Assistant Scoutmaster for Merit Badges
The Assistant Scoutmaster for Merit Badges is an Assistant Scoutmaster designated to handle the Scoutmaster's part of the merit badge process. When a scout wants to connect with a merit badge counselor, they come to you: you hold a short conference with them, help them find a counselor, and approve their blue card. When they finish, you sign it off as complete.
The specialty is added on top of the job of an Assistant Scoutmaster, not in place of it. Specialized ASMs are still regular ASMs in addition to their specialization.
The signatures are the smallest part of the role; the real work is the conference with each scout, which is an avenue for mentorship.
- Selection
- Appointed by the Scoutmaster
- Reports to
- Scoutmaster
Responsibilities
- Carry out all the responsibilities of a regular Assistant Scoutmaster
- Hold a short conference with each scout before they start a merit badge
- Help scouts find an appropriate registered counselor
- Sign blue cards to approve scouts to begin working with a counselor
- Sign the final unit leader signature on completed blue cards
- Meet with scouts again if they want to change counselors
- Handle scouts who work with a counselor or complete a badge without first getting your approval
- Live by the Scout Oath and Law
- Set a good example by showing Scout spirit and wearing the uniform correctly
Starting a Badge
Section titled “Starting a Badge”Before a scout works with a counselor, they must meet with the Scoutmaster or their delegate. The Scoutmaster often has several blue cards to sign at a single troop meeting, and not enough time to give each scout a real conversation. That conversation is the point of this role.
Your signature isn’t really an approval: as long as the scout has a real registered counselor to work with, you sign. What the signature does is make sure every scout starting a badge comes to see you. It only needs a few minutes, but treat it like a short Scoutmaster conference, not a formality.
When a scout comes to you about a badge:
- Talk it through. Ask why they’re interested, look at the requirements together on the official badge page, and talk about how they’ll approach it and what they’ll run into. Point out any requirements that take months, like tracking something over time. The best conferences wander into the scout’s interests and goals more broadly.
- Help the scout find a counselor. See Finding a Counselor below.
- Sign the blue card.
- The scout makes contact. The scout reaches out to the counselor themselves to set up the first meeting. You share the contact info with the scout if they need it.
Finding a Counselor
Section titled “Finding a Counselor”Start with the In-Troop Merit Badge Counselors list. If nobody in the troop counsels the badge, search the official counselor list to find local counselors from other units:
Some of our own counselors live outside Southbury and won’t show up on the Scoutbook list if you search by distance, which is why you should check the troop’s internal list first.
When choosing:
- Prefer an in-troop or other local counselor over a council or district badge day, when practical.
- Wherever possible, send the scout to someone other than a member of their own family.
- Online “merit badge factories,” such as Epic Badges, cannot be approved.
If the scout already has a specific counselor or badge day in mind, you can still suggest an alternate option to them off of our lists. But if the scout doesn’t agree, they must be allowed to work with the registered counselor of their choosing.
The only exception to this is that online badge factories, a la Epic Badges, are not approved, because their entire M.O. is to break numerous rules that badge counselors are required to follow in order to expedite the process and churn out badges for commercial gain.
Scouts planning to attend a merit badge fair or other group program still need to see you for approval before the event, even if it’s run by our own district/council.
Finishing a Badge
Section titled “Finishing a Badge”When the counselor has signed off every requirement, the scout brings the blue card back to you for the final unit leader signature. That signature is what makes the badge officially complete. Like the first one, it comes with a short conversation: ask about the scout’s experience and celebrate the badge with them. This is not a retest; the counselor has already done the testing. Then the scout takes the card to the Advancement Coordinator to be recorded.
If a badge clearly could not have been earned (for example, a scout comes back from a program with an impossible number of badges, or completes a badge in an impossible amount of time), bring it to the Scoutmaster. The Guide to Advancement has a specific, limited recourse for this, and it must be handled within 30 days.
Work Without Approval
Section titled “Work Without Approval”Sometimes a scout will meet with a counselor, or do a whole badge, without seeing you first. The first time, talk with the scout about the proper way to start a merit badge, log the conversation in the Unsigned Blue Card Warnings spreadsheet, and sign.
If a scout keeps skipping the process after that, bring it to the Scoutmaster. These are handled case by case.
Resources
Section titled “Resources”Guide to Advancement — Section 7 covers the merit badge program; topic 7.0.0.3 describes this role’s conversations with scouts