Eagle Scout Benster

While most readers of this feature know the Benster best for his always entertaining football picks, he's now accomplished something greater than making fun of Jim Tressel; the Benster is now an Eagle Scout.

The Boy Scouts have been a controversial organization in recent years. Scouting is, among many other things, a repository of some old-fashioned values. It's also weathered some scandals involving scoutmasters and other adult leaders who have preyed on individual scouts, which led to a ban on gays in the Scouts. As mores have changed over the years, this has put the Scouts on the wrong side of the ongoing culture wars, at least for some people, and has caused a lot of problems for the larger Scouting organization.

Still, while the culture wars rage on, individual scout troops do great work, often quietly. The Benster's troop is small, with only 10-15 scouts in the troop during the seven years the Benster was involved. It's been an ongoing struggle to find new scouts, especially in an era where young men spend more time watching video games than going on camping trips. Having said that, the boys in Benster's troop have been able to learn and grow in many ways and have done a lot of quality service within the community.

The biggest challenge for most boys who pursue the rank of Eagle is finding and executing the service project. Benster's project turned out to be a doozy -- he built dugout enclosures for the softball field at a church in Isanti County. The site is about 40 miles north of here; the pastor there was once the assistant scoutmaster of Benster's troop and his sons both are Eagle Scouts. All told, Benster's project involved over 700 hours of work and over 30 volunteers assisted in the construction. The finished product turned out well, as you can see:

If you build it, they will play

He learned many things in executing this project -- how to plan and design, how to manage people, how to adjust to unforeseen circumstances, and most importantly, why you need to persevere. You can learn these lessons in other ways, but Scouting does a great job in providing opportunities for young men to learn and grow. While I am obviously proud of his accomplishments, I'm also grateful that he had the opportunity to participate in Scouting. While some of the values of scouting might seem quaint to the modern mind, the benefits are obvious to anyone who participates. Benster is more prepared for the world he'll encounter because of the experiences he's had. There's no gainsaying the value of that.