Nick's Ramblings

Last night was my Group’s Annual General Meeting. As well as the ‘formal’ stuff, awards were given out. It was pleasing to see three Beavers get their Chief Scouts Bronze Award and the Cub of the Year Award presented (we really need to have Beaver and Scout awards as well!).

But it was also pleasing to see a A Chief Scout’s Commendation for Good Service given to the Group Treasurer. A Group Treasurer is one of those mythical things that appears when money is needed or is required to be collected!

Seriously, a Group Treasurer is worth their weight in gold. It means that the Leaders don’t have to worry about keeping the Group’s finances in order. And, for example, it means that the Leaders do not have access to the bank account (like in our case).

Our Treasurer has been in the position for seven years now and we’re really lucky to have him. He was recently awarded his 5 years service award, but to get the Chief Scout’s Commendation for Good Service is very impressive. Like our DC said last night, its great when uniformed adults get these awards, but even more special when a non uniformed member gets one. They too show their commitment to Scouting, but in different ways to the uniformed members, and rightly deserve to be honoured for their work!

It’s pleasing to know that one of my ex Scouts will be representing his Country, County, District, Explorer Unit and Scout Group at next year’s World Scout Jamboree in Sweden (no pressure then!).

To attend this exciting event is going to cost him about £2100 or $3145 or kr24,375. Now this is quite a lot of money to pay to go away for a fortnight or so, especially in the current economic climate.

So he is not just getting his parents to ‘cough up’ the amount, but doing various activities to raise the money. He, along with the other 4 Explorers from my District who are going, have done sponsored walks, held a charity stall on the local charity market and done car washes to name but a few. He is also, in the best traditions of ‘Bob a Job’, going to do work for people in return for a donation to the fund (hmmm, the car needs washing I think!).

A couple of weeks ago, a District colleague of mine was at a meeting and was chatting to someone from another county. This person was apparently quite surprised to learn that our Explorers are fundraising to enable them to go to the Jamboree. He, apparently, just wrote a cheque for the full amount for his son to go and couldn’t understand why our Explorer’s parents don’t do the same!

Now apart from the small matter that they probably cannot afford to just write out a cheque for that much, it gives the wrong impression to the Explorer attending the event. As our Explorers have to work for the money, they will appreciate the actual cost of going to the Jamboree and realise that it’s an honour to go and will be a once in a lifetime event (I am, of course, very jealous as I never had the opportunity to go on one!). The Explorer whose Daddy just wrote the cheque will think that this is the normal way to get money for things they want in life. I think our Explorers will have a better understanding of the value of money and that it doesn’t just grow on trees in the future.

Whenever you write a post on a blog or an article on a website, you want people to read it and hope that they find it interesting.
Recently there has been a post on here that has proved to be quite popular.
But not for the reason I would have expected!

Last year I wrote about a local District who were being advised not to parade on St. George’s Day carrying the English and Union flags (read it here). And to illustrate I had pictures of both the flags taken from a site which had pictures of national flags available to download free of charge and without copyright. Sadly this site seems to have disappeared now.

However, due to England being in the World Cup (yawn – sorry can’t be doing with football, cricket is more of my thing!), whenever people are looking for the England flag, the search engines are sending them to me! It’s nice to see the blog’s stats on the up, but sadly people are not stopping to read about Scouting 🙁

Also interesting is the fact that my Group’s site is getting quite a lot of hits on the post I made which includes a video on how to tie a friendship knot (see here). Again it’s the search engines sending people towards it and because people are ‘Scouty’ in their outlook (why else would the be searching how to tie a friendship knot?) they are looking at what my Group gets up to.

However, I’ve had to update the post as people think my Group has made the video and we didn’t! I don’t want to take credit for something that’s not ours!

Luckily I found out who did, so if you look at the video, please take a look at the site of the 3rd Ware Scout Group and tell them how helpful their video is!

Another video message from the Chief Scout, this time thanking the adult volunteers.

On the weekend of 28th – 30th May the Group held its second Family Camp (our first was for our Centenary in 2008). This time we stayed at Barnswood Scout Camp, which is near to Rudyard Lake.

Everyone arrived on the Friday evening (the majority of families having put their tents up the previous nights) and we soon started the weekend’s programme. First was a walk around the campsite as many people had never visited Barnswood before. This was followed by one of Paul’s special wide games! After this chaos subsided, it was time for supper and bed – where did the evening go?

 

Explaining the Wide Game

Saturday morning brought the rain! After cooking breakfast for 105 people (the most we’ve ever had on a camp!), we split into two groups. The Scouts and their parents lit fires and did some pioneering, while the Beavers, Cubs and their parents went down to Rudyard to go on the Lake on Bell Boats. To say it rained a lot would be an understatement and we got wetter from the rain than the lake!

After lunch the Scouts went on the lake and the Beavers and Cubs got themselves painted with pirate faces and learned how to make secret messages, how compasses work and made their own telescopes.

By this time the rain had stopped and we prepared the BBQ. The BBQ was a huge success and we must have cooked well over 150 burgers and sausages!

Then it was time for part 2 of the wide game, a general knowledge quiz with questions for both adults and children (can you name the Titanic’s sister ships and do you know which country Dora the Explorer comes from?) and of course a campfire. The camp fire saw fine performances from a group of the Beavers and one of the Scouts did a solo turn. The rain even held off for most of it and just came on at the end. Then time for supper and bed.

Sunday began a bit more leisurely and after breakfast and flag break we held a Scouts Own and then invested one of the Beavers.

Then it was a few quick games and activities, then packing and tidying, lunch, more packing and tidying, the close of the camp and home!

It was great for me as both Carol and Rachael stayed out for the weekend, although we all stayed in a building – 5 months old is a bit young to camp! Rachael got to wear her Group t-shirt, which Mummy had to put on over her coat as the t-shirt is WAY too big for her! Best of all she slept soundly both nights and loads of Beavers, Cubs and Scouts running around and shouting didn’t wake her!

I came across this video of Scouts of the 2nd Kenton Scout Group, North West London, who set up a help bureau in 1939 at the beginning of the Second World War.

It’s really fascinating to watch. Enjoy!

A couple of weeks ago the Scout Association released the figures from this year’s census and the reported that the youth membership was up by 3.45% year on year. These figures are very promising and show the greatest year on year increase since 1972!

Then last week my County, Staffordshire, released its figures. Overall across the County the number of youth members are up by 1.8%. Not as good as nationally, but still an increase. My own District, Newcastle, shows an increase of 2.8%, which, again is below the national average, is still an increase. Other Districts show increases above and below the national figure, and, unfortunately, some decreases.

One interesting thing is that all of the Districts in the County (11 of them) show they have young people on waiting lists. In fact, when the census was taken in January, there were 362 young people waiting for places in Beavers, Cubs or Scouts across the County. And that’s kind of sad that there aren’t places available for them. Generally speaking, there are not enough adults in the various Groups to be able to accept these young people. This could be down to actual lack of adult help or just that the Group is ‘full’ and cannot physically accept any more kids.

Hopefully, Groups across the County will be able to recruit new adult members and ensure that these young people who want to join are able to do so without much delay!

If you want a piece of really special Scouting memorabilia, tomorrow you have the chance to buy, at auction, Baden Powell’s Scout hat!

 

According to an article on the BBC, Gilwell sold the hat some time ago and now its owner wishes to sell it on. Of course this is a great opportunity for the collector of Scouting memorabilia, but it does beg the question ‘WHAT WERE THEY THINKING??????????’. Why on earth would they sell off one of the most recognisable symbols of Scouting? The SA really ought to buy it back!

It will be interesting to see where it ends up.

Here are a couple of updates on the last two posts I’ve done.

First of all, here is a message from Bear Grylls, the UK Chief Scout, about the recent increase in numbers of Scouts in the UK.

Secondly, there is a report about the 350 new Queen’s Scouts meeting Prince Charles and Bear Grylls at the St. George’s Day parade in Windsor on the Scout Association’s website.

Today hundreds of Scouts will parade through Windsor to meet up at Windsor Castle, will then inspected by Prince Charles and finally attend a service in St. George’s Chapel where they will renew their Scout Promise led by the Chief Scout, Bear Grylls.

To be able to go on this parade is an honour for all those Scouts who have become Queen’s Scouts over the past year.

I was able to attend this parade in 1992 when I was 21. I remember having to leave home at around 5 in the morning and being in an absolutely foul mood as I’d been to a friend’s 21st birthday party the night before! When we arrived in Windsor we had to go to an army barracks to do some marching practice. As a rule we don’t do marching in scouting these days, so the Sergeant  Major who was instructing us got a bit frustrated to say the least!

It was a cold and damp morning and we weren’t allowed to wear coats over our uniforms, so I was glad that I’d worn extra layers under my shirt! We paraded to the Castle and lined up on the parade ground and were then inspected by HM The Queen! I was terrified as I was on the front row and didn’t want to make a prat of myself if she decided to speak to me. She didn’t however, but at least I can say was inspected by the Queen!

We then marched into St. George’s Chapel for the service where we were led in the renewal of our promise by the then Chief Scout, Garth Morrison.

After the service, the time was our own and I spent the rest of the day sightseeing in Windsor with Mum and Dad.

It was certainly a talking point at work the following day, being able to say I spent my weekend being inspected by the Queen!

It was a great honour to take part in the parade.

If I can find them, I’ll put some of the photos on here!

Great news from the Scout Association today. The results of the 2010 census are in and the number of young people Scouting in the UK is up again! The membership now stands at 499,323, which is 3.45% up on last year! This is also the greatest growth in numbers since 1972. The other good news is that the number of adults are also up another 3.1%. However, as always, there is need for more adults as there are around 33,500 young people on waiting lists!

You can read the full story here.

It is interesting to note that the media are all being very positive about Scouting again and saying that Scouting is (obviously!) a good thing. Another interesting point is that again they are making a big thing about mentioning our Chief Scout Bear Grylls.

Of course it’s good to note that in my own little corner of Scouting, my Group’s numbers are also up again this year.

Two of my favourite things!

There has long been a tradition of naming locomotives with Scouting related names. In the 1930’s the London Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS) named 2 of their Royal Scot engines The Boy Scout (6169) and The Girl Guide (6168). Then in the early 1950’s British Railways named one of their new Britannia class engines after the then Chief Scout Lord Rowallan.

There was talk in 2007 that one of the train operating companies was going to name a train with a Scouting name to celebrate the 100 years of Scouting. However, nothing came of it.

This year sees the Union Pacific Railroad launch one of their locos in a livery celebrating the BSA’s centenary.

 

You can also read more about it here. It looks very impressive and I have to say I’m a bit jealous that I’ll not get to see it!