Northumberland County Explorer Scout Council - Feb 2007

Northumberland County Explorer Scout Council

Minutes from meeting held 20th February 2007 at Eversheds, Newcastle upon Tyne.

Welcome Address

There were representatives from the following Districts: Great North Hadrian Tynemouth Whitley Bay

The chairperson Lauren from Whitley Bay Explorers and the ACC (Explorer Scouts) thanked Eversheds for the meeting room.

Centenary Jamboree Update Things are going well. There is a ball to be held at the Assembly Rooms on the 19/3/07 to raise funds for the contingent. There will also be a casino night held with plenty of entertainment including a ceildlh. Chris Eldridge explained that the fee for the jamboree was worked out based upon the GDP of each country, to enable as many countries to be able to attend. The cost was thus high in the UK requiring fundraising.

County Explorer Scout Events

The county founder’s day service went very well, with verdicts from the Explorer Scouts that the day was generally ok. The pageant was liked by all who attended

Caud Marra There will be around 170 Explorer Scouts out of 330 in the county attending. The Explorers will have their own sub camp down by the reservoir, with some additional activities. A communal BBQ will be available for Saturday night for all to cook on. There will be an “X Factor” competition on the Saturday evening.

March Hare This event has now been cancelled.

Jamboree
There is still a last minute opportunity for an Explorer Scout to join a group going to the World
Scout Jamboree.
Please contact the county office if you have any Explorer Scouts wanting to be part of this fantastic event.

Winter Walking Weekend – Cairngorms Scotland
This is a great opportunity for Explorer Scouts to experience winter walking. The weekend will offer participants the option to learn winter walking skills and the use of relevant equipment such as Ice Axes & Crampons in safe but challenging environment in the Cairngorm Mountains.
Date - 23-25 March.
There are 20 places available
Cost approximately £35 and Bring your own food.
Accommodation = Camping on the shores of lake Morlick in the cairngorms.
If you have Explorer Scouts interested please contact Paul Henderson directly.

Bronze Expedition Training There will be a bronze expedition training weekend on the 21-22 April. This will involve two evenings on the 11th and 18th April at Great North District Headquarters followed by the weekend at Alwinton, Northumberland. If interested please contact Chris Eldridge or Andy “CAS” Castling (Great North District Explorer Scout Commissioner)

7/7/07 Centenary Event This event clashes with the Gilwell 24 Event; however the weekend was chosen as everyone should have finished exams by then, and it was before people started going on summer holidays. The aim of this weekend is to get from the Scottish Borders to Tynemouth (some 70 miles) camping over at Dilston completing 7 challenges on route. 4 activity badges can be gained during the weekend. Some training prior to the event will be required especially as there is much mountain biking involved. All participants will have to prove competency on a mountain bike before taking part. Teams between 4 and 7 can enter, with a minimum of 4 taking part in each challenge. It will be possible to change team members to allow rest during the event. It will be necessary to have a full support crew to transport the bikes when not in use, and to provide meals etc... The cost of this activity is £30 which includes a Lowe Alpine Dry Flo Base top worth between £20 and £25. A discussion followed on how to split the age ranges, with the verdict being, one group for Explorer age and another group for Network and above. There will be entertainment at Dilston on the Saturday night. It was voted that the age ranges for this event would be adjusted to co-inside with the normal Explorer Scout Age group. For this event the catergories are 14 to 18 nad 6 months and the other catergory starts at 17 and six months upwards. We will be looking for a mix of ages in each team within the age ranges.

Scouting Sunrise Each District will make their own arrangements to take part predominantly at 8am, with those who can’t make it having the opportunity to take part at 8pm. Some plans are in place as follows: Tynemouth intend to be at the priory or Collingwood monument with the Scouts and Explorer Scouts completing a night hike just before, and the Cubs and Beavers having a fun day on the beach the following day. Whitley Bay intend to hold their’s on the beach with North Tyneside council supporting the event. The county will also have an Explorer representative on Brownsea Island that morning.

Dragon Boat Race This will take place on the 16 September, which is the same day as the QE2 arrives in Newcastle. It is a race between Northumberland and Durham counties.

National Scout Sailing Regatta On the 21 September, at South Shields there will be a national sailing regatta, this was last held in the North East six years ago with only one unit taking part from Northumberland. Let’s see if we can get more units this year!

Later in the year there will be a Search and Evade event with the TA and army cadets, and a sea surviving training day for the Tall Ships Unit. More details to follow.

Uganda 2008 A 3 week expedition to Uganda is planned for summer 2008. This will be for 50 Explorer scouts aged 15 and above. It will involve 2 weeks community work, and 9 days of exploring with activities such as going on Safari, climbing Mount Elgon, and white water rafting. There will be an opportunity for those over 18 to do the Explorer Belt. Further information will come out via email.

Leaders and Explorers discussion
At this point the leaders moved into a separate room whilst the Explorers discussed various ways of promoting their units.

Summary of Explorer Discussion: Be seen is the key! – talk to people Mention the activities that we are doing Have a bring a friend evening Wear some of the uniform to be noticed. It was felt that full uniform sometimes put people off joining and it would be preferable to only wear some parts of it such as just the necker, or having a unit T’ Shirt.

Summary of Leaders meeting: Ian Morley (Great North) indicated he was willing to coordinate the March Hare event (now cancelled) and there would be a link on the Gosforth Explorer Scouts website (www.gosforthexplorers.blogs.com)

Leon (Great North) is willing to assist units to set up blogs on the web. He is also looking into developing the County Website, and Chris Eldridge will feed back at the next meeting.

There was some discussion over Scout Network. As Northumberland is such a large county, localised Network units have been set up at District level. There are 3 people at county level, including Ivan Brazier - ACC Network, looking at developing this section, but it was agreed that it needed to be started at District Level first and then linked together.

Chris Eldridge has a folder with details of a skills list of people in the county available.

There is a National Explorer Scout Conference on the 23-25 March at Warwick. We are looking for a representative to go. All costs would be covered.

Attached are notes on fundraising via “Youth in Action” The leaders then rejoined the Explorer Scouts

Other matters arising Chris Eldridge asked if leaders could check the details he has to ensure that the information was getting through.

John (Tynemouth) asked for Explorers to receive the minute notes from the Council meetings to keep everyone informed. Date and place of next meeting: A vote was cast in favour of using Eversheds again. Date is to be the 22 May.

Close of meeting Chris Eldridge thanked everyone for attending, and indicated that the staff from Eversheds would be thanked the following day for allowing the Explorers the use of the room and for the refreshments on offer. It truly is a superb venue for the Explorer Scout Coucil to take place and is greatly appriecated. Thank you Eversheds.

A big thank to Barney from Griffin Explorers for producing the minutes.