Tracking Merit Badge Not Found on Council's Advancement Site

[mt_goodrich]

I am double-checking to be sure a boy has all of his merit badges and ranks entered correctly. All are in there; however, I cannot find Tracking Merit Badge in order to enter the information.

Anyone have any ideas? I am going to call the council office tomorrow, but thought I'd check here too.

[smtroop168]

The national Advancement Team requested the four “historic” merit badges be taken down because some Scouts were continuing to earn them. They did not realize that the Internet Advancement software would also delete the badges from Scouts’ records. That wasn’t supposed to happen. Since reprograming Internet Advancement isn’t really an option at this point, they plan to add the merit badges back into the system. IA will eventually be replaced by advancement functionality that will be added to the new “Unit Tools.”

[mt_goodrich]

Thanks for the response. I have a young man who has completed all the work necessary for Eagle Scout and this was the only issue I found.

I'll call the office this morning and talk to them about it.

[FrankJ]

A good reason for keeping track of Blue Cards by the scout.

Seems like this issue would have come up before with other retired merit badges.

[smtroop168]

The last MBs to be truly retired before these were in 1995.

Of course this occurred because of not following the rules and scouts continuing to be allowed to work on these discontinued MBs by UL and MBCs, the council's processing the IA reports and the stores for selling the MBs.

[FrankJ]

On the other hand. Your typical advancement chair who has not drunk the Koolaide... Their training is YPT & committee challenge. Their concept that this is really an hour a week job. They see in internet advancement that tracking is a merit badge & they can award at a click of the mouse. The little sheet of paper you sign & turn in to council probably does not get more than a glance before it gets filed. I can see their thinking that it is in there so it must be active.

I understand the issues with scoutnet & not spending money on fixing something that is going away. But I am not very sympathetic about either.

[smtroop168]

The SM and MBC who signed a blue card after the program was over should have known better.

[FrankJ]

I am not saying it is right, but there are a lot of troops off in their on little world. I expect some of them have effective programs.

We once had a scout turn in a signed blue card for ice skating. Imagine our advancement chair's consternation when he tried to find the patch. (In the end he did not get the merit badge.)

Bulging was on again off again. But that happen so fast that IT probably never got the memo.

[Quailman]

I've been the AC for my troop since April. I entered a Carpentry MB this summer for a boy who earned it in Dec., 2010, but it had never been recorded or awarded. Council said go ahead and do it that way.

Our prior AC had her own agenda, advancing her family and friends at the expense of other boys. We always had mistakes at COH and had to correct things later. When I took over I found that she had, for example, entered a POR for her nephew in an effort to get him a Palm, even though he had not attended one meeting since his EBOR. He supposedly was the "advancements verifier", helping her update Troopmaster and Scoutnet. She also entered a SM conference date. I confirmed with the SM that he had not seen him around that time. Council understood and said to enter the Carpentry MB. There were a couple of other missing MBs and awards from 2011 but they still exist and so were not a problem.

Maybe I should check to see if it's still listed for him.

[razor_strop]

When I took over I found that she had, for example, entered a POR for her nephew in an effort to get him a Palm, even though he had not attended one meeting since his EBOR.

Just to clarify, a Scout doesn't have to hold a POR in a unit to earn an Eagle Palm; he has to demonstrate leadership, which can occur outside of Scouting. This isn't to say the Scout in your case was doing the right thing, of course.

[Quailman]

I understand that. It's not the AC's call, however.

[FrankJ]

That is why you have a BOR?

[smtroop168]

I've been the AC for my troop since April. I entered a Carpentry MB this summer for a boy who earned it in Dec., 2010, but it had never been recorded or awarded. Council said go ahead and do it that way.

If it was earned in 2010, I'm sure you entered the 2010 date. What was happening is that these MBs were being entered as earned post 2010.

I am not saying it is right, but there are a lot of troops off in their on little world.

Did you mean Bulging or Bungling MB???

[Quailman]

That is why you have a BOR?

She announced that he was ready for one. The other committee members just laughed.

[mt_goodrich]

I spoke to the AC and he actually had print out from the online advancement showing Tracking MB was entered in August 2010. Looks as if the system "purged" it at some time.

None of the other boys earned any of the historical merit badges so I have nothing else to compare to. Going to Scout Office today.