Scouting Life
Beginning/current involvement
I first joined the Scouting Movement as a teenager in January 2017. I'm currently volunteering every week as an adult scout leader for a Beaver group of (ages 6-8). This involves doing online admin work of uploading the register, weekly activities in the programme and linking them to show the child's progress.
A programme follows the school term dates and a weekly activity could be for example; building fires, shooting, hiking, arts & crafts, camping/sleepovers, cooking, or first aid.
In order to become an adult scout leader, there is a 3 year training programme which I completed in April 2024. Some of the training included GDPR, Safeguarding, administration and data protection.
Media and Scouting
I have created social media posts about information on the weekly programme activities or upcoming events for parents using Canva.
I volunteered at a week festival for teenagers being a photographer and live streaming the open ceremony.
Network
I am a current member of Burns White Network group for (ages 18-25). Network meet up once a month and go to pubs, or explore in an activity that not many of us have done before. Occasionally we go camping, have a day trip or helping the community when needed. One of the community projects was refurbishing an outdoor play park at our local scout group. Most members of Network are scout leaders and volunteer with the younger scout groups.
Kent International Jamboree (KIJ)
In 2022 I was camping at Kent County Showground along with 5,400 other people for one week. I was a photographer and also live streamed the open ceremony.
The jamboree only happens every four years to allow other counties to host. KIJ is basically a seven day festival similar to Reading or Glastonbury festival for teenagers but a lot smaller and safer. The theme for our jamboree was Space. The showgrounds was divied into sections by names of planets and each planet had roughly 1,000 kids camp together. The planets were Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Neptune and Mercury for staff only.
Every evening the main stage had live music and entertainment. The daytime activities are adventurous, arts & crafts, science & history, global issues & culture and in inflatables obstacles.
Here are some photos that I took with a camera and my phone.
Adventurous Activities & My Scouting Experience pre-covid 19
I did Microlighting on 16th October 2021 in Maidstone. Microlighting is a hang glider with a motor on the back. We flew into the air just below cloud level and I was able to see the outskirts of South London from there. I was also allowed to glide the Microlight for 5mins in the air!
My favourite activities in Scouting: shooting, archery and axe throwing. I have managed to hit the bullseye with a rifle and crossbow before and hit exploding targets when shooting. The exploding targets are a tiny thin can and makes a loud sound when the bullet touches the target.
I first tried a crossbow on my first Jamboree camp which is a 7-day camp during the first week of the school summer holidays. I managed to line up the scope perfectly and hit bulls eye first try!
Charnwood Jamboree was my first week long camp in Leicestershire in 2019. There was a total of 6,000 scouts and guides that attended this camp from all over the world to join this event. On the first and last day there is an opening and closing ceremony. Bear Grills went on stage and made a speech followed by an indoor fireworks display.
Every volunteer and Scout/Guides all lived in a sub camp site this meant that roughly 1,000 people were living on one camp site and the others lived in a different sub camps. The sub campsites were named after elements which were: water, light, earth, sound, mechanical and fire. My Scout group stayed in the water sub campsite and was the entrance to the campsite.
During the day and evening there was a range of entertainment and activities for everyone to try and enjoy. One of the evening events was music night! A group actors/actresses performed songs from multiple musicals on stage in front of us. The musical in the image was Matilda. Some of the day time activities I tried was quad biking, caving and rodeo.
Other camps I have been to is to my local campsite next to Wildwood, Kingswood, Thorpe Park and Network Festival in Coventry.
The image below is me with my camp blanket. All of these badges are sewn onto a blanket / poncho called a camp blanket that we take on our camping trips to sit around the fire and sing songs.
