Volunteer and Leader Training
Training helps volunteers make the Scouting program more fun, more effective, and more rewarding for your youth, for your adults, and for YOU! Training helps us all get past the nervousness of performing a role for the first time, whether it’s leading a meeting or leading a camping trip or field trip program.
Many in-person training opportunities are offered throughout the Pine Burr Area Council and listed on our Training Calendar. Others are offered online in your My.Scouting.org account.
Youth Protection Training
Scouting America Youth Protection Mission Statement
True youth protection can be achieved only through the focused commitment of everyone in Scouting. It is the mission of Youth Protection volunteers and professionals to work within Scouting America to maintain a culture of Youth Protection awareness and safety at the national, territory, council, district, and unit levels.
Leadership Selection
Scouting America takes great pride in the quality of our adult leadership. Being a leader in Scouting America is a privilege, not a right. The quality of the program and the safety of our youth members call for high-quality adult leaders.
The adult application requests background information that should be checked by the unit committee or the chartered organization before accepting an applicant for unit leadership. While no current screening techniques exist that can identify every potential child abuser, we can reduce the risk of accepting a child abuser by learning all we can about an applicant for a leadership position—his or her experience with children, why he or she wants to be a Scout leader, and what discipline techniques he or she would use.
Scouting America has a multilayered adult leader selection process that includes criminal background checks administered by a nationally recognized third party and other screening efforts. Click here for information on the selection process.
Required Training
Safeguarding Youth training is required for all Scouting America registered volunteers and is a joining requirement.
Safeguarding Youth training must be taken every year. If a volunteer’s Safeguarding Youth training is not current at the time of annual registration renewal, the volunteer will not be re-registered.
Click below to take the training in English or Spanish
You do not have to be a registered member of Scouting America to take Youth Protection training.
To take the training, go to My.Scouting.org and create an account. You’ll receive an email notification with your account information, including a member ID/reference number.
From the My.Scouting.org portal, you can launch the Safeguarding Training from the home page. Upon completion, you may print a training certificate to submit with a volunteer application, or wait for an email with your certificate to be sent to your email address. Your training will automatically be updated in our system and associated with the member ID/reference number issued when you created the account.
When your volunteer application is approved, you will receive a Scouting America membership card that includes your member ID number.
Scouting America places the greatest importance on creating the most secure environment possible for our youth members. To maintain such an environment, Scouting America developed numerous procedural and leadership selection policies and provides parents and leaders with resources for the Cub Scout, Scouts BSA, and Venturing programs.
Position Trained Requirements
A Trained Leader is a registered adult. Youth Protection Training is a joining requirement for all registered adults and must be retaken every two years (some Councils require it to be retaken every year.
Adult leaders in units are considered “trained” and eligible to wear the official Trained emblem when they have completed Youth Protection Training and the training courses outlined in the linked document below.
Training Awards and Recognition
Most adult awards and recognitions have certificates, pins or medals, and a patch usually with a square knot embroidered on it in different colors. Adult leaders wear these square knot patches on their uniform over the left pocket. The order that they are worn is up to the individual. To learn more see the Guide to Awards and Insignia.
Square knots are rectangular representations of a variety of Scouting awards. Most of these awards are for adult volunteers, but there are some awarded to Scouts and Scouting professionals. The square knot itself isn’t the award; it is a convenient way to wear the award — usually a medal or a plaque — on your uniform. You don’t want to carry around a plaque, do you?
You can earn awards (and the representative knots) for service to Cub Scouting, Boy Scouting, Varsity Scouting, Sea Scouting or Venturing. You can earn awards for getting trained. There are awards for Eagle Scouts, Venturing Summit Award recipients and Quartermasters. There’s even a new award and knot — the Scouting Service Award.