Lack of depth and repetition are both significant flaws in the Scouting merit badge system.
Even though it is explicitly stated as one of the goals of the Scouting merit badge program, it is still worth noting that no merit badge covers any skill or topic in any significant way beyond just an introduction. While you might safe a person’s life after getting the Lifesaving merit badge, it is far more likely you would only vaguely remember they skill you once learned all those years ago.
Once a person gets a merit badge that person never has to repeat any of the learning or skills in any significant way. Sure, you have to be able to answer and demonstrate at any “board of review” for any rank along the way, but everyone knows that requirement is rarely acted upon by the people doing the review and I’ve never known anyone to fail their “board of review” for not being able to reproduce a skill or answer from any merit badge they received, even for a specific rank. In theory, the review should work, but doesn’t because once a scout has a merit badge they almost never go back and work on anything from it. They already earned it. They got that fancy badge and, honestly, that’s the primary motivation. Few scouts (or people in general) really care about something presented in a challenge/badge/gamified way after they earn it. It’s just human nature. Hell, we’ll even cheat when we know we are the only ones seeing the badges. We are all weird that way.
Overcoming these flaws is tough, but doable. Adding levels addresses both the depth and repetition problems. In other gamified systems involving badges we see levels for badges that offer further motivation to learn more, to dive deeper, to revisit the learning previously and build upon it. Scouts were inhibited by the physical nature of merit badges. You couldn’t sew on a level into every badge. There are “palms” you can get for your Eagle to level up even a once achieved rank. These are just levels effectively. Modern takes on the original Scout merit badge program should, therefore, be sure to add levels to any gamified badge or achievements system.
#pedagogy #learning #scouting #gamified