Complete 3 hours of service

Service to the community is a lifelong commitment of every First Class Scout. Requirement 9d expands your volunteer efforts to three hours of approved service and asks you to analyze how your actions directly reflect the twelve points of the Scout Law.

Rules for First Class Service Hours

To fulfill this requirement, your project must satisfy four core conditions:

1. Scoutmaster Pre-Approval: As with all rank advancement service, the project must be approved by your Scoutmaster before you begin work.
2. Distinct and Independent Project: The project(s) must not be the same service project(s) used for Tenderfoot Requirement 7b or Second Class Requirement 8e.
3. Time Requirement: Complete at least three full hours of service (which can be completed in a single project or divided across multiple distinct sessions).
4. The Cumulative Milestone: Earning First Class brings your cumulative service total to six hours (1 hr for Tenderfoot + 2 hrs for Second Class + 3 hrs for First Class).

High-Impact Service Opportunities

Look for meaningful projects that allow you to practice leadership, teamwork, and practical skills:

• Conservation & Environmental Restoration: Building erosion-control check dams, planting native trees, clearing overgrown trails in municipal or national parks, or building bat houses and bird nesting boxes.
• Community Aid & Food Security: Organizing and executing a neighborhood canned food drive, packaging meals at a community soup kitchen, or building wheelchair ramps.
• Civic & Youth Support: Assisting at a local public library book sale, setting up equipment for community youth sports events, or leading crafts at a children’s shelter.
• Eagle Scout Projects: Lending hands-on labor and construction assistance to a fellow troop member’s Eagle Scout Service Project.

Connecting Your Service to the Scout Law

During your Scoutmaster Conference, you will explain how your service directly connects to specific points of the Scout Law:

Points of the Law in Action

• Helpful: Giving your time freely to relieve someone else’s burden without seeking monetary payment or recognition.
• Kind: Treating the people you serve—and your fellow volunteers—with gentleness, patience, and compassion.
• Loyal: Honoring your commitments to your troop, chartered organization, or neighborhood by showing up on time and working diligently.
• Cheerful: Maintaining high spirits, smiling, and encouraging others even when tasks involve physical strain, heat, mud, or cold.
• Thrifty: Handling tools carefully, avoiding the waste of project materials, and protecting community property.
• Clean: Leaving the service worksite spotless, picking up litter, and cleaning tools thoroughly before returning them to storage.
• Reverent: Showing respect for other human beings as sacred members of our community and caring for the natural world.