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EAGLE SCOUT PROJECT – MICHAEL REED McCORMACK Benefitting Plymouth Housing Group Boy Scout Troop 430 – Medina, Washington |
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About Me and What I am up to: Some of
you know me very well; others of you visiting this site may not know much
about me. I am 17
and a senior in high school. I was
born and grew up in Bellevue, Washington.
I attended St. Thomas School in Medina from the time I was 3 years old
through 6th grade. I then
attended Villa Academy in Seattle for 2 years. My freshman and sophomore years in high
school were spent at O’Dea High School on First Hill in Seattle. At the
start of my junior year in high school, I moved to Bradenton, Florida to
attend school and improve as a baseball player. Down here, I attend classes at The
Pendleton School and play baseball at IMG Academies. I live in the equivalent of a dormitory. My life isn’t that exciting. I get up early, go to school for 5 hours,
eat lunch, go to baseball practice for 3 hours, work out for an hour, eat
dinner, study most nights until midnight, go to bed, and start all over again
the following morning. There are about
60 of us in this program. Most of the
players down here are drafted out of high school and/or go on to play
baseball in college. So, it is a
pretty challenging environment. Outside
of school, my primary interests are working out, baseball, art and playing
guitar. I have
been involved in Boy Scouts most of my life.
I started as a Cub Scout in 2000.
In 2003, I became a Boy Scout and member of Troop 430. During my years as a Scout, I have attended
several summer camps, gone on other outings such as the annual Camporee and
igloo camping events, pitched in on other Scouts’ service projects,
challenged myself on difficult hikes, and volunteered my time for numerous
good causes. I look back now and am
appreciative of many of the skills I have picked up through my involvement in
Boy Scouts, even though I often didn’t think much of it at the time. I still use the knots I learned early on,
and I appreciate the survival and emergency preparation skills I picked up
along the way. I became a
Life Scout, which is the rank immediately below Eagle, in June of 2005, and I
completed all of the merit badges required for the Eagle rank in March of
2006. The only major requirement for
me to complete to reach the rank of Eagle is the well known “Eagle Scout
Project”. Putting aside the time I
spend on baseball, it has been a struggle for me to plan and execute my
community service project because I am away from home and unable to make my
Troop’s weekly meetings. The
reason I set up this website is to allow me to complete part of my service
project while I am away from home. One
of the objectives for a Scout working on an Eagle service project is the
demonstration of leadership and organizational skills. Troop leaders often say that the service project
should incorporate enough organization, documentation and delegation to the
point where the project can be executed by other Scouts without the physical
presence of the sponsoring Scout. I
couldn’t come anywhere close to completing this project without the behind
the scenes support and hard work of many of the scouts of Troop 430. So I would like to thank all of the Scouts
that have pitched in and agreed to help me take care of things related to my
project that I cannot really do myself from 3,000 miles away, particularly
Andy Miller. I also really need to
thank the adult leaders of Troop 430 who have supported my efforts to reach
Eagle Scout status despite being away from home and missing so many troop
meetings, including Mr. Taylor, Mr. Hughes and Ms. Miller. They have really gone out of their way to
accommodate my unusual situation. My mother
introduced me to Plymouth Housing Group, the organization that is the
beneficiary of my service project. I
didn’t know anything about this group, but after meeting with them, I became
pretty excited about doing a project that would help them out. There is some information about Plymouth
Housing Group on this website, as well as a link to their website. I hope you will take a minute or two and
read about Plymouth Housing Group. If
you do, I feel confident that you will support my project. As for
what is going on with me right now, I am working hard on my schoolwork as
well as baseball. My baseball team is
getting ready to play in a regional qualifier sponsored by the WWBA (World
Wood Bat Association). We will play in
a tournament in September in Ft. Myers, Florida where there will be 48 teams
in the 18U division. Depending on how
we do as a team, we may be participating in the WWBA World Championships in
Jupiter, Florida in October. Thanks
for taking the time to visit my website.
I would really appreciate it if you would set aside a few minutes,
either now or in the next day or so, to find a way to donate one or more of
the new or used items I am collecting on behalf of Plymouth Housing Group. |
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