Education: A Sense of Belonging

In a school classroom in Lubbock, Texas one afternoon this month, 17 teenagers gravely went through a ritual familiar to Boy Scouts the world over. After chorusing the Scout oath (". . . I will do my best ... to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake and morally straight"), they settled down to an afternoon of studying the silent signals used on hikes. What distinguished the meeting was the fact that few of the boys were likely to put into practice what they learned in the classroom: they were all members of a troop of physically and mentally handicapped Scouts.

Tailored Program. The Lubbock troop was organized in 1953, after the mother of a 13-year-old retarded boy went to the local Boy Scout office with the suggestion that scouting instruction might give her son and others like him the sense of belonging that they so desperately needed. A group of Texas Tech students who were members of Alpha Phi Omega, the national service fraternity of former Boy Scouts, agreed to take over the instruction of a group of handicapped youngsters. Lucian Thomas, a local jeweler who had been confined to a wheelchair for 16 years, sponsored the troop. The A.P.O. members scheduled two meetings a week, one for physically handicapped youngsters and one for the mentally retarded.

Although other cities have organized more than 450 troops, patrols, or small groups for handicapped youngsters, Lubbock's Scout leaders found that there was all too little published material to guide them in their work. "We felt our way along," says one official. "We had to learn everything the hard way." Gradually, the A.P.O. leaders developed a program tailored to the capabilities of the handicapped.

Since the boys cannot go on camping trips, they earn their merit badges by telling the leaders how to follow a trail, how to build a fire, how to treat blisters, burns and snakebites. Most of them have learned to identify trees and to tell directions in the woods. Although many of the physically handicapped are confined to wheelchairs with cerebral palsy, polio, arthritis or paraplegia, they have proved remarkably adept at mastering certain basic normal skills, e.g., tying knots, which some of the boys can do only by using their teeth. The mentally retarded boys have learned the simpler stages of first aid, how to build a fire in the open, and hobbies such as basketry.

Earned Advancement. The instruction takes longer than it would with non-handicapped boys. In the two years since the troop was founded, all the boys have earned Tenderfoot ratings. A few are Second Class Scouts. The most significant thing about their accomplishment, Scoutmaster Alan Conley believes, is that all of them have genuinely earned their advancement: the program has been modified, but not simplified, for their benefit. "We have learned," says Conley, "that these boys crave responsibility. Before, they were always treated like babies. No one gave them responsibility because it was felt they did not want it. Now they are thankful for what they have, and they are happy."