Do you love the outdoors? Do you love the DofE? Become one of our Expedition Leaders! We’re running our next DofE Expedition Leader Course from 14-18 July at Low Port Centre in West Lothian. Join us and gain your:
- Lowland Leader Award
- DofE Supervisor Qualification
- First Aid Training
To register for this course you must be a current volunteer with at DofE group and aged 18 to 25. You must register with the Lowland Leader Award (£39) before you attend. The cost is £200 and includes full room and board. This price is subsidised by the DofE Scotland Volunteer Fund.
To sign up please email your completed booking form to Katy.Forrester@DofE.org before 11th July.
The first Bronze DofE Award was achieved at HMP Edinburgh this month! The young person who achieved his Bronze completed all of his DofE activities within the secure environment – an achievement which shows the creativity of both him and his Leaders.
There are a lot of opportunities for Physical and Skills in the prison. The Bronze Award holder completed his Physical by doing gym and fitness activities. His Skill was to learn plumbing. The Volunteering section and Expedition activities were a bit less obvious at the beginning.
For the Volunteering, the group decided to run charity fundraisers from within the prison. Most recently they had breakfast roll mornings for MacMillan Cancer Support, which raised over £300! And donations came mainly from the prisoners themselves.
For the Expedition, the participants mapped out a route based on an expedition from Aviemore. They went through all the required training for an expedition, like camp hygiene, map skills and first aid. They then used the fitness facilities to complete the expedition route – climbing up hills on the treadmill and using the stationary bikes for cycling. They also completed problem-solving activities like rescuing a rucksack from a bog. To complete the Expedition, they got permission and camped in the grounds of the prison, creating the full expedition experience.
The participant who completed his Bronze is the first, but definitely not the last to complete his DofE in this way.
If you’d like to learn more about DofE in residential settings, take a look at our short video:
Hollie Hepburn, 18, is a special kind of Modern Apprentice. She’s helping other young people to develop their skills for life and work while she’s improving her own skills.
Hollie works with the Employment and Skills Partnership Team at Glasgow City Council. As part of her apprenticeship, Hollie helps young people in Glasgow to do their DofE Award. She helps them to learn how to use eDofE and goes out to volunteer events to get people inspired to do their Award, or to volunteer with the DofE.
While Hollie is doing this work, she is also doing her own Bronze DofE Award. Sue Seeds, Skills, Aspirations and DofE Coordinator for Glasgow City Council, sees this as a great way for Hollie to help engage other young people in DofE.
Sue said that “As Hollie is currently working towards her Bronze award she can share her own knowledge and experiences of undertaking DofE. She is able to share her enthusiasm and passion for the award with other young people and this has proven invaluable especially when we go along to volunteer events.”
Hollie is just finishing up her Bronze Award now and she’s loving her DofE experience. She said “Hopefully I’ll go on to do my Silver after I finish. I don’t think I’d bother doing a lot of the activities if not for DofE. It’s something fun that you normally wouldn’t do.”
As part of her apprenticeship, Hollie is working towards her SVQ Level 2 in Advice and Guidance. This helps her gain employability skills that she can use in the future. Jacqui McBride, 16+ Learning Choices Development Officer, said that she’s seen Hollie’s confidence increase and that she has “blossomed” as part of her apprenticeship.
Jacqui is very passionate about giving young people the opportunity to develop their employability skills through their apprenticeship and their DofE. She said “I feel modern apprenticeships are a fantastic opportunity for young people. They are able to learn on the job whilst undertaking a qualification. Actually working as part of a team helps them to develop their softer skills enabling them to become more resilient and competitive in labour market. It gives them the confidence to try new things and hopefully inspires them to continue learning and develop new skills. We can offer wrap round activities to enhance the experience for young people and the offer for our MAs to undertake D of E whilst on their apprenticeship is a prime example of this.
Hollie also sees the impact of her DofE and her apprenticeship on her future. She said that “It helps your CV a lot with your experience when you’re doing different things. It shows employers that you can stick at something and be focussed.”
Over the past three years, the scope of the DofE in Glasgow has grown nearly 400%. This growth has been made possible in partnership with the Scottish Power Foundation and their support to extend the reach of the DofE in Glasgow. Hollie’s DofE Leader Viki is key to this approach, with some of her work as the DofE Development Officer for Glasgow City Council being supported by this partnership.
To find out more about the work DofE is doing with modern apprentices, please see our Employability briefing, or watch our short film DofE and Employability.
Are you getting tired of walking expeditions? It is possible to branch out a bit, as an Argyll group did, and do your expedition on horseback. They faced some challenges, but worked through it to make a pony expedition work for them.
The five participants set out on their practice expedition a few weeks ago after a few months of training. They learnt how to care for the horses, road sense and safety and tack inspections. After planning their route and working with Nona, their DofE Development Officer they were all set to go.
The first day was great and they caught a lot of sun “the highlight was wading through the ford, which was waist deep, and gave the horses a welcome cool-down on a hot day!”
They also experimented with dehydrated curry “it tasted a lot nicer than it looked” and banoffee pie “which looked almost identical to the curry!”
The kept on going and despite a few minor hiccups, they successfully completed the practice and will be going for their qualifying in July.
If you’re interested in planning a horseback expedition, one of the things to keep in mind is that your LO might have particular insurance requirements for this type of expedition, so make sure you check before you plan your routes.
More information about horseback expeditions can be found on the website.
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