Q: Who can/should perform requirement sign offs?

A: The Trail Guide assigned to a Trailman's patrol is generally the only adult who can sign off on a Trailman's completed requirement.  Trail Guides from other patrols can perform sign offs, but the Trailman should ask permission before reaching out to another Trail Guide.  Other Trail Guides should generally refer a Trailman back to his primary Trail Guide.  

Fathers cannot sign off their own son's requirements without permission from the primary Trail Guide.  In the situation where a father is a primary Trail Guide, this may be difficult or impossible, but the father should make efforts to have their son's sign offs performed by another Trail Guide or qualified leader in the Troop.

Other Trailmen cannot validate and sign off on requirements for other Trailmen.

Q: How does one know a requirement is ready for a sign off? 

A: For a requirement to be signed off - the Trailman must complete the requirement as stated by the current version of Trail Life's requirements.  That means if a requirement says demonstrate, they must demonstrate, if it says explain, they must explain.  

For ex. if a given requirement states: "Demonstrate how to orient a map" (maybe they're working on this separately because they missed a meeting), the Trailman should schedule a time with their adult leader, have practiced the skills, bring a map and compass to the meeting, and be ready to demonstrate orienting the map to the leader as per our required answers.  No more no less. 

For what qualifies as an appropriate answer in our troop see: Trail Badge Home Page.    

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Q: When working on trail badge requirements at home, how can someone learn and practice the skills they need?  How can parents help when help is needed?  

A: For all the Trail badges we have worked on so far, the materials and skills necessary to "answer" a requirement have been generated.  See: Trail Badge Home Page.  Our "answers" are:

• Specific to our troop (which is encouraged by Trail Life)
• Define what the adult leaders train from
• Are what the Trail Guides use to confirm a Trailman has completed any given requirement.   

In this way, troop leaders know what to train, we ensure that sign offs from the various Trail Guides are as consistent as they can be from Trailman to Trailman, and Trailmen and adults can feel confident they know what is expected in order to complete a sign off. 

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Q:  Can skills signed off in the Mountain Lion program count towards sign offs in Navigator and Adventurer programs? 

Examples we know of: 

• Fireguard and Woodsman --> Fire Ranger and Woods Tools Trail Badges
• First Aid skills --> First Aid Trail Badge 

A:  As of this writing, there is not an official TLUSA answer to this question.  In the situations where there is no clear answer, we know that TLUSA leaves the question to be answered by the individual troop.  After review, although there is some program overlap between these sign-offs, we feel it's most important to ensure that the boys explain and demonstrate the skill as the Trailman within their respective program.  It's not a burden to reproduce these few items and it is a benefit to both leaders and Trailmen to ensure these sign-offs can be successfully completed by the Nav/Adv. when the time comes.

Our troop "principle" to follow: While a skill learned in Woodlands Trail is great and can help a Trailman when they crossover to Navigators, program sign-offs are separate by program.  Woodlands Trail completes their requirements per their program and Navigators and Adventurers complete sign-offs per the requirements of their program.