Solihull Scout County

Young Solihull – Annual Meeting Invite

Mathew (online) — Wed, 16 May 2012 16:38:20 +0000

Gangshow Registration Day

Mathew (online) — Mon, 14 May 2012 16:12:52 +0000

For all those members of Scouting and Guiding in Solihull, Gangshow Registration Day is coming this Sunday (20th May) at Solihull Methodist Church.
Please arrive at 2pm to get registered and fill in the admin parts before we start running some workshops at 2.30pm. Workshops are a great opportunity for you to sing, dance, act and meet new and old members of the gang!
The day will end at 4.30pm after a few messages and key dates from the production team!
If you’re keen to get involved then we look forward to seeing you there, To speed up the process on Sunday please register here.

Cole Cub Camp

Mathew (online) — Fri, 11 May 2012 13:12:33 +0000

Flooded out of Rough Close but undaunted, nearly 80 cubs and their leaders relocated their District Cub Camp to Pikes Pool (Blackwell Court) for a fun weekend of activities, outings and friendship. After a last moment phone call from Rough Close informing us that our site was underwater, we managed to find a spot at Pikes Pool which in many ways turned out to be a better site for us – particularly as we had the whole place to ourselves and spread ourselves over 2 fields. On Saturday we arranged our own activities, which included backwoods cooking, clay model making, tracking, orienteering, building fires, water slides and practising sketches for the campfire. After a tasty supper of spaghetti bolognaise we moved down to the campfire circle for a tuneful campfire led by Stuart Moseley (3rd Olton) where the cubs had the opportunity to show off their dramatic skills with some traditional campfire stunts. On Sunday we went – courtesy of Harry Shaw coaches (Coventry) who very kindly did not charge us any extra to take us the much further distance from Bromsgrove – to the Coventry Transport Museum. This was enjoyed by all – the cubs still had the energy to sing on the coach on the way back, quite an achievement.

We are pleased that we didn’t have to cancel the camp even when faced with flooding, just goes to show what you can do with teamwork, District staff would particularly like to thank all leaders who pitched in and helped at the last moment with activity organising and cooking and catering. Because we all pulled together it worked really well. The highlight was seeing the cubs from all over the District get to know each other and take part in activities together, I hope they will have gone home with happy memories.

A special thanks goes to Harry Shaw coaches, I would encourage leaders to use their services, not only were they much cheaper than other coach companies they were prepared to literally go the extra mile to get us to the Museum

Big Day Out for Blythe District

Mathew (online) — Thu, 10 May 2012 13:40:06 +0000

The last Saturday in April saw Blythe District link together their annual St Georges Day Celebration with an Olympic style event. Officially named the St Georges Day Dragon Challenges it quickly also became known as the Blythe O-limp-it Event!

We started with a parade round the field with our very own torch and flags carried by Explorers to music such as Chariots of Fire and World in Union. As we passed each tent each group joined the parade with their own flags and they all paraded up to the main stage area. There we lit the flame and opened the Challenges to words similar to the official opening of the Olympic games.

For the next 5 hours all Beavers, Cubs and Scouts took part in a wide variety of activities. We had hoped for 200 young people and we actually got 400 registering so it was a logistical nightmare but a great challenge to have! They were split into country groups of approx 10-12
young people and a couple of leaders per country and rotated round different activities. Some teams even dressed up depicting their country dress style. Activities were manned by Base Commanders and ranged from zip-wires, 3G swing and archery for the Scouts, team building exercises for the Scouts and Cubs, a circuit of grass sledging, go-karting, obstacle courses and a fairground for the Beavers and Cubs and a craft area and night line for the Beavers.

In addition everyone took part in a Paralympic sport of either Goal-ball (football for the partially sighted when you are blind-folded and the ball has a bell in it) or Boccia- similar to bowls but for wheelchair users so everyone was seated. A variety of running races- mostly silly ones such as 6 legged races and an O-limp-it Village with a wide variety of activities including well wanting, basketball skills and toss the caber were also activities for everyone to participate in.

Our Explorers who had been helping all day on bases were then given the opportunity to go on the zipwire or the 3G swing for a well deserved treat!

Cake and a drink were provided and we then assembled in the main field again to a short St Georges day ceremony and presentations. Young people were collected by their parents and the leaders stayed for a well deserved fish and chip supper

Young people charged round the fields during the day and the whole day was a fantastic display of team work. The district team took on the bulk of the organising but we could not have done this without the help from all groups, County staff, Network, SAS, the Gang Show team, Cole District and Blackwell Adventure staff. It was a great day, the weather that had been dreadful held (just!) and will we do it again next year- umm well there’s a question!

JLR Community Team helps Solihull Scout Group

admin_user — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:54:23 +0000

Through a parent contact at Jaguar Land Rover the Scout Group was put forward and chosen for an annual Community Project. On 18 April 12 a volunteer team of JLR staff came for one day to help the Leaders at the Group in carrying out maintenance and improvements to the Group’s Scout HQ. They made a big difference to the condition of the HQ and the Group is most grateful for the help given. Although the JLR Team were only able to help one Group they showed a great interest in the continuing success of Scouting in Solihull and were very pleased to have been able to give their support.

Solihull Award Winners

Mathew (online) — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 12:18:51 +0000

This year, Solihull has 4 recipients of St George’s Day Awards this year; all of whom have made invaluable contributions to scouting in Solihull, giving us their time, commitment, enthusiasm and passion to ensure that not only do the young people of Solihull continue to receive first class scouting, but that as leaders, we’re supported in the roles we hold.

Awarded for service of an exceptional nature, the Silver Wolf if the Scout Association’s highest award for service and it’s with enormous pleasures I can announce that Bob Fear will receive this award. You will have met Bob at some stage of your Scouting career – whether it’s at your appointments panel; a discussion about training, an e-mail chasing you for CRBs or he’s simply leant you his ears and offered you his advice.

The Silver Acorn was first introduced as a St George’s Day Award in 1933 and is given in recognition of especially distinguished service. Huge congratulations to Ian Carpenter and Roy Clarke on receiving this award! During his service, Ian has played a key role on the County Exec, keeping the books in order and providing valuable insight and advice into County matters. Roy is ADC Scouts in Blythe and has recently switched from SL to GSL at Tidbury Green; his strong leadership skills and no nonsense approach make him a valuable team member.

In recognition of further especially distinguished service, the Bar to the Silver Acorn has been awarded to Jenny Davis, GSL at 6th Shirley. With her knowledge, experience and warm personality, she provided a cub leader new to Solihull 9 years ago (yours truly) much to aspire to!

Please join me in congratulating them all on these much deserved awards!

Katy Sara, County Commissioner

The Future of Scouting Blooms in Young Spokesperson

Michael — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 23:14:12 +0000

On 7th June 2012 Nick Allen’s book, The Essential Camping Cookbook, will be released. To promote this it had a book launch on 18th April. At this book launch, a few young spokespeople were invited to share their experiences and love of Scouting with the book publishers and many other important people one of which was Megan Hague from Orion Explorer Scout Unit. She arrived at Coughton Court in the morning and were welcomed by the staff with tea and biscuits. They then had a brief tour of the building before heading off on a 2 mile walk.

Along this walk we witnessed Felix Dennis’ love of trees and the work he’s put into them. So far, Felix has planted around 1 million trees on his property and plans to plant many more making vast wooded areas. Along with Tim Kidd, the Chief Commissioner of England, the other 3 young spokespeople and Megan planted a tree. As the years go by that tree will grow just like our Scouting movement.

Their then arrived at the education centre where they got to eat a very tasty lunch. The lunch consisted of food cooked from the recipes in the cookbook. After this we enlightened the publishers to cooking marshmallows on a campfire. Many of these people will take that experience back home with them, and improve their marshmallow cooking skills.

Orion take on the Apex Challenge

Michael — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 12:49:48 +0000

elven members of Orion Explorer Scout Unit travelled to Bramham Park near Leeds to take on 95 other teams from Explorer Units all over Yorkshire, Derbyshire, and the City of Coventry in the Apex Challenge which is a 6 hour event of orienteering, challenging events and meeting new people.

This is the 3rd year Orion Explorer Scout Unit have travelled to the Apex Challenge and we have taken to the challenge and have been improving year in and year out.

Matt Richards event planner said “What a way to start celebrating our tenth anniversary! We couldn’t have asked for a better location than Bramham Park for the first of this year’s events. Its spectacular mix of open ground, dense forest, water features and amazing historical sights made for an unforgettable event for the 400 adventurous competitors”.

This year the Explorers took on a record number of teams 95 in total where they come 89th, 44th and the best ever finsh for Orion Explorers 2nd place and missed out on 1st place by 25 points and as a result earned a Go Karting trip for the team.

Kirsty Matthews said Apex is amasing, pandamoneium are the runners up and we all enjoyed it so much, I can’t wait for the next one it should be even better.

Apex will be celebrating the tenth Anniversary in October in Apex Extreme where Orion Explorers will be attending and try and improve on their 2nd place finish. Michael Sarjeant Asst Explorer Leader said its such as great event, the best part is watching the faces, even though I was more on edge as the teams went though and get second place is a great achievement, I could not be more proud to be a leader of Orion Explorers and Solihull Scouting. I hope that in Extreme more units from Solihull attend and show how great we all are against other units across the UK

Solihull Scouts Complete the Chase Walk

Michael — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 11:37:31 +0000

On Saturday 17 March Explorer Scouts from all over Solihull descended on Cannock Chase to complete the 40 Mile Chase Walk, this event also Saw Scouts from Solihull complete in the sorter version of event with a 13 mile walk.

This event has been running none stop since the mid 1980′s and Paul Webb Scoutleader at 1st Shirley and also ACC Scouts has walked in all of them.

You can see the times and places by going to the website

A Special well done goes to Megan Hague and her team from Orion, Armstrong, and Drake Explorers who walked the 40 miles dressed as Leprechauns and raised £580.50 for Beat Charity who are a leading charity which helps people with eating disorders.

This event is always well supported by Solihull Members where you saw a team from Intrepid ESU who had a team who finished in 2nd Place in the Boot Trophy, Simpson ESU coming 3rd in Knot trophy, Orion Explorer Scout Unit coming 4th in the Rock Trophy and a special well done for a team from Intrepid ESU and Galileo ESU who started with 7 members and finished with 7 members. I am sure more team next year will be just as well supported.

Mayor Presents Cub Scout Awards

Michael — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 11:03:32 +0000

Friday 9 March 2012 the Mayor of Solihull Councillor Irene Chamberlian presented 52 Cub Scouts from all over Solihull, with their Silver Chief Scout Awards at Solihull School.

Cubs from as far as Chelmsley Wood, Dorridge, Shirley and Olton had the opportunity to meet the Mayor and have their Photo taken, The Mayor committed on how impressive it was having so many young members achieve the highest award in their section.

Photos of the event will be uploaded soon for you to download