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Eagle Scout Leadership Service Project
The Eagle project is planned, developed, organized, and led by the boy. Leading the project from start to finish is often a highlight of the boy's life. It allows the scout to use and further develop his scouting leadership skills and knowledge to benefit others.
Keep a Log
The boy should keep a log or calendar of all the days and amount of time spent on planning, researching, and leading their project. This includes discussions with scoutmasters, Eagle coordinators, and other advisors, phone calls, and other communications. The scout may want to write complete and detailed sentences so they can be easily understood or re-used later for the final report. Extra notes may be useful also as reminders.
It is highly advisable that the boy takes pictures, gets things in writing, and saves every document he can possibly muster for his project. He should compile them in orderly fashion for the board to look over. The more thorough his notes — the more valuable it is to the Board of Review.
Choose a Project
The Eagle project needs to involve imagination, planning, and supervision. Regular, ongoing service is not considered. The project may not begin before the Life rank is accomplished — this is expected since the project must be approved ahead of time. The project must be completed before the Eagle Board of Review.
The project may not be done for any profit-making organization or business. The project also cannot benefit the Boy Scouts of America directly, including your troop or council property. The project may not be planned and led by multiple scouts — only one scout may use a single Eagle project.Footnote
Blood drives and other donation drives are often not considered worthy as an Eagle project. Some involve little creativity and recipient organizations often have the procedure fine-tuned leaving little need of planning or leading by the scout. If the scout desires to plan and lead a collection drive, he should be careful to define very high expectations and a clear plan of how this will be different from routine drives.
The scout should make sure he follows the troop's, district's, and council's recommendations or requirements related to choosing a Eagle project. They may have some wishes or demands that will make the project easier to be accepted.
The project should be helpful for your community, a school, or a religious institution.
The scout may want to brainstorm ideas and write a long list. He may ask others, visit websites, and discuss with his Eagle advisor and Scoutmaster to find more ideas or to fine-tune his list. Questions he may want to discuss are:
- Who will benefit from the project?
- How will it be accomplished?
- Will I be proud of this project?
- Will I be able to demonstrate leadership?
The boy should log this time in researching ideas and who he discussed potential projects with.
After the scout has discussed his chosen plan with his Scoutmaster and group representative, he should start writing his initial project plan in the official workbook.
Some troops require the boy to make a proposal in front of the local troop committee, but it is not part of the standard requirements, application, or workbook. Ask your Scoutmaster about this to find out if the committee wants to have a brief proposal which may be done before the lengthy initial write-up or if the committee as a group prefers to see the final plan. (Note that a committee member signs the final plan to approve it; this is discussed in a following section.)
Initial Project Plan
The workbook provides a few pages for the boy to complete to describe his project and planning. The sections include:
- Project name
- Project description
- The group it benefits
- Why it benefits this group
- Date when discussed with unit leader
- Signature from the group's representative
- Present situation and planning details
- Drawings / illustrated plans
- Before photos
The representative from the community, church or religious institution, or school who will benefit from the service also signs the workbook saying they discussed the idea or concept with the scout. Note that a representative of the group receiving the service signs the workbook three times: 1) discussed the project; 2) approved the project plan; and 3) when the project is completed.
The project details section is a few pages long. This is the detailed plan that describes the current condition or situation and how the project will be directed. This section does not need to restate the benefits. The scout should clearly list and explain how to carry out the project step-by-step. He may want to consider writing it as thoroughly as if he was not around to lead the project — so it should answer any questions or help solve problems volunteers may get.
Topics to be covered and questions to be answered by the scout in this detailed plan may include:
- Where will the work be done? Will the materials of near-completed project be moved? How?
- What to do about weather changes? (Such as raining when needing to paint outdoors.)
- How will volunteers get to the destinations? Who will transport supplies, tools, and materials? Any special types of transportation needed, like a truck bed or a vehicle towing a trailer. Who will drive?
- How will the event be announced? How will volunteers be found? Will posters, invitations, or flyers be distributed to get help (volunteers and/or supplies)? Any letters and other written or printed information?
- What materials are needed?
- What supplies need to be purchased? This may include a shopping list with specifications, sizes, item count, costs, etc. It may need to be specific with quality, finish, brand, item, and model numbers.
- What will be donated? How will these donations be procured?
- What tools are needed? What types? How many? Who will use? Any adult or experience restrictions for certain tools? What can be reused, borrowed, or bought? What is done with purchased tools after the project?
- What expendable supplies, like garbage bags, markers, drop cloths, disposable paint trays, fuel, posters, and other things? Where will you get these? What will you do with them when completed?
- What will be borrowed? How will you keep track?
- Who will take photos? What camera? Developing?
- What about drinks, water, and refreshments?
- What other costs or possible fees?
- Who will pay for needed supplies? How to get monetary donations?
- How to evaluate or judge completion?
- Who will do the work? (Do not need to name anyone specifically.) What organizations are they from? How and where will you find volunteers? Do you need any special skills or experts? How will you recruit them?
- Will the volunteers be grouped into certain times or days, or specific tasks?
- Will the volunteers need to be taught skills ahead of time or during the event?
- Who are the adult supervisors? Will anyone be needed for double-checking work or providing expertise? (Scout activities should be supervised by two adults, one with Youth Protection certification. See page [Two-deep Leadership and No One-on-one Contact] for details. Of course, the adults will not lead the Eagle project.)
- How will you make the project safe? Do you have any safety guidelines?
- What is needed for cleanup? Who will do cleanup? Any cleanup supplies needed?
This write up should also include step-by-step directions for the volunteers to follow. These instructions explain every task in order, including setup and cleanup.
In addition, the plan should include a schedule, timeline, or calendar that lists when the tasks will be started and completed.
The scout may want to discuss the planning steps before writing them up with his Eagle advisor, Scoutmaster, or experts related to his service work to help clearly explain the needs and schedule the time.
Note that this detailed project plan is used to direct and complete the project — and also to discuss the project work and success during the Board of Review.
The details may also need to describe the work environment and surroundings to help explain the work. Drawings and illustrations may be useful to further illustrate the steps, design, and project as needed. (Use graph paper if applicable.) Photos or pictures of other completed, similar projects may be useful. On location photos taken before the project are also good.
Approvals
The detailed project plan must be approved by four people:
- Group representative
- Scoutmaster
- Unit committee member
- District or council advancement committee member
The project plan also needs to be approved and signed by a troop committee member. As mentioned previously, the scout may need to present his project plan to the troop committee as a group (even though this requirement is neither clear nor consistent). The scout (or Scoutmaster) may contact the committee to schedule for the boy to present his project plan proposal. Wearing a Field Uniform, the boy introduces himself and shares his printed plan and discusses it. Generally this would just be a brief two to three minutes, but may be longer if the committee has many questions. A member of the committee, such as the Troop Committee Chairman, then approves the plan with a signature.
Next the scout needs to schedule to present the project plan to his district or council's advancement committee. Ask the Scoutmaster or troop committee to help know who to contact about this. The scout shows up on time wearing his full Field Uniform to present to the District (or Council) Advancement Committee for approval. They sign the workbook also. (In some cases, long distance may require a phone or email approval.)
The scout may want to make photocopies of the entire workbook just in case one is lost.
Project Management (Conducting the Project)
The scout cannot begin actually working on the project until he has received the four approval signatures, including the district's (or council's) advancement committee's okay.
Leading up to the day(s) of the event, the scout may continue to fine-tune and communicate his plan. He will recruit volunteers and assign specific tasks with clear and maybe written instructions. On the days of the event, the scout will coordinate, supervise, monitor and evaluate, guide, share examples, delegate, problem solve, and express praise, encouragement, and gratitude. He will lead.
If a boy must modify his project while it is in progress, he should secure the reasons in writing and approvals required. This is imperative when it substantially changes the scope or nature of the project. If a boy is approved to do one thing, and does it differently, he needs to have at minimum the approval of the receiving organization, but should also get the same person who approved the project to allow it to continue. If it isn't going to pass the Board of Review, he needs to know now — not after his modified project is completed.
At the end of the project, the previously-planned and scheduled clean-up procedures are followed and supplies and tools returned.
The scout should continue to keep a log of his and other's efforts on the project. A sign in / sign out time sheet may be used to list who assisted and how much time was volunteered. The boy and/or his volunteers may take photos to help document the work in progress and its completion.
After the event, the scout can send thank you notes as appropriate.
Final Report
The final section in the workbook is the write-up about carrying out the project. Often this is the greatest delay to submitting the Eagle paperwork. While the planning and event is in progress, the scout should consider writing in his log or calendar daily. Then he should complete his workbook as soon as possible before forgetting details. A good idea is to set a goal and plan to have the write-up completed within ten days (for example) after the project.
This includes documenting the hours the scout spent planning and leading the project. It also lists volunteers by name and their time worked. (Note that there is no minimum time requirement.) The scout also documents the materials used (or supplies bought) and their costs, donations received, and tools borrowed.
In addition, the scout briefly describes how and why he strayed from the initial plan and show approval(s) for the changes as applicable. The scout can compare his initial plan and his updated plans and then write how his checklists, dates, needs, supplies, finances, volunteer personnel, and other things had changed. He may explain if these changes were good or bad, helpful or disruptive.
Photos may also be copy and pasted or attached as extra sheets and clearly labeled to show the different steps of the project and the project's final results.
The scout also signs his report in the workbook. The scout may consider having his advisor review his final report before submitting it to his Scoutmaster and group representative who sign it again after the project is completed.
- ...Footnote
- Of course, other scouts may assist to earn service time for earlier ranks as approved by their Scoutmaster or corresponding merit badge counselor.
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