Chief Scout’s Acorn Award Explained

The Chief Scout’s Acorn Award is the highest award a Squirrel Scout can earn.

It’s designed to recognise the experiences, skills and development a young person has gained during their time in Squirrels. Scouts describes it as recognising Squirrels who have had adventures, helped their friends and learned new things.

It’s not a single activity or challenge.

Instead, the Acorn Award brings together achievements from across the Squirrels programme.

What Does a Squirrel Need to Do?

The requirements are straightforward.

To earn the Chief Scout’s Acorn Award, a Squirrel needs to complete:

All four Challenge Awards

and

Any two Activity or Staged Activity Badges of their choice. (Scouts)

The four Challenge Awards are:

All About Adventure

All About Me

All Around Us

All Together

This means there is some flexibility in which Activity or Staged Activity Badges a Squirrel chooses.

The Four Challenge Awards

The Challenge Awards form the main part of the Acorn Award.

They give Squirrels opportunities to try new things, develop confidence, explore their surroundings and work with other people.

All About Adventure gives Squirrels opportunities to experience adventure and try new things.

All About Me focuses on the individual and encourages Squirrels to explore their interests and develop confidence.

All Around Us encourages them to discover the world around them and their local environment.

All Together focuses on working with others and developing teamwork.

A Squirrel needs to complete all four to earn the Acorn Award.

The Two Activity Badges

As well as the four Challenge Awards, Squirrels need to complete two Activity or Staged Activity Badges of their choice.

This gives young people some freedom to choose activities that interest them.

One Squirrel might enjoy outdoor activities.

Another might prefer creative activities.

Someone else might choose a science, nature or practical skill.

The important thing is that the two badges are completed as part of their Squirrels programme.

Is the Acorn Award Complicated?

Not really.

The challenge is more about giving Squirrels enough opportunities over their time in the section than completing everything in a short period.

Scouts provides programme planning resources specifically designed to help Squirrels work towards the Acorn Award, including a two-year programme plan.

This is useful because the award can be built naturally into normal Drey activities.

A Squirrel doesn’t need every meeting to be about earning their top award.

How Long Does It Take?

There isn’t a requirement that every Squirrel must complete the Acorn Award within a particular fixed number of months.

A Squirrel can work towards the requirements throughout their time in the section.

The official Scouts programme even provides a two-year Acorn Award programme, showing how the requirements can be spread naturally across a Squirrel’s time in the section.

What If a Squirrel Moves to Beavers?

A useful feature of the award is that a Squirrel doesn’t necessarily lose the opportunity to finish it simply because they move on to Beavers.

If they haven’t quite completed their Acorn Award when they move to Beavers, they can complete the remaining requirements during their first term in their new Beaver Colony.

That’s worth remembering when planning badges towards the end of a Squirrel’s time in the section.

Wearing the Acorn Award

Once earned, the Chief Scout’s Acorn Award can continue to be worn when the young person moves into Beavers.

Scouts’ current uniform guidance states that a Squirrel joining Beavers may continue to wear the Acorn Award on the right breast until they earn the Chief Scout’s Bronze Award.

This means the achievement can remain visible as they begin the next stage of their Scouting journey.

What Does the Acorn Award Represent?

The Acorn Award is more than a collection of completed badges.

A Squirrel working towards it has had opportunities to:

Try new experiences.

Explore their interests.

Work with other people.

Develop confidence.

Learn new skills.

Take part in adventures.

Discover more about the world around them.

That’s why it’s an important milestone in the Squirrels section.

How Leaders Can Encourage Squirrels

The best way to work towards the Acorn Award is usually to make it part of a varied programme rather than treating it as a checklist.

A Drey might spend one meeting exploring nature, another trying a new activity and another working on a creative project.

Over time, those experiences can contribute towards different parts of the programme.

Scouts also provides activities specifically designed to help young people work towards Chief Scout’s Awards.

Don’t Make It All About the Badge

For young Squirrels, earning a badge can be exciting.

But the experience behind it is more important.

A Squirrel who tries something new, works with their friends and discovers something they’re good at has achieved something meaningful whether or not they’re thinking about the Acorn Award at the time.

The award is a way of recognising that journey.

The Acorn Award and the Wider Scouting Journey

The Acorn Award is the first of the Chief Scout’s Awards across the Scout sections.

It is followed by the Chief Scout’s Bronze Award for Beavers, Silver Award for Cubs, Gold Award for Scouts, and Platinum and Diamond Awards for Explorers.

So the Acorn Award is the beginning of a progression of top awards that young people can work towards as they move through Scouting.

Final Thoughts

The Chief Scout’s Acorn Award gives Squirrels something significant to work towards without requiring every young person to follow exactly the same path.

They all complete the four Challenge Awards, but they can choose two Activity or Staged Activity Badges that interest them.

That balance gives the award structure while still allowing Squirrels to follow their own interests.

🌱 THE BIG IDEA

The Acorn Award is about the journey, not just the badge.

Four Challenge Awards.
Two Activity or Staged Activity Badges.
Plenty of opportunities to explore, learn and have adventures.

For a Squirrel, earning the Chief Scout’s Acorn Award is a great way to celebrate everything they’ve achieved during their time in Squirrels.