Mountain Brook Eagle Scout does small act of service for local church

A local high school Eagle Scout decided to take initiative in the Mountain Brook community.

Mountain Brook High School student Gri Cashio took it upon himself to replace two bulletin boards at Mountain Brook Presbyterian Church as his Eagle Scout Service Project.

Cashio asked then-pastor Lant Davis what he could do for his Eagle Scout project that could benefit the church, which is where his Eagle Scout group hold their meetings.

He said Eagle Scout Service Projects are an opportunity to help people in the community.

“They just help everyday people,” Cashio said. “The bulletin boards, for example, people that walk past the bulletin boards are now going to know certain announcements for their church. You couldn’t do that before.”

He said it took him a little less than a month to replace the church’s bulletin boards.

“We saw character traits in him that we didn’t know he had,” said Meredith Cashio, Cashio’s mother. “Having grit and persistence and when it gets hard and tedious, you’ve just gotta keep plugging.”

Cashio started as a cub scout in second grade, Meredith Cashio said. He has since then risen through the ranks, becoming a boy scout in fifth grade and later becoming a Life Scout and then an Eagle Scout.    

“There are different ranks that have to be achieved to go to the next rank, merit badges have to be earned,” she said.

An Eagle Scout is the highest rank in BSA. Teens in BSA start with the rank of Scout and then progress to Second Class, Star, Eagle, Tenderfoot, First Class, Life and Eagle. Scout programs are divided by age and activities, per the website. Cub scouts are boys and girls are in kindergarten-fifth grade and scouts are sixth-12th graders.

Teens between the ages of 14-20 are also eligible to be Venture and Sea Scouts.

Cashio comes from a family of Boy Scouts, his mother said. Her father and her two brothers were Boy Scouts as well as her two nephews that are currently active, she said.

“My husband and I are very proud of him,” she said. “We come from a very rich Boy Scout background. My dad received a Distinguished Eagle Scout Award, I think he got the silver beaver… He was very active in Boy Scouts.”

Since it was founded in 1910, the BSA has had over 130 million youth members and more than 35 million adult volunteers, according to its website.

The mission of the BSA is to “prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Scout Law,” according to the website.

“My granddad was a physician in Birmingham and he was very in tune with the community,” Meredith Cashio said. “He realized that there was such a need for something for these boys to learn responsibility, to learn the importance of integrity, character development. I believe that the Scouts allow these young men to hone those skills.”