BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — After six Bakersfield Boy Scouts completed service projects in the community, powering through the height of the pandemic, they rose to the rank of Eagle Scouts.
Family members and scout leaders throughout Kern and even as far as India attended the event.
It was a room filled with a warm smiles, big applauses and six young men earning the title of Eagle Scout.
A room filled with memories for six young men. They first saw this room since children as Cub Scouts,
And now they are in the same place, about a decade later being promoted to eagle scouts.
“The highest rank a scout can achieve is eagle scout,” the troop spokesperson said. “Many strive to reach this goal but few do reach it.”
The boys Ryan, Jake, Trent, Sameer, Connor and Drew have been friends since early grade school. Some of them, friends since kindergarten.
They’ve grown together, cried together and now have become eagles together.
A feat which only 4% of Boy Scouts achieve according to their assistant scout master.
Their scout troop 442 promoted six scouts Sunday afternoon bringing the total number of the troop’s Eagle Scouts to 46.
“To become an Eagle Scout is a tremendous accomplishment,” Rick Pierce the assistant scout master said. “Taking drive, personal drive and not just from friends and family. It’s something the scout has to really want to do.”
The new Eagle Scouts completed projects across the city that helped local nonprofits. The high school scouts came up with all of the plans and funded every project.
“It’s an accomplishment I’ve always wanted to have since I was in cub scouts,” Connor Ashton the first of the six to become an eagle scout said.
“It’s like a right of passage to not only manhood but also my interpersonal relationships with these guys,” Sameer Eppanapally the fifth of the six to become an eagle scout said.
The Eagle Scouts said one of their favorites trips in their long career as scouts was going to the Kretzer’s farm where they threw tomahawks, shot bow and arrows and even guns.
During the ceremony the boys vowed to continue to help their troop and the community.
