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Troop72 Eagle Court of Honor
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(Last modified: $Date: 2006/10/30 22:08:42 $)
I was in charge of our troop's Eagle Court of Honor (ECoH) on Sunday, October 29, 2006. Not only was it the first Eagle Court of Honor in our troop's 5.5-year history, it was the first one I had ever been to! I learned all about putting on an ECoH from various web sites and a book. I created this page to capture everything I learned, in case it might help others.
- Tom Arneberg, Scoutmaster (tom@arneberg.com)
Contents of directory for this Eagle Court of Honor:
- Invitation (jpg) (created with Gimp)
- Blurb for church bulletin (txt)
- Press Release (txt)
- Complete script (pdf)
- Printed Program (pdf) (I bought color stationery from the Scout Office with an eagle bird and badge on the front; when I printed, I deleted the graphic from the file here.)
- Appendices for script (in plain text format)
Other useful links:
- Ben's Eagle Project write-up
- Newspaper column about Ben's ECOH
- New section of our Troop Guidebook for ECoH
- Eagle Court of Honor Book -- I learned a lot from this book by Mark Ray
- Eagle Mountain Certificate -- I bought this personalized certificate and had it read at the ceremony. (Sure, I could have printed it myself with desktop publishing software, but it is copyrighted, and besides, I wanted to reward the guy who created it and the book.)
- Planning a world-class Court of Honor (EagleScout.org)
- Invitations and requests for letters of commendation (EagleScout.org)
Things we learned:
- We had no idea how many people to plan for. Several people we thought would come didn't...we had to schedule it during a Green Bay Packers' game, since it was the only time available for our out-of-town relatives. We had 130 show up, I think, but had planned for 150-200.
- Everyone takes a little longer speaking than they think. My goal was to finish in under an hour, but we went an hour and a quarter, 2:00-3:16 p.m. It moved nicely, though; I don't think anyone minded. Still, we'll probably cut a speaker or shorten the slide show next time to keep it under an hour.
- The classic candle-lighting ceremony for the 12 points of the Scout Law works great! (I had never seen it, but read about it.)
- We had a drummer play while the flag was brought forth, and then stop while it was being hoisted, during which the bugler played "To the Colors." Worked nicely!
- We should've allowed more time before the ECOH. Sadly, we got letters from President Bush and our US Sentator the week after the ceremony. :-( I had sent out requests for letters of commendations four weeks before the day; should've been at least five. (However, the council sent the request to the President supposedly NINE weeks prior, and that still wasn't enough time.)
- Get creative in Commendation Letter requests! I went out on a limb and risked a 39-cent stamp to senda request to Brett Favre. Here in Wisconsin, he is close to a deity among adolescent boys. I just sent it to him care of the Green Bay Packers -- and he came through! The letter from Brett Favre was one of the highlights of the ceremony.
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