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David from Hawaii writes:I am a fairly new Scoutmaster and I asked the committee to present merit badges and rank patches in troop meetings and present the certificates for those badges at the court of honor. They declined out of fear that no one would attend the court of honor.Next thing you know they are handing out the Eagle award to a scout who was not not in 100% uniform!How do I change a committee stuck in their old ways?How do I ensure parents and Scouts attend our quarterly courts of honor even when they did not advance?
Hello David
What you write about is a good example of a troop practice running up against ‘recommended best practices’.
A ‘recommended best practice’ is something in the literature or training that’s not a mandated procedure and is explained this way in the Guide to Advancement:
Mandated Procedures and Recommended Practices
This publication clearly identifies mandated procedures with words such as “must” and “shall.” Where such language is used, no council, committee, district, unit, or individual has the authority to deviate from the procedures covered, without the written permission of the national Advancement Team. Recommended best practices are offered using words like “should,” while other options and guidelines are indicated with terms such as “may” or “can.” (on page 2)
You’ve understood the best practice about presenting badges, here’s where it’s mentioned in the Guide to Advancement:
4.2.1.4 The Scout Is Recognized
When the board of review has approved his advancement, the Scout deserves recognition as soon as possible. This should be done at a ceremony at the next unit meeting. The certificate for his new rank may be presented later, during a formal court of honor.
Your committee is worried that if they don’t hold on to badges that Scouts won’t attend the next court of honor. I suppose that’s an understandable concern. I’d be more concerned that there’s one or more things with the way your troop is presenting courts of honor that may be causing the problem:
Who is running the court of honor? To my way of thinking the senior patrol leader ought to be the master of ceremonies aided by his fellow youth leaders. If it’s the Scoutmaster or troop committee handing out badges and the Scouts just watching it’s not likely that they will be very interested in attending.
How long is the court of honor? Our troop has about 35 Scouts on average, even when we have a table full of things to present to them the court of honor lasts less than an hour – about 30-45 minutes at the most, if we are presenting an Eagle rank (which we do as a part of our regular courts of honor) we may go a bit longer.
What’s the program at the court of honor? Is it appropriately formal without being overblown? Simple words spoken in honesty are always better, at least to my mind, than a lot of pageantry. Scouts want some formality and ceremony but not to the point where they are reluctant to participate.
What else is happening at the court of honor? We usually combine the court of honor with some announcements and discussion with our families. We have a parent’s business meeting for a few minutes before each court of honor to talk about the schedule of camping trips, rechartering, etc. this added value is an encouragement for parents to attend.
When is the court of honor? We hold our courts of honor in the place of a regular troop meeting, that way it’s already on everyone’s schedule. A family with a couple of active children is likely to have a pretty involved schedule of meetings and activities. I think it’s important to make things easy for them to remember and easier to fit in their already busy schedules.
If you apply some of these ideas you may find that parents and Scouts are more interested in courts of honor and make a point to attend. There’s little chance you will get every single scout and family to any given court of honor, so do what I do – concentrate on the ones that show up and change things around so that more will show up.
It’s not always the fault of families and Scouts when they don’t attend; we ought to look at what we are doing, how we are doing it and why we are doing it before we get upset that nobody is showing up for what we are doing. Scouts and families vote with their feet – if they aren’t showing up it’s likely we have something off base.
You also touch on something that many Scoutmasters ask – how do you get a committee to change their old ways? It all begins with training and studying resources like the Troop Committee Guidebook, the Guide to Advancement and the Scoutmaster’s Handbook.
We too often think that we have to wait for a training event. Don’t wait! Take the initiative and get your adult volunteers the resources and work with them to learn about these things together.
There’s a number of ways to get trained; there’s online training through Scouting.org, traditional events in your district or council, asking someone to come and hold a training session for for your troop adult volunteers, and studying things together as a group. Think creatively and get everyone trained or retrained on an annual basis.
Finally an observation about the Eagle presentation you mention. Uniforms are a ‘best recommended practice’ and are not required by policy at any time or in any place. You’ll find this in the Guide to Awards and Insignia on page 5:
While wearing the uniform is not mandatory, it is highly encouraged. The leaders of Scouting, both volunteer and professional, promote the wearing of the correct complete uniform on all suitable occasions.
Hope that helps!
CAG
Once more, thank you Walter!!
Committee chair gets five minutes or less. At the very beginning.
District gets no time.
SM gets a minute.
I’ve never understood the attendance issue. We’ve always had a majority of the parents at our COHs. We do, however, have food 🙂
We don’t actually disagree about this – our parent’s meting may stretch into a 1/2 hour but is more likely to be ten or fifteen minutes, basically announcements. It doesn’t diminish the court of honor, which is led by the Scouts.
There are as many different ways to hold a Court of Honor as there are troops. That said, the purpose of the court of honor is to recognize Scouts for their achievements (Guide to Advancement) and to review troop plans with the parents (Journey to Excellence, and probably elsewhere). The Scoutmaster and perhaps the committee can have time to address the parents but the “honor” part of the event belongs to the boys, and should be run by the boys without any participation by the adults (you can interpret that as “interference”) except, of course, for the Scoutmaster minute.
The committee needs to realize that they do not “own” the troop or its policies or processes. The committee chair may be the top volunteer in the unit, hierarchically, but the committee’s role is to support the Scoutmaster and the troop program, not to try to send it in another direction other than the way BSA requires or recommends.
These are all wonderful recommendations and ideas for perking up a troop’s court of honor. The bottom line is that it’s the boys’ event and adults should not take it away from them. Our troop has been moving in that direction over the last few years and while there is sometimes still the issue of lackluster attendance, the boys taking part are getting so much more out of being participants rather than spectators. They even choose the menu! Out with boring old spaghetti – bring on the pizza!
I really disagree that the purpose of a court of honor is to both recognize Scouts and to review troop plans with the parents. The court has exactly one purpose, and that is recognition. It is tempting to turn it into a parent meeting because everyone is there, but that detracts from the sole purpose of the event.
From the Language of Scouting page:
“court of honor: A recognition ceremony for those who have met the requirements of any one of the Boy Scout ranks, merit badges, or other awards.”
http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/Media/LOS/All.aspx#def-head-c
Agreed, we just have those two events on the same evening, quite distinct from one another. While the Scouts are preparing their court of honor in another room the parents are meeting in another room – then we break and present the court of honor. We don’t hand out a few awards, take an announcement break and return to handing out awards, it’s two distinct events.
The Journey to Excellence scorecard lists as one of the metrics courts of honor at least twice a year “where troop plans are reviewed with parents”. I think Clarke’s approach is a good balance between a parent meeting and a Scout-led court of honor, holding both events on the same night but separating them in time and space so it’s distinct when the adult time ends and the boy time begins. In our troop, and the other troop in town, the boys convene the court of honor, recognize the Scouts (it’s kind of fun when the SPL has to present himself with his certificate), do skits and such, followed by adult announcements and Scout-led closing.
“The committee does not get to decide this. The Scoutmaster informs them that he is following the BSA program and apologizes that the troop has been doing it wrong.”
Thank you, Walter!!!!!
“the awards are given out by the adults. Merit badge cards, rank cards special awards. There is a certain protocol that I feel needs to be maintained.” Yes, the “certain protocol” that needs to be maintained is that the Scouts run the COH.
Ok, here I go. “As the Scoutmaster of a very successful troop I have made several changes to the Court of Honor format overtime.” Probably not a “very successful troop” if the Scouts aren’t running things. Maybe a large Troop with a large membership or a lot of adults running things, but not a successful “Scout” troop. If the certain protocol means that you adults “need” to run the COH then you don’t trust your Scouts to run their own program.
“that the troop participated in since the last COH, this is set to music.” Do the Scouts produce this?
“I have not been able to find a suitable Advancement person for my troop so I continue to manage the advancement even as the scoutmaster.” Not a sign of a successful Troop. Alarm bells all over the place. YMMV.
We have a family dinner before the CoH. After eating the Scouts prepare the area for the ceremony. The SPL is in charge of this and the actual ceremony unless there is someone working on Communication and needs to be the Master of Ceremonies.
The Scouts work the entire CoH. The PL will hand out the the ranks from within the Patrol, the SPL will hand out the MB and other items. He can get help if necessary. If we have a new Scout joining I and the SPL will have this new Scout up front and present him with a Troop neckerchief, then I sit down.
The boys have a good time doing this, and there are traditions that they seem to keep following without a lot of prompting. I’ll say a few word at the end, but the adults aren’t up front much at all. (this is not to say that I don’t still cringe sometimes at what happens, but it has never been very bad. Sometimes it would be nice to have a 10 sec delay on what they do before the parents see it.)
We have had outside guests commit on how nice it is to see the boys doing this on their own.
Presentations:
We keep the metal pins(which are the temporary rank insignia) in stock and present them during the troop closing for any advancements that happened that night. MB and the cloth rank patches are presented during the CoH.
Our Scouts run the whole Court of Honor. An adult may be asked to present special awards, like adult training knots. The Scoutmaster closes with a Scoutmaster Minute. Otherwise, it is 100% Scouts up front and they do a great job.
When a Scout has completed a Board of Review, we recognize them at the closing circle. We give them the patch at the next meeting.
Merit Badges are awarded at the next Court of Honor.
The committee does not get to decide this. The Scoutmaster informs them that he is following the BSA program and apologizes that the troop has been doing it wrong.
As the Scoutmaster of a very successful troop I have made several changes to the Court of Honor format overtime. As merit badges and ranks are given out at the first available meeting. We have Boards of Review during a meeting so at the end of the meeting I present the new rank. I also keep some stock of the required merit badges and whenever possible they get the badge the same meeting I get the blue card. As far as the Court of Honor ours takes about an hour and a half. We start off with a 15 minute video presentation of the trips and activities that the troop participated in since the last COH, this is set to music. The COH is MC’d by the SPL but the awards are given out by the adults. Merit badge cards, rank cards special awards. There is a certain protocol that I feel needs to be maintained. We also present our beads at this time. Each trip/activity gets a special color wooden bead that goes with it. The scouts collect the beads and wear them around their neck on a suede piece of cord. Another thing we do is have each patrol do a song or skit at the COH. This also keeps them involved. I have not been able to find a suitable Advancement person for my troop so I continue to manage the advancement even as the scoutmaster. I have a chair on committee who organizes the BOR’s but I handle all COH prep, Troopmaster entires and Internet Advancement.
We have the SPL lead Court of Honor. Honor guard, electric candles for Oath and Law, real candles for the ranks which get lit by one of those advancing. Scoutmaster recaps what the troop did since the last court of honor (campouts, service projects,etc). Committee recognizes adult achievement. Several Patrol recognitions are included (honor patrol, etc.) and the whole patrol comes up for merit badge distribution. We make a big deal about the First Class rank. Refreshments are served. We also have one fun contest like invent a new merit badge, leave no trace poster, crazy dessert contest. New adult leaders who have come on one campout get to be inducted into the Geezer Patrol. For the Spring Court of Honor, the boys cook a dinner in dutch ovens and propane stoves in the parking lot.
The boy leaders (usually SPL & ASPL) present the Merit Badges, and Service Stars at the CoH, so they are involved. The SM still presents rank – usually just the cards, because we present the rank badges during meetings, unless they are earned withing a couple of weeks of the CoH. I have kept a few in stock when it became required to have an advancement report for all advancement. Driving to the scout shop for individual Merit Badges is not going to happen on my time and my dime, unless a trip to the council office (same location as the scout shop) is needed anyway to turn in an application.
One thing that keeps the CoH interesting – the SM presents a framed certificate and small scouting-related gift to the Scout of the Court. Only the SM and myself (SM wife/advancement chair) know who it is. There are no set criteria, so all boys can earn it if they are on track. One usually stands out.
As the advancement chair, I would never consider passing out any advancement, unless approved by the SM. While I prepare it, it’s not my place to present it.