Photo credit: Charlotte Whittington

Maya Sakhnini (’27) sits with her Eagle Scout badge and her sash on the front veranda. She became an Eagle Scout the summer before 10th grade and was a Scout for four years. “I was invited by a friend,” Sakhnini said. “I’m very outdoorsy, so I like the outdoor aspects – especially my troop – ; they’re very active.”

Since 1912, 130 million children have participated in the Scouting America program, and more than 2 million have reached the highest rank: Eagle Scout.

Scouting America is a Congress-funded initiative that teaches kids ages 11-17 survival skills through outdoor activities such as canoeing, hiking and camping. They also prioritize community service, and have kids within the program complete service projects and engage in civic engagement often. Scouts earn merit badges to show proficiency in First Aid and Citizenship in the Community skills. Then, once they have 21 badges, completed a service project and held leadership positions among Scouts for six months, they reach Eagle Scout.

Junior Maya Sakhnini is an Eagle Scout who completed the program in the summer of her 10th grade year. She joined the program in seventh grade after her friend recommended it.

The Oracle sat down with Sakhnini to discuss her experience with Scouting America.

What is your favorite merit badge that you earned?

Maya Sakhinini [MS]: I have to say the theater merit badge. That was the one I taught to my patrol. I thought it was cool to learn how to do it. Also, I just like theater.

For your Eagle Scout project, what inspired you to do the book drive and build bookshelves?

[MS]: I was looking at all these different places I could do it, and I found the Alliance of Children’s Rights, and it’s for a good cause. They help support foster kids, especially the ones that are aging out of the system, and they’re a really cool organization. So I reached out to them and offered that I could build something with them, and they sent us bookshelves that are going to go in their room for children. They have a room for children to sit in while they teach skills to kids who are aging in the foster system, but already had their own. And it was just since they needed the bookshelves, I was like, “Okay,” and we got the plans, and we figured out how to make it, and it’s just very cool.

How would you say this impacted your leadership and outdoor skills?

[MS]: I think that’s definitely inspired me to get out of my comfort zone and teach. [Scouting America] taught me a lot about hard work. Backpacking is very difficult, especially at the Scouts level, because you’re actually doing a lot each day and carrying a lot of weight. I was on the training regimen for both of my backpacking trips I went on. I think that being in Scouts taught me a lot about  “How do you effectively lead? How do you delegate to make sure you’re not doing every single task as the boss? And how do you stop situations from getting out of hand? What’s the best course of action?” I definitely think that Scouts has taught me a lot of emotional intelligence, I guess, in the way of how to deal with situations when they’re difficult and how to persevere.

For any Scouts that are either in the program already or want to become a Scout, what advice do you have for them?

[MS]: I would say, there’s going to be moments where you want to quit and where you’re really not having a fun time, and you’re cold and tired. But I think that, in the end, it’s worth it. You don’t enjoy it when you’re climbing a mountain, but you think back on climbing the mountain, and you’re like, “Wow, I did it. I did something that was hard. I did something I thought was impossible, and it was fun, and I made all these memories.” You may not enjoy it in the moment, but looking back on it you could. You should have fondness for it, but you should be ready to have hard work and be ready to learn and put the effort in.