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Lincoln Trail College and Scouting America collaborated on a Merit Badge Fair on September 21. The event gave area Scouts a chance to come to Lincoln Trail College for the day and work on specific merit badges through the help of Lincoln Trail College employees.
President Tona Ambrose says the event came from a United Way meeting in the spring where Noah Olson talked about other similar events and that he was looking for a partner in this area.
“LTC has a unique geographical spot in the scouting world,” said Olson, the Redhawk District Senior District Executive. “It is in a corner where events like this do not often happen because it is in this ‘in-between land’ where it’s too far from population centers like Indianapolis, St. Louis, Champaign, and Evansville.”
Ambrose felt like it was a great opportunity to get involved and help the community.
“I think it's essential to always be looking for new opportunities to build relationships within the community, to collaborate on projects like this that benefit students, and to be creative in how we are fulfilling the IECC mission which is to deliver exceptional education and services to improve the lives of our students and to strengthen our communities.”
Scouts had the opportunity to earn merit badges in Art, Theatre, Welding, Coin Collecting, and Family Life. Volunteers for the day included Angela Compton, Taylor Dahlberg, Jackson Hemrich, Krystal Riggle, Taylor Newlin, and Chris Forde.
Ambrose believes that this is an event that will continue to grow.
“We had six wonderful faculty and staff who volunteered their time and talents on a Saturday to facilitate various badges, and we definitely have more highly qualified badge facilitators at LTC and within the community, so not only could we offer more badge offerings, but we could turn the event into a career exploration day, take students and their families on a tour of our awesome campus, and have current LTC students facilitate a panel discussion where the scouts could ask our students questions and learn about what college life is like. Our LTC students could also ask the scouts questions and learn more about what is involved with their scouting programs.”
Olson says the event was great because the scouts got to work with top-quality merit badge counselors with LTC’s experienced employees. He says it was also great to give the scouts a chance to visit the campus and explore LTC as a place to go to college.
He and Ambrose both said the event had good feedback, and the consensus is to build upon it and make it a larger event next year.
“It's fun to think about how this entire event started with unexpectedly meeting Noah at a United Way meeting several months ago and reiterates the power of community partnerships and collaborative efforts that have now culminated into positive student experiences, new friendships, and who knows, maybe even future Statesmen,” exclaimed Ambrose.
