Page Updated January 1, 2026

National Youth Leadership Training

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Financial Aid is Available for Participants and Staff

NYLT is a crash-course in teamwork, problem solving, leadership, and goal setting that set me apart from my peers. It helped shape my thinking in a way that had a huge impact on the next 10 years of my life.

-- Dominic Musilli, CPA, Eagle Scout and former SPL for Troop 1 in GTC

NYLT 2026 Course Information

NYLT is a six-day course over a full week.
Sunday to Friday

Participants must attend the entire 6 days

June 7-12, 2026, Camp Stambaugh

Participant Fee:

Early discount $330 if paid by May 2
Regular Fee $360 after May 2

Male and Female Youth Courses Available
Jericho Johnson, Course Director

Ben Koester, Scoutmaster of Male Youth

Leona Lovell, Scoutmaster of Female Youth

Questions? Email nylt@gtcscouting.org

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NYLT is a fantastic experience for any scout to grow as a leader in the short and long term. Even today, having taken the course almost eight years ago, I still find myself regularly thinking back to and using leadership and mentoring skills and practices I learned at NYLT.

-- Harley Hoff, 2016 NYLT Participant, Eagle Scout, James E. West Recipient

I completed NYLT. How can I continue the experience?

Get Involved

The most important thing is to take your new leadership skills back to your troop and help the troop become stronger.

- Talk to your Scoutmaster about how you can help the troop.
- Step up and take on new challenges in the troop. Use your training. It is the best youth leadership development training the BSA offers, but it only works if you take what you learned and run with it.

Come back to NYLT next year as a staff member.

Go to NAYLE!

Take the next level course, National Advanced Youth Leadership Experience, at Philmont or the Summit Bechtel Reserve.

Get your fellow troop members involved

Convince your friends in your troop to participate in NYLT this year or next.

Talk to other NYLT Trained leaders in your troop and see how you can all work together to strengthen your troop.

Maybe that is more and better PLCs.
Maybe help create an older scout program in your troop.
The possibilities are endless.

Get your Scoutmasters and other adults to Wood Badge

Suggest to your adult leaders that they take Wood Badge. gtcscouting.org/woodbadge.

- Wood Badge is NYLT, but for Adults. They will have similar training to yours but on a more adult level.
- If your Scoutmasters have Wood Badge, they will understand what you have experienced as a participant.
- If your Scoutmasters are not Wood Badge trained, then they will not easily understand you, and you will have to explain your skills in great detail for them to understand.

What if my troop has never used NYLT as part of our program?

This is a great year to use NYLT for the first time (or in a long time). What will NYLT do for your scouts? It is going to allow them to see how a troop should work running the patrol method so all scouts have the most fun and learn the most. It will empower them with ideas that they can bring back to their unit. As a Scoutmaster, you can learn from them and give them more say in how the troop is run and what they do. Your troop will become stronger.

If you, the adult volunteer want to speak the language of NYLT, to understand how to let the youth bring back there skills toolkit and be effective, there is nothing you can do as important as being Wood Badge trained. (Visit our Wood Badge web site).

"I sent my new leaders to NYLT every year during my tenure as Scoutmaster. This is so important, our troop always helped pay their way.

We became a very strong troop because we had many NYLT trained youth and we let them lead."

-- 25 year Scoutmaster, Great Trail Council.

What is it and what do they learn?

What is NYLT?

National Youth Leadership Training is a week-long, intensive summer camp experience designed to teach scouts leadership and communication skills!

NYLT enables scouts to better serve as leaders in their home troops.

NYLT models a month in the life of troop: planning and conducting three meetings, leading up to an overnight outpost camp all in a summer camp setting.

While the course is designed to have patrols experience the four stages of team development as a team, it is also intended to enable individual Scouts to internalize the leadership skills and concepts being presented to them along the way.

Who should attend?

All Scouts, Venturers and Sea Scouts who want to be better leaders in their units and especially those who seek or find themselves in the top position of Senior Patrol Leader, Crew President or Sea Scout Boatswain.

"Among the most powerful tools in your leadership toolbox is EDGE, which stands for Explain, Demonstrate, Guide, and Enable. EDGE allows you to tailor your teaching and leadership styles—and those of your youth leaders—to the needs of your Scouts. When you meet your Scouts where they are, learning and growth happen."

-- Scouts BSA: Troop Leader Guidebook - Volume 2.

If your Scouts can’t take NYLT in your own council because of scheduling conflicts or lack of space, check with neighboring councils.

-- Scouts BSA: Troop Leader Guidebook - Volume 2

"Becoming Scout-led takes time and patience. Being in charge doesn’t feel natural to Scouts who rarely get the opportunity in other areas of their lives. And adults aren’t accustomed to yielding authority to kids their own children’s age—perhaps especially if those kids are their children."

-- Scouts BSA: Troop Leader Guidebook - Volume 2.

Why Attend?

NYLT will give the youth leaders the tools they need to be effective in their positions of responsibility.

--Scouts BSA: Troop Leader Guidebook - Volume 2

The focus of each session is not only providing knowledge, but giving the youth a “Toolbox of Skills” that equips them with the skills necessary to lead a troop.

A Toolbox of Leadership Skills

National Youth Leadership Training introduces the following skills.

Vision—Goals—Planning: Creating a Positive Future Success

SMART Goals: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Timely

Planning and Problem-Solving Tool: What, How, When, Who

Assessment Tool: SSC—Start, Stop, Continue

Teaching EDGE: Explain, Demonstrate, Guide, Enable

Stages of Team Development: Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing

Leading EDGE: Explain, Demonstrate, Guide, Enable

Conflict Resolution Tool: EAR—Express, Address, Resolve

Making Ethical Decisions: Right vs. Wrong, Right vs. Right, Trivial

Communication: MaSeR—Message, Sender, Receiver