part of the Scout Law, which a Scout would have to recite at a Board of Review.
A major part of earning the rank of Eagle Scout is participating in a Board of Review.
The goal of the board is to determine whether the candidate would be a good fit.
At this, the board inquires about the scout’s ability to display and show these skills and details concerning the project.
According to Welch, the board asks many questions about the candidate’s Eagle Scout project and asks the candidate to recite the Scout Oath and Scout Law.
In the process of becoming an Eagle Scout, there is no shortage of paperwork that needs to be done before a project can be started.
Paperwork is also required for the Board of Review to finalize a project and to get the rank of Eagle Scout.
According to Updike, the hardest part of the Eagle Scout project is “getting he paperwork in,” Updike said. “One of the most frustrating things was getting the paperwork from my computer to my Scoutmaster’s computer so he could proofread it and send it back.”
Scouts do many things to stay motivated during the process to get the rank of Eagle Scout.
According to Eagle Scout candidate Charlie Hunsicker some of the things that keep him motivated are his parents, Scoutmasters and other peers that are also working on becoming an Eagle Scout.
“I say iron sharpens iron. Everyone istrying to make everyone else better,” Hunsicker said
Being an Eagle Scout provides opportunities for people who are looking for jobs or looking to go to college because of the lessons that being an Eagle Scout teaches.