WEBELOS Rank Advancement
Here’s How to Help Your Scout Advance!
To earn the Webelos badge (“Webelos” stands for “WE’ll BE LOyal Scouts”), a Scout must complete five required adventures, plus one elective adventure, and complete the "Protect Yourself Rules" adventure for their age.
The required adventures are:
- Cast Iron Chef is about nutrition, cooking and fire building.
- Duty to God and You will often be an at-home because faith beliefs in Scouting are determined by the family and everyone's duty is different.
- First Responder covers basic first aid and emergency preparedness.
- Stronger, Faster, Higher covers fitness, and exercise.
- Webelos Walkabout is all about taking a 3-mile hike safely and with fun.
The 11 elective adventures are Aquanaut, Art Explosion, Aware and Care, Build It, Castaway, Earth Rocks, Engineer, Game Design, Into the Wild, Into the Woods, and Sports.
After finishing the requirements for an adventure, the den leader, rather than a parent, approves most of the adventures, unless the den leader delegates that role (den leaders are encouraged to recruit parents and other adults in the Cub Scout’s family to help with all den adventures, including supervision sign off on Webelos and Arrow of Light requirements). On completing each adventure completed, Scouts receive a pin to wear on the Webelos colors or on their hat.
More Webelos program resources are available at this Webelos adventure resource page, which has a fuller Webelos overview, plus the Adventure by Adventure pages that have fun den group activity ideas like simple plans, videos, websites with more activities and tips, and more – see the adventure by adventure links above for examples. You’ll also find Word versions of the Streamlined and Family Led Plans that you and your Den parents can download and tailor your Den activity to fit your parents, location and activities.
Seven elective adventures may be in your Handbook, but were “retired” as of May 31, 2022 – Adventures In Science, Build My Own Hero, Fix It, Looking Back, Looking Forward, Maestro!, Moviemaking, and Project Family. These Adventures are no longer eligible to be an Elective Adventure counted towards earning the Webelos Rank, but if you like them, you can make them part of your fun Webelos activities.
(P.S.: In the image below, don’t worry about that “no blue shirt” image and “tan uniform only” message. This is a “rolling change” and blue shirts are OK – especially if they still fit! A blue shirt is perfectly fine because “A Scout is Kind” (and Thrifty) -- so if your Scout hasn’t had a growth spurt out of that blue shirt yet, it is OK to wait a bit to buy a khaki shirt that might fit for years.)
