old MB requiements

[SM270PAL]

I would expect the BSA to treat advancment and MB similar to the College Courses. If you start your Major using a certain catalog year, you get to finish with that catalog year. If you decide to change to a newer year, you can, but you must also completely follow the newer year. This method is used so that students can graduate on time. Otherwise, some majors wouldn't have graduates as they are always changing the major requirements each year.

The same would be expected from BSA. If you start on a MB or rank BEFORE the change, you have the option to keep using it, or completely move to the new requirements.

Enjoy.

JazerNorth

Scouting usually has some type of grandfather clause. However, after a certain point of time you must complete under the new set of rules. Examples of this are the rank requirement changes. The change made April 1999 is a good example. Scouts had a set period of time to complete under the old set or rules When merit badge requirement change within the year you have until the end of the calendar year to finish under the old set. When the new requirements book is published the requirements will dictate. Once the book comes out you ae now under the new set.
Another example would be the new first class requirement that will start on January 1. If you have started First Class under the old set you have until June 30 to complete without completing the new requirement - after June 30 all must complete with the new requirement.

[Scouting179]

I would expect the BSA to treat advancment and MB similar to the College Courses. If you start your Major using a certain catalog year, you get to finish with that catalog year. If you decide to change to a newer year, you can, but you must also completely follow the newer year. This method is used so that students can graduate on time. Otherwise, some majors wouldn't have graduates as they are always changing the major requirements each year.

The same would be expected from BSA. If you start on a MB or rank BEFORE the change, you have the option to keep using it, or completely move to the new requirements.

Enjoy.

JazerNorth

But colleges also generally have a drop dead date, like 6 years from when you first enrolled, otherwise some people would be trying to graduate 40 years aftewards with requirements that are 40 years old.

[Scouting179]

I would expect the BSA to treat advancment and MB similar to the College Courses. If you start your Major using a certain catalog year, you get to finish with that catalog year. If you decide to change to a newer year, you can, but you must also completely follow the newer year. This method is used so that students can graduate on time. Otherwise, some majors wouldn't have graduates as they are always changing the major requirements each year.

The same would be expected from BSA. If you start on a MB or rank BEFORE the change, you have the option to keep using it, or completely move to the new requirements.

Enjoy.

JazerNorth

Scouting usually has some type of grandfather clause. However, after a certain point of time you must complete under the new set of rules. Examples of this are the rank requirement changes. The change made April 1999 is a good example. Scouts had a set period of time to complete under the old set or rules When merit badge requirement change within the year you have until the end of the calendar year to finish under the old set. When the new requirements book is published the requirements will dictate. Once the book comes out you ae now under the new set.
Another example would be the new first class requirement that will start on January 1. If you have started First Class under the old set you have until June 30 to complete without completing the new requirement - after June 30 all must complete with the new requirement.

I've got to go with SM270PAL on this one. Excellent point.

[Rick Tyler]

In 2001 I had an issue with an Eagle scout that had started a merit badge when and needed to finish the partial. This letter was brough up to me at that time. After consulting with the council I was informed that all merit badges (and ranks and other awards) needed to be completed under the new requirements.

Please provide the written instructions from National that this is BSA policy. Until then, I'm going with Paul's letter. I would also like to see the written National policy of grandfather clauses pertaining to merit badges. In this context, if it is not written down it is an opinion, not a policy.

My opinion isn't really any more relevant here than anyone else's (either it is a BSA poicy or it isn't), but it doesn't make sense to me that a Scout can be working on a merit badge on Dec 31 and then on Jan 1 have to start all over again because new requirements have been published. As an example, I counsel Cit in the World. A Scout has finished all the requirements except 9, and he has chosen to do 9d, study a foreign language for a year. This next June he will have finished this requirement, except that in January new requirements are published. With 8-1/2 requirements completed he will now have to start over?

Why do adult leaders keep adding to the written requirements? How does making a Scout start over advance the goals of Scouting?

[Scouting179]

It makes just as less sense to let him start an MB when he's 11, have the requirements change 3-4 times over the next 6 years, and then finish when he's 17y,11m,15, under the requirements that are now 6+ years old and out of date by 3 handbook editions.

The closest thing I've seen in writing, other than that 10yr old letter Paul posted--which is a LETTER, not a formal POLICY stated in a manual, is the statement at the front of every Adv. requirements book.

[Rick Tyler]

The closest thing I've seen in writing, other than that 10yr old letter Paul posted--which is a LETTER, not a formal POLICY stated in a manual, is the statement at the front of every Adv. requirements book.

Which statement from the "Boy Scout Requirements" book are you thinking of? I have the 2005 edition here in front of me and I'm not sure what you are looking at.

The letter Paul posted was written eight years ago, not ten, and the author was the Director of Advancement for the Boy Scout Division of BSA. He strikes me as a better authority than an unnamed person in an unnamed Council quoted by an anonymous poster to a Web discussion forum. His position is also consistent with what I've learned in roundtables, Commissioner College, and Scoutmaster training.

[Mrw]

I am curious and would like to know how many people involved in this discussion have actually had a kid want to finish a badge he had started more than about one year earlier?

After 8 years with our troop, I have yet to see this happen.

[Mrw]

I am curious and would like to know how many people involved in this discussion have actually had a kid want to finish a badge he had started more than about one year earlier?

After 8 years with our troop, I have yet to see this happen.

[Scouting179]

I am curious and would like to know how many people involved in this discussion have actually had a kid want to finish a badge he had started more than about one year earlier?

After 8 years with our troop, I have yet to see this happen.

I have...and many times. Some do it every year in our troop. Though you are right, that after 1 yr it's less likely.

[evmori]

I am curious and would like to know how many people involved in this discussion have actually had a kid want to finish a badge he had started more than about one year earlier?

After 8 years with our troop, I have yet to see this happen.

I have...and many times. Some do it every year in our troop. Though you are right, that after 1 yr it's less likely.

It's a fairly common occurrence. If the Scout starts a MB under one set of requirements he can complete the MB under those set of requirements regardless of changes to the requirements along the way.

[Mrw]

The most I have ever seen is from one summer camp to the next. The partials that linger longer than that have always been of the I decided I didn't want to do that one variety.