1st Whitwell (Open) Scout and Guide GroupWelbeck Street Recreation Ground, Whitwell, Worksop, NottsRegistered Charity Number 1036062

1st Whitwell (open) Scout and Guide Group Annual

Report

1st April 2010 to 31st March 2011

1st Whitwell (open) Scout and Guide Group Annual Report 2010-11Contents

Committee Chair’s statement PAGE 3

Scout sections report PAGE 5

Guide section report PAGE 7

Brownie Guide section report PAGE 9

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Committee Chair’s statement

Welcome to the 2010/11 Annual Report for the 1st Whitwell (Open) Scout and Guide Committee. This year the committee has met most months to organise and plan fund-raising events, manage the building and the Group’s finances. Raising adequate funds to keep the building and Group going remains an issue for the committee, as does recruiting both section leaders to work with the children and Committee members to help and support. Although we have a core group of committed committee members we still need to plan for succession of the key posts and encourage new parents to become more involved. Our fund raising activities involve parents, leaders and children, all working together. Here’s some of what has been taking place this financial year:

In 2010

May: Bikeathon at Clumber Park, activities for younger children whilst the adults took part

in the bikeathon raising money for Old Boys Parachute Regiment -. Great morning out and one where the older Scout

and guide groups really get involved, putting the tents up, serving tea and coffee and bacon sandwiches and clearing up. The new gas boiler proved its worth.

July: Well dressing- One of our biggest fund raising events of the year. The Well Dressing sub-committee worked well, with a Treasure Hunt/BBQ and Pie and Peas Quiz night.

August: Coffee Morning

September: Whitwell Music Festival – taking donations for entry on the door

November: Sweet stall at the village fireworks display

The weather stopped some of our planned activities at the end of November and beginning of December. Bag packing at Dobies and a sweet stall at the Lantern Parade were unfortunately cancelled, however the Scout Post still got through despite the snow!

In 2011

Jan: 3rd Burns Night – bigger and better than ever; with a live band ‘Beggars belief’. A whooping £580 was raised, making this our second largest annual fund-raising event. All the effort in the kitchen, peeling those ‘neeps’ was well worth it!

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The Replacement Building Committee has been running in the background during the year, continuing to apply for the funding for the new build. At least 4 separate fund applications have made; the time taken in this is often unrecognised. Unfortunately only one bid was successful raising only part of the money required for the Building Regulations stage. The money given to the group by the Lousie Smalley Walkers continues to be used as match funding in these bids, alongside the many volunteer hours given to the groups. The current economic environment is unfortunately not working in our favour and future appropriate funding streams seem unlikely.

The New Year saw more vandalism to the Scout and Guide Hut and the winter weather brought down guttering and further damaged our already leaking roof. Options to accommodate the Scout and Guide groups at other venues were explored and considered, however everyone was keen to keep our ‘family’ together as long as possible. It has been recognised that the new building will not happen quickly and that we need to spend some money on repairs and renovation to keep our ‘home’ together for the next few years. The Committee finished the financial year drawing up a plan to tidy up the Scout and Guide Hut grounds and make some essential repairs to the roof, guttering and walls. We are determined to give the hut back it’s lived in look, as opposed to one of dereliction!

All year funds have also been raised by shopping and searching online through easyfundraising. So if you haven’t already put the address on your computer, please do.

http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/whitwellsgOr search using:

http://whitwellsg.easysearch.org.uk

I’d like to thank the Committee for all their work during the year; Parents of our Scouts and Guides should not under-estimate the hard work that goes in to help support the groups. I hope you can see from the photos we’ve published in this year’s report the real reason we do all this and there’s much more of the same planned in the coming year. This is why your continuing support is needed.

Gillian Maiden Committee Chair

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Scout Group Section Report 2010-11

The Beaver Colony is for both boys and girls aged 6 to 8 years who enjoy making friends, playing games, going on visits and helping others. This year Whitwell's Beavers had to close temporarily because we did not have any adult volunteers able to maintain the weekly commitment necessary to deliver the Scout Association programme. This meant that we did not have the throughput of young people progressing from Beavers to the Cub Pack, which has contributed to a lower than usual number of Cubs this year. Beavers from other villages in the District joined Cubs, Scouts and Explorer Scouts at Walesby for the District Camp which included a sleepover and joining in activities. With two new volunteers stepping forward to offer their time, we hope to re-open the Whitwell Beaver Colony during September 2011, probably on Fridays. The Cub Pack is for both boys and girls aged 8 to 10½ years who like to try lots of different activities like swimming, music, exploring, computing and collecting, go on trips, go camping and sleep in a tent and doing loads of outdoor activities. Cubs is open Thursdays 6:30pm-8pm during term time and is led by Kirstie Raitt. Our Cubs once again took part in the District Camp and enjoyed air rifle shooting, raft building (swimming), water slide, caving and the campfire. The weekly programme has seen a number of activity badges earned and Challenges completed this year on the way to achieving the Chief Scout Silver Award. The Pack relies heavily on the Parent Rota to keep open each week, so thank you to Kirstie and the Cubs' parents for keeping the ball rolling this year. Anyone wanting to help on a more regular basis please step forward.

As in previous years the group is in need of additional volunteers to help with delivery of the weekly activity programme. Support of parents, on a rota basis, has been invaluable and on behalf of our members, Kirstie and myself, ‘Thank you’ to all who have helped this year. The Parent Rota will need to continue until we have sufficient volunteer Leaders in place to run our weekly programme, so thanks in advance to all parents for your help in the year ahead.

The Scout Troop is for both boys and girls aged 10½ to 14 years who love being outdoors, and discovering new challenges. As with Cubs the Scout Troop relies heavily on parents to help out at weekly sessions and during weekend camps and outings. Scouts is open Mondays 7-9pm during term time. The Troop is currently led by the Group Scout Leader as we don't have a Scout Leader. This hasn't stopped the Scouts from having a full and action packed year, so much so that a Celebration Night was held in January so that parents could learn about their children's achievements. Every one of the Challenge awards were achieved by some or all of the Scouts this year, with some close to completing their Chief Scout Gold Award. Highlights of the year included an activity packed week at PEAK 2010 International Camp, climbing Scarfell Pike the highest mountain in England, The Scarcliffe Challenge, The Kinder Challenge, and the District Camp at Walesby. Craig EdsonGroup Scout Leader

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Guide Group Section Report 2010-11

The guide report for 2010-2011 continues where last year’s finishes with more Centenary Activities.

We supported Worksop Guides by attending their show in the Acorn Theatre.

For a different day out Darren and Charlotte planned a Monopoly Treasure Hunt around the sites of Sheffield City Centre, we finished the day out with a ride on the Sheffield Eye.

The Well Dressing and Peak 2010 dominated the summer with both following the centenary theme. The experience of the Peak Camp; is enjoyed by all in different ways and I know that Brownies and Cubs who visited are looking forward to camping next time.

In October we had the finale to our Centenary Year at 20:10 on 20/10/2010 at Bolsover Castle, all the members from the entire District assembled to celebrate with food, a treasure hunt and short celebration over looking the town from the castle.

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All the guides gained the special Adventure 100 badges, which involved lots of different activities all year covering all parts of the programme particularly meeting new Guides and making friends.

The winter caused problems as it did for all sections with the exceptionally heavy snow over several weeks but we managed to keep the unit programme going missing only one full meeting.

In February half term we travelled to York by train and stayed in the YHA visiting some of York’s attractions, the Railway Museum and Castle Museum and on Sunday had an invite to a district Thinking Day Event in York.

The Guides continue to show a great commitment to the programme and we are proud of the 4 guides who gained their Baden-Powell Awards this year.

Hilary EllisGroup Guide Leader

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1st Whitwell Brownies Unit Report 2010-2011

Sept – Dec 2010Began the new school year with a regular number of 6 to 8 Brownies and introduced the 1st

Whitwell Brownies Group on Facebook in order to maintain regular contact with Parents and friends of the Unit. The online group is a “closed” group, meaning that only the administrators of the group can allow members to join when they are invited or make a request. Only group members can see the posted information and photographs ensuring safeguarding of our girls.September 2010, Brownies were invited to McDonalds in Worksop to help with a Litter Pick in the area surrounding the Restaurant – Mums and Dads and little Brothers helped out too and we were rewarded with a free meal!October 20, 2010 20:10pm saw the meeting of all guiding units in the district at Bolsover castle to celebrate the Centenary of Girlguiding. The girls gathered for wide-games, hot-dogs, a sing-song, cake and goody bags. In December, Brownies were able to take up a special offer at Sheffield Arena and we went to see Disney on Ice. We took four girls and we had a brilliant time with our goody bags and glowsticks.During our remaining meetings in this term, Brownies worked on their Stargazer Badge and we had planned to work on Christmas makes towards the end of November, but due to the snow and cold conditions in the hut we postponed Brownies until January for safety reasons.

Jan – April 2011 Brownies began working on their Brownie Skills and Brownie Traditions badges – this has included learning about the history of Brownies and the sorts of activities they used to do such as learning how to tie a knot and safely lighting a candle by striking a match.On Thinking Day (22nd February) Brown Owl had been chosen at a district meeting to bring one member from each Guiding Unit at Whitwell to the unveiling of a special Blue Plaque in honour of Lady Baden Powell. It had been placed in the grounds of her former home in Chesterfield.As part of their World Cultures badge, Brownies held a Japanese Doll Festival in March, amazingly just days after the tsunami hit Japan. The girls learned about the tradition of the Doll Festival and brought their own dolls to help celebrate, learned some Origami paper-folding, made a peg doll in traditional Japanese clothing and rolled their own Sushi. The girls were asked to invite a friend to come with them to see what sort of things Brownies get up to, and as such our numbers increased.

May – July 2011Brownies numbers increased again due to the arrival of some new Rainbows and friends of current Brownies to the unit. This term, we completed our Crime Prevention badge and our Number Fun badge. One week in the summer we had intended to take the girls out for a walk and to go ‘grass Sledging’ on Quarry Hill (Southfield Lane) but were unable to do so at the last minute due to a change in the weather. We ended our year with a pow-wow to discuss what activities we would like to do next year and what badges we would like to work on.

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GENERALWe have been focusing a lot on badge work this year, mainly due to the fact that there have been a lot of ‘outside’ activities going on in the previous year thanks to Centenary Celebrations. We understand that as part of that the girls and their parents have had a lot of activities to either pay out for or have to take their girls all over the place to get to and everyone was exhausted! Of course our unit account has subsidised some of these trips, but it has meant that we have at times run low on funds. Fortunately through ‘in-house’ activities and an increase in members we have a healthy unit again and we hope for better things to come.

Rebecca NortonBrown Owl

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