You are ready to start your Eagle Scout service project.  Congratulations!  It took a lot of hard work just to get to this point.  Nevertheless, you may be a little overwhelmed in looking over a 28-page Eagle Scout service project workbook!

OK, take a deep breath and we’ll work through it one step at a time.  Trust me, you can do this.  You just have to want it strongly enough.  And I know you already have that desire, or you wouldn’t be reading my advice now!

It may seem that the purpose of the Eagle Scout service project is to provide the world with more benches, fences, memorial gardens and other worthwhile benefits for organizations whose mission is to help others.  While that is certainly a desirable result, it is not the real purpose of your service project.  The purpose of the Eagle Scout service project is for a young person to demonstrate his or her ability to lead others in the accomplishment of a worthwhile objective.  You will do this by using all the lessons of Scouting that have already led to the achievement of Life Scout rank.  In the last three to six years in Scouting, you have learned how to communicate, organize, teach and guide others.  The Eagle Scout project is the capstone course of everything that you have learned.

From the dawn of human history, young people have been eager to prove themselves ready to assume a position of adulthood.  Perhaps it was a boy killing a bear on his first hunting trip, or a young person going on a vision quest in solitude.   Adults today rarely kill bears, but the majority of them are responsible for some aspect of selling, proposing, planning, budgeting funds, leading others, executing projects, and reporting the results.  That neatly describes the Eagle Scout service project.  When you have completed an Eagle Scout Service Project, you have proven yourself worthy to all the adults in your life.

I tell all Scouts embarking on this adventure, “Nobody expects that you know how to do this.”  That’s why adults will coach you through the project.  “Coach” is the perfect word – like a sports coach who can teach and drill you, your Eagle coach cannot get out on the field on game day – you must do the work.  However, there are all sorts of people ready to help you to accomplish your daunting task.

Spend some time with a parent or guardian and read the instructions in the workbook.  This is NOT one of those cases where, “if all else fails, read the instructions.”  It is very easy to go down the wrong path or make incorrect assumptions with an Eagle project, both of which will cost you time and aggravation.  Please get off on the right foot by reading through the instructions and getting a good overview of what is required.

“Oh, the possibilities!”

Coach Hunt

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