What were the hottest merit badges last year?
I’ve got the answer. Maybe.
So first, a caveat: The friendly folks at the Supply Division tell me there’s no way to determine exact numbers of merit badges earned. That info is tracked by troops — not the National Council.
That said, by examining sales figures, we can get some idea which badges sold more than others in 2011. I’m thinking that if a Scouter buys a merit badge emblem in a Scout Shop or at ScoutStuff.org, chances are good that a Scout recently earned the badge.
After examining the 2011 sales list, here’s what I’ve come up with for the 20 top-selling merit badges of 2011:
- First Aid*
- Swimming*
- Environmental Science*
- Citizenship in the World*
- Citizenship in the Nation*
- Camping*
- Communication*
- Citizenship in the Community*
- Personal Fitness*
- Family Life*
- Personal Management*
- Rifle Shooting
- Fingerprinting
- Emergency Preparedness*
- Leatherwork
- Wilderness Survival
- Wood Carving
- Archery
- Canoeing
- Fishing
Conclusions:
- Each of the top 11 and 12 of the top 20 are required for Eagle (marked with an asterisk above).
- Summer camps typically teach the eight on this list that aren’t Eagle-required.
- The top three are both Eagle-required and taught at most summer camps.
- Scouts have embraced technology (with their excitement for cool new merit badges like Inventing and Robotics), but they’re still enjoying “classics” such as Rifle Shooting, Leatherwork, Archery, and Fishing.
What about the other end of the list?
There are no bad merit badges — as far as I’m concerned, they’re all great. But there are some that aren’t earned as often as others, for a variety of reasons.
Adult leaders, I challenge you to add a positive spin to the “bottom 20″ by encouraging your Scouts to earn one of the “20 rarest merit badges” the BSA offers.
Here’s the 20 rarest merit badges of 2011, starting with the rarest:
- Bugling
- American Business
- American Labor
- Stamp Collecting
- Surveying
- Drafting
- Landscape Architecture
- Journalism
- Public Health
- Entrepreneurship
- Skating
- Dog Care
- Truck Transportation
- American Cultures
- Insect Study
- Gardening
- Model Design
- Plant Science
- Farm Mechanics
- Composite Materials
Conclusion:
- Many of these require highly specialized merit badge instructors, so be sure to share your expertise with your troop if you work in one of these fields — professional buglers, I’m talking to you.
What conclusions do you draw from these lists? Did anything surprise you? Leave your thought below.
I would have thought that with all of the fundraising activities troops do that’s centered around sales (Christmas tree lots, for example) that salesmanship would have been in the top 20.
If you remove the ones that are required for Eagle (since going for Eagle skews the numbers in favor of those Merit Badges), what then are the top 20?
Since Chess was just added, was it included in the sales figures? What’s the time frame of the above sales?
The Statistician in me needs to know.
Great questions, Michael. Here’s the top 20 without the Eagle required ones:
Rifle Shooting, Fingerprinting, Leatherwork, Wilderness Survival, Woodcarving, Archery, Canoeing, Fishing, Art, Mammal Study, Indian Lore, Shotgun Shooting, Climbing, Geocaching, Cooking, Space Exploration, Aviation, Geology, Basketry, Pioneering.
Hmmm those look very familiar…oh, scout camp. I think us as adult leaders (committees, districts, and councils) need to come up with ways to use the other MB’s and give our scouts a greater chance to expand their horizon.
As others have mentioned down the list of comments, we need to partner more with our local businesses and contacts. I know our local university offers clinics for robotics and archaeology.
Yeah, I was going to ask, “if you take out merit badges offered at camp, what are the top 20.”
I whizzed through so many merit badges by leaving one session open and cranking out “do on your own time” badges during that time.
I believe the figures were for all of calendar year 2011. Chess was in there, yes. So were Robotics and Inventing.
I thought the bugling merit badge was merged with the music merit badge and was no longer available on its own.
My conclusion–we do a good job with badges at summer camps and merit badge pow-wows, but we could do better getting individual scouts to go directly to counselors for badges without it being part of some bigger group program.
Tory, Bugling had been merged with music, but after Scouts and Scouters contacted the BSA, it was reinstated as a separate badge.
Here’s a post I did on the news.
No real surprises here, except that Atomic Energy was not in the bottom 20. My conclusion is that perhaps councils and districts need to do more outreach to their local business and professional community to ask them to share their expertise in the “under-served” badges.
Here’s a flyer from an event run locally with exactly that aim. They focus on those ‘lesser earned’ science and career based badges. The event is very popular with the scouts and sells out quickly. http://www.troop322.net/files/Math-Science-Technology%20Expo%20Flier.pdf?g=PZBlRMYcTJQD
Cool! Thanks for sharing. Seems like an awesome event.
Great idea. I assume there are limitations on organizations donating money for events. I’ve often thought it would be great to seek monetary assistance for events but have never researched the restrictions etc. Do you have a link?
I don’t have specific information about guidelines for corporate sponsorship. Maybe Bryan can point us to this? I know from attending that particular event, that the companies who donate are invited to come in and display some of their technology during a ‘career fair’ the first day of the event. Several of the donor companies also encourage their employees to register as counselors, and make their facilities available for tours the second day of the event. The lead sponsor even gets their logo on the sleeve of the event T-Shirt.
I know of a summer camp that teaches Atomic Energy – they even include a tour of a local nuclear plant. Given the number of nuclear plants in the US, I would think it a wonderful thing if more Summer Camps offered this program.
These are all great ideas. There is a nuclear energy plant near our summer camps in northern Illinois. Perhaps the Blackhawk Area Council should research the feasibility of offering the Atomic Energy merit badge at our summer camps.
I’m pretty sure Bugling and Music are two merit badges, but they’re in the same book.
According to this unofficial list, my son has almost earned the rarest merit badge for 2011: Bugling. He took the class at Winter Camp in December, and now just has to be his troop’s bugler for 3 months. Lol.
Nice! Go buglers!
Bugling is a very difficult merit badge. I have been counselor for many music merit badges, but I have had only 1 boy complete Bugling. Congfratulations to your son!!!
Did he play the bugle (or trumpet) before camp? I can’t imagine anyone being able to master those calls in a week.
I think they tried to dump Bugling last year, but there was a huge outcry for the traditionalists within Scouting, and for the fact tat it was in the original 1910 list, that National decided to NOT fight that fight.
Nice to see that Scuba Diving isn’t in the bottom 20 also.
What about Fly fishing? I had heard that that one was considered sort of a dud, and might be dropped.
Fly Fishing’s in the bottom third but still hanging in there.
I would LOVE to see a merit badge fair with the focus being “think out of the box”. Yes, everyone knows the Eagle-required, and they’re always offered, but there are a bunch of fun ones, badges that encourage the boys to learn something totally new, something that might pique their interest towards a new career option in the future. My sons went to the same Boy scout camp two years in a row, and we were unhappy to see that the list for merit badges was exactly the same as the year before. When you factor in the scheduling of the badges, sometimes it restricts the boys. I will suggest this at our next committee meeting, take the bottom 40 or so, find counselors, and make our own merit badge fair with unusual badges.
My son is not yet in Boy Scouts, he is a Webelos II but he has started on learning to play the trumpet. He told me one of the first merit badges he wants to earn is the Bugling one. He thinks that it is important that each troop have their own bugler so that they have their wake up calls when they are camping.
I have to think that part of buglings low rate last year was because people thought it was dropped. And yes, loooong after it was announced it was reinstated.
Outside of that, with his partial list, I see a lot of emphasis on eagle requireds overloading the need of youth to try new things so they can learn and experience things and grow through the merit badge program.
Roughly half of the “bottom 20″ are linked to a career field. Perhaps there’s an opportunity here to emphasize another aspect of Scouting; equipping the boys with life skills, not just outdoors skills. Partnering with local professional organizations could be a real win-win for communities.
In my opinion, Skating Merit badge is not popular because it’s too hard. I was a skating merit badge counselor. Skating merit badge has one requirement for ice skating that is extremely difficult. Requirement 2-D-1: Perform a forward shoot-the-duck until you’re nearly stopped. Rise while still on one foot.
My troop had a skating night with the hopes of completing this merit badge. We had some very experienced skaters in our group and even they couldn’t perform this maneuver. The only person who pulled off that requirement was the younger sister of one of our scouts…who was a trained figure skater.
Dave,
Thanks for making this available. Is there a possibility of seeing the entire list?
I 2nd that request…with the number purchased.
Make this an annual list! If National can’t keep track, let’s make Bryan the head merit badge tracker!
If Merit Badges are not tracked by National, how are they on ScoutNet reports…? And how does National verify the requirements were properly met on Eagle Applications?
my son earned plant science and graphic arts last year. He was told that they were two of the rarest badges. he’ll be disappointed to know graphic arts didn’t make the rarest list.
Let’s be honest guys….. Most of the merit badges in the bottom 20 are frankly boring to the boys. The requirements read like an assignment from school. Unless the boys know someone directly involved in them, I hardly think they would even give them a second glance. this is not to say they wouldn’t find them interesting once they started, but its getting them to even consider taking them up that is the issue.
As a merit badge counselor for the Eagle required Citizen Badges, I can tell you that most boys only do those because they are Eagle required. I am also a counselor for Scout Heritage, and only one boy ever approached me for it and he basically stalled on it because he found it boring. If you look at the list of the top 20 without the Eagle required badges, most either seem to have a sense of adventure to them, are fun, or are easily covered at camp.
Well I guess im helping out with the rare list. Im teaching the drafting merit badge at a merit badge madness weekend camp at the end of march. Nice to teach something you do at work every day
At many eagle courts that I have attended, the new eagle gets a wall hanging that contains many of the badges that he has earned. If this were a common practice, it would skew the sales of both eagle required and possible some of the other popular badges.
So, when a badge is dropped, it’s based on sales and not on a lack of scouts earning it? Years ago, I read in, I think Scouting Magazine, that when less than X number of scouts (500…1,000, can’t recall in my addled brain this morning) earn a badge for 3 years in a row, it gets dropped by National. Maybe I didn’t read it if National doesn’t actually track earned badge figures.
The truth is youth are pushed to work on the required merit badges ( which is the efficient method ) and then take some other easy, fun ones at summer camp. To earn Eagle a youth only needs 21 merit badges. I live near Houston, Texas and some of the Engineering and Petro-Chemical Corporations offer merit badge days as a Public Relations idea and to help Scouts. Unfortunately the youth very rarely have the opportunity to take career type merit badges like Law, Dentistry, Veterinary Medicine, etc. I remember as a youth I had the opportunity to take some unpopular merit badges Reading, Coin Collecting, Railroading, Painting, Animal Industry, and Architecture because there were counselors near my house and I thought they were easy and wanted a full merit badge sash. You would think that merit badges like Energy, Nuclear Science, Space Exploration, Astronomy, and Computers would be in the top 20 non-Eagle merit badges. The youth like action / sports-type merit badges but some of the requirements are so time consuming the youth get turned off. How about a Leadership merit badge or Political Science merit badge.
Cooking MB, where was it?
Bryan answered this, Cooking was in the top 20 non-Eagle required merit badges. Of course, it’s fun and easy and offered at summer camp.
Having experts come and speak at a Troop Meeting will help energize the youth about that persons work or avocation. Everyone likes outside speakers. The youth might not pass the merit badge associated with this but they learn some valuable information about jobs for life.
Is the entire list posted anywhere? Meritbadge.org used to post the statistics, but hasn’t for a few years.
As a counselor for American Cultures (and a few other merit badges) I would encourage anyone with expertise in an underrespresented area to take the challenge to step up to the plate. I offered this badge in the local troop as a sort of “mini-merit badge university” and there were LOTS of enthusiastic takers and one very gratified counselor!
For what it’s worth: as I look at my merit badge sash, I realize that I earned not only some “historic” badges (Signaling, for instance) but also some that were not all that common at the time: my first merit badge was Corn Farming, and I was a city kid. Fruit and Nut Growing was one of my most enjoyable.
The take-home lesson: EVERY badge is the chance to learn something that will serve you later and enrich your life. If you are a Scout, earn a broad selection of badges. If you are a Scouter, encourage that pattern.
Phil Webber
Eagle Scout since 1959
Hey Bryan-
Is there any discussion on them bringing back the 4 special merit badges from 2010? I don’t know a Scout that didn’t try to earn them all – and everyone had fun with them.
Looks like this was a very popular post. Surprised and not surprised to not see Lifesaving – a tough one but a good one. We have a good number of merit badge colleges in Texas; if there’s a good teacher, a merit badge will get a reputation and Scouts may flock to it (Electronics and Law were 2 hits this year). I tell Scouts that they should consider Law and/or Medicine because there’s a good chance that (i) they’ll enter a related field, and (ii) there will be an attorney or M.D. on their Eagle board. Fingerprinting and Basketry impresses no one and I always recommend a Scout select something (anything) else for Camp or a Merit Badge College. Other than required merit badges, I think a Scout should take merit badges from a variety of program areas at Camp (but I’m not a big fan of handicraft), and I’m biased towards the Scoutcraft program area. If you’re in a big enough city call your local Bar Association and see if they’ll put together a Law merit badge day (might try your State Bar to see if they’ll put together a program that local Bars can use). I’m thinking about doing that while trying to get a major local hospital to run a Medicine merit badge clinic and having a “Doctors versus Lawyers Challenge” – see who can put on the biggest program with the most merit badge completions.
Bugling is likely so rare because it takes so long to properly learn the calls. My son went through 10 months of lessons to earn it.
What I see (excepting Eagle) is that many of the badges that take a real commitment are foregone in favor of ones that can be given (sometimes earned) at camp. I don’t think they’re boring so much as they actually require some measurable work. Kudos to the boys who choose badges where they’ll actually learn something.
I was hoping that I’d have at least one of the bottom 20 merit badges so that I could brag, but alas, I don’t.
I’m sad to see Entrepreneurship in the bottom.. What an amazing badge! I wish I’d have gotten that when I was in Scouts.
My son just earned the brand new Welding MB and loved it. It was offered during the Texas State Technical College Merit Badge College in Waco. Top notch!
As a kid I remember wanting to earn the Plumbing merit badge, but I never finished it.
Texas,Texas A&M,Baylor all have great Merrit Badge Colleges. My son had a great time at all three. And was able to get some hard to find merrit badges. Law,Inventing,Scupture. Thank You to those Schools and others that put on these events.
Why don’t scouts choose the ‘career’ or specialty badges as often as we would wish? For one, boys enjoy scouting because it ISN’T just like school (the place where a lot of career preparation takes place). Otherwise, every scout would try to earn Scholarship (a badge about being a good student). Second, I suspect that the most-earned badges are done as a group effort, including required ones and camp ones. The career/specialty badges don’t fit this, because it might be impossible to get a whole patrol to take an interest in the same topic.
Third, scouts don’t think like adults: what seems like an easy badge to us is very difficult for someone who has never done it before. They don’t see the vision of what the outcome might be. But with the right motivation…
Fourth, there isn’t enough time! By focusing on Eagle, other badges become secondary. There will always be those badges that we wished there was time for. Fortunately, by earning the Eagle, scouts are already being stretched to do new things. I think scouting strikes a great balance in developing men of character through the required ranks and badges, regardless of future career.
Having said that, I wonder what would happen if the Eagle Rank required a scout to complete a merit badge from a specified list of ‘future career’ badges?
I think it could be interesting to see a little more variety in the Eagle required badges. I don’t think when I was in scouts as a youth there was the option of Hiking or Cycling or Swimming, I think Swimming was the required one. Looking at the bottom 20 I see Insect Study and Plant Science. So how about for Eagle the choice is earn Environmental Science OR two of the following: Insect Study, Plant Science, Bird Study, Mammal Study, Reptile and Amphibian Study. That would get a little more diversity in badges.