Four EA Scouts Achieve Eagle Rank

Andrew Bauerschmidt, Evan Michalski, Chris Niepsuj and Alex Freitag recently became the newest Eagle Scouts of Immaculate Conception in East Aurora's Boy Scout Troop 599. They were honored at a special Eagle Scout Court of Honor on June 22.

Congressman Chris Collins, also an Eagle Scout and chairman of the Congressional Scouting Caucus, was the event's guest speaker. He congratulated the scouts on their significant accomplishments and presented each with a certificate of Special Congressional Recognition, a commemorative medallion and a Congressional Eagle Scout uniform patch.

Collins also spoke about the many benefits that scouting provides to our communities and encouraged the boys to remain active in scouting.

Scouting has been good to you as a boy, he said. Be good to scouting as an adult.

To become Eagle Scouts, each scout completed a minimum of 21 merit badges, 13 of which are required. Required badges include camping, cooking, environmental science, first aid, and personal fitness, among others. Non-required or elective badges were as diverse as: archery, astronomy, computers, forestry, shotgun shooting, skiing and small boat sailing. Scouting offers about 150 possible merit badge activities.

Each scout also served in leadership positions in the troop, volunteered many hours in the community and led a major community service project.

Bauerschmidts community service project involved restoration of gardens and grounds, including walkways, at St. Matthias Church.

Michalskis project was to improve drainage on trails at Knox Farm State Park by installing earth fill, drain tile, geo-fabric and five tons of crushed stone.

Niepsujs project was restoration of nature trails at the American Legion post on Center Street, including installation of benches, signposts describing local wildlife and steps to improve the accessibility of steeper sections of the trails.

Finally, Freitags project involved planting 24, 8-foot saplings of various species of trees within Knox Farm State Park.

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Four EA Scouts Achieve Eagle Rank