>>>Another alternative is that you can volunteer to set one up for the Boy Scouts...<<<<br><br>Actually, it was the lack of a good Scout program that led me to this forum. Two of our scouts last year signed up for Wilderness Survival merit badge at summer camp. Midway through the week, I was checking in with them on when they planned on doing their overnight in the shelter they had to build. They replied that they decided to drop the badge because the instructor wasn't teaching them anything. Of coarse, I brought this to the camp director's attention, but I learned two valuable lessons that day.<br><br>One, never underestimate the capacity of our children. These boys could have skated through the badge requirements with that staff and received the badge and patch. But they weren't doing it for the patch, they wanted the experience. I truly admire them for their honesty and integrity.<br><br>Two, that in any organization, one is going to find great variation in skill and capability. Hence, I've challenged the boys in our troop to earn this badge this summer. And I've committed myself to augmenting their experience from what I know, which is limited to mostly what I've learned through this site and related links & books. I'm no expert, but I hope I can move them in the right direction. (BTW, merit badges are mostly introductions into specific areas and are not training coarses. So one would not expect an scout to become an expert at wilderness survival from a 50 page pamphlet.)<br><br>There are a few palces that offer courses, I beleive a few are listed in the links Doug provides. But make sure you call and talk with them to make sure the course meets your expectations. Choose one that will address issues and skills that matter to you and your lifestyle. Taking a class intended for small plane pilots would be a waste of time and money if you don't fly, even though many of the skills apply to non-flying emergencies.<br><br>