McCoy worked for three years to earn all the merit badges he now wears. He completed some in just an afternoon or two, with a good bit of concentration and effort. Others—like learning to play the bugle—took up to two years to master.
In the end, McCoy developed an impressive array of skills. The badges signify his knowledge in a wide variety of subjects, including SCUBA, geocaching, robotics, and hiking. The broad, intensive study has exposed the fourteen-year-old Scout to a variety of subjects and has motivated him to pursue engineering as a career.
And what exactly inspired Josh McCoy to acquire every badge in the book? Describing himself as “competitive,” the young man reported that he felt driven to exceed the number of badges earned by his father, Tim McCoy, who received 82 merit badges when he was a Boy Scout.