There’s tons to see inside the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum near Portland, Ore. But it’s what’s outside that caught my eye. The museum, located in McMinnville, just opened a new designated Scout camping area. That means Scouts can set up their tents among oak trees right off the museum’s parking lot and then walk over to the museum during the day. Once there, they can check out displays like the original Spruce Goose, movies in the museum theater, merit badge classes, or the “educational waterpark” with its 10 waterslides that teach visitors about the power of water.  No Scout camping area is complete without a...

Are all service hours created equal? If a Scout, say, builds a house with his church youth group or delivers meals with his school’s student council, can those hours count toward Boy Scout rank advancement? That’s what a Scouter named Andrea wondered this week: Bryan, Our troop only allows service hours to accrue if it is a troop-sponsored service event. I think that this is against Scouting principles but understand the difficulty in calculating hours if the boys are collecting hours through school, church, etc. What is the BSA policy for this? Can the boys earn service hours outside the troop and how do we...

With some teens, you might as well give their allowance directly to Best Buy, GameStop, or Cinemark, because it’s going straight there anyway. There’s got to be a better way. And now, there is. Harness the power of the Boy Scouts of America Discover prepaid card, which lets you monitor your kid’s daily spending, teach him or her how to create and manage a budget, and do it all while benefiting the Boy Scouts of America. I mentioned this program last year, but it’s worth repeating: This isn’t a credit card. Instead, it’s a prepaid, reloadable card that’s safer and more practical...

You may have heard there’s a big party at the Summit this summer, a little get-together called the 2013 National Scout Jamboree. But did you know that just an hour northwest of the BSA’s extravaganza sits the hip, historic city of Charleston, W.Va.? West Virginia’s capital city has a host of opportunities hand-picked for packs, troops, teams, crews, and Scout families visiting the area this summer. And they’re extending a formal invitation to make Charleston a stop on your itinerary before, during, or after you visit, attend, or serve on staff at the jamboree. The video embedded below — made just for Scouts...

Updated May 15 with some clarifications. Not all merit badges are earned in the traditional troop setting. Enterprising Scouts can earn them at council-run merit badge “colleges” or workshops, summer or winter camps, or on their own with a registered counselor. But some troops restrict or even prohibit this practice, insisting that merit badges must be earned under their own roof — with only troop-sanctioned counselors. True, the Guide to Advancement says Scouts must discuss their choice of merit badge counselor with their Scoutmaster, but some troops take it one step farther, declaring that merit badge workshops themselves aren’t kosher. Is that OK? That’s what a...

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