Over 400 young people accompanied by around 70 adult volunteers had a fun filled weekend at Ferny Fest - Explorer 20 to celebrate the 20th birthday of the Explorer Scout section.

Back in 2002, the section for those aged 15.5 to 20 was called Venture Scouts, then in 1976 it was the first program of The Scout Association opened up female participants. The Venture Scout program was replaced by the Explorer Scout (14-18) section and Scout Networks (18-25) in 2002.

Fast forward to 2022, after having to be online for near 2 years and with face to face scouting seemingly back for good, a team of adult volunteers and the staff at Ferny Crofts Scout Activity Centre came together to plan the first Ferny Fest.

The Weekend

What did the young people think?

Tom an Explorer scout said “All the activities were really fun and everyone was super nice. Meeting all the explorers from other groups was an amazing experience."

"The weekend at Ferny Fest was very eventful and fun, lots of cool activities to do. I enjoyed my time and made some good friends there." Bethan said, she went on to say "I enjoy being an explorer because I can chill and hang out with my friends but also get to do things I wouldn’t normally do"

Explorer Scouts are young people aged 14-18 and we have groups all across Hampshire. Visit our Explorer's page to find out more and to get involved.

Article by: Michael Doncom

Contributions from: Tom, Bethan

Photography by: Dave Jenkins, Adam Russell

Day in, day out our lovely volunteers are working hard to show young people the skills they need for school, university, the interview and for life in general.

To help support them, Hampshire Scouts have a programme team full of experience to share with leaders and to help organise the events that bring everyone together.

New for this year, the programme team has had a refresh to better support our volunteers. Joining our lead volunteer Teresa Ginn we have two new assistants who both bring a wealth of experience.

Adam Jollans has enjoyed more adventures and international trips abroad than most, is the chair of Hampshire Scouts Expeditions and has previously been our lead volunteer for International trips and Hampshire Scouts as a whole.

Ray Noice brings a range of organisational skills and has previously supported our Network section for 18-25 year olds and helped us shout about Scouts as lead volunteer for media and communications.

As well as our experienced leaders, we also have some of our own Scouts joining the team. Louis Soccard, Lisa Burns, Daniel Cooper and Haydn Allen all help support the team and ensure our youth have a voice in what they do right now.

As well as the very successful events, camps and adventures open to every member in Hampshire the team also recommend new tools for fun and skills building.

One of these is a new programme planning tool with a whole host of ideas for badges, meetings or even a whole term’s worth of activities. So many can be done at home that these have been picked up by lots of groups in the current climate as part of #TheGreatIndoors.

More volunteers are finding out about these activities and helping their scouts learn skills for life as a result.

You can find out more about what we do by browsing our website or contact us here if you want to join the team and help support our lovely leaders.

**** Vacancy - Lead Volunteer - Itchen South ****

We're looking for someone, or a team of people, to become the new lead volunteer/s for the Scouts across the Itchen South District.

Have you got - or know someone that has - what it takes to be the District Commissioner for the area?

Please see the voluntary job specification here.

Nomination form can be found here.

**** Vacancy - Lead Volunteer - Meon Valley Scouts ****

We're looking for someone, or a team of people, to become the new lead volunteer/s for the Scouts across the Meon Valley.

Have you got - or know someone that has - what it takes to be the District Commissioner for the area?

Please see the voluntary job specification here.

A sunny July weekend saw nearly 400 Beavers from 14 districts come together for the second Hampshire Beaver's County Camp.

With it being 50 years since Scouts first stepped on the moon we took that as our theme and had our Space Camp at Ferny Crofts Scout Activity Centre in the New Forest. Months of planning came together with huge support from Hampshire Scout Archery Club,

Pro-Badge, Tanzania 2020, Top Awards Team, Young Leaders and my extended team to offer a programme including cooking, climbing, archery, exploring, games and more.

This camp was a chance for Beavers across the county to come together and see some of the adventures open to them in Scouting, it was great to see over half of our districts represented and get the support of other teams in Hampshire Scouts to create this great opportunity for our youngest members.

The camp was one of the biggest most of us will get to join in with involving nearly 600 people and so big we had to split the camp fire into 2 sessions.

We were honoured to have visits from Chip the Beaver and Peter Marcus, the new County Youth Commissioner who even got a go on the Go-Karts!

Pro-Badge joined in the fun with crafts including opportunities to make your own badge and rope and the hugely popular water rockets, I hope none landed on your tent!

The Scouts have been talking about whether it could be extended to 4 and 5 years old for a while now.

It’s all part of the UK-wide plan to support even more young people to develop skills for life.

Through an exciting pilot scheme, our headquarters is gauging the impact Scouts has on the development of even younger young people.

External funds have made the pilot possible, and now the first set of pilots have opened, including some in Hampshire! So, what is being tested?

Alongside looking at the benefits Scouts could have on this age group, it's also testing different models, all based within local Scouts.

This means the pilots are being approached in three different ways based upon local community needs.

These models are:

• Scout-led; A section before Beaver Scouts that’s run by both existing and new volunteers.

This is the model most of us are familiar with. It involves meeting in the same venue and same time slot each week.

• Partner-led; A section run by individuals in an organisation who deliver a Scouts programme in their own setting. This could be a day nursery, an Action for Children centre, or a local community organisation, for example.

• Family Scouts; The key rule to this model is that an adult accompanies the young person and engages with the programme alongside the 4 and 5 year olds.

Meeting venue and time slots may vary week to week. This type of Scouts has been seen in Denmark, Finland and the USA, amongst other places.

I'm on a mission to inspire millions of young people - that's the message of Hampshire Scouts ambassador James Ketchell.

The world-record holder, who covered 24,000 nautical miles over the last 175 days, says the Scouts has instilled the confidence and belief he needed to complete his mission.

James said: "I've met a lot of amazing people around the world. My flight has really confirmed that 99 per cent of people are kind and generous. I will be paying forward favours for the rest of my life, I really will."

Thank you to the 8th Bramshill, Four Marks, and James' local Scout Group, Hatch Warren, for being there to welcome our role model home.

James added: "The whole mission wasn't really about me, it's all about trying to get young people to believe that they too can do cool things or anything they want to set their mind on.

"Scouting has really instilled the confidence in me and given me the belief that I can go out there and do things I desire. I spent a lot of time in the scouts when I was young and I would say it has really shaped who I am today."

After 2044 km and 61 days, Joe Doherty reached the end of his Antarctic expedition, having skied from the Messner Start to the South Pole and kite-skied back to Hercules Inlet.

This is an awesome achievement, and our congratulations go to Joe and to his family, friends and sponsors who have supported him.

“We are all better than we know, if we could only be made to realise this then we may never be willing to settle for anything less again” - Kurt Hahn, founder of the Outward Bound Trust.

Sunday 13 January 2019 marks our 110th birthday. Over the past 110 years, we have given tens of thousands of young people the opportunity to experience new things, make new friends, and learn Skills for life.

Our 110th birthday gives us a great opportunity to celebrate the amazing range of activities our members take part in every week, the work they are doing to make a difference in their communities, and the dedication of our adult volunteers. By making the most of this opportunity we will be able to kickstart a renewed interest in adult volunteering, promote a modern and engaging image of Scouting, and prepare our movement for the next 110 years of adventure.scouts.org.uk/get-involved

Scout leader Craig Hollands from Fareham West used his Scouting skills to jump to the rescue of a woman crying out for help in the River Hamble last night.

Craig, an assistant scout leader at 1st Stubbington, was one of two kayakers who attempted a late-night rescue after coming across the woman who had been out walking her dog when it ran after a deer.

Craig said to the Daily Echo: "I heard this cry of 'help' and looked over to see a flashing light.

"The woman was out walking her dog and was stuck in the mud. The tide was rising as well so our first call was to the coastguard if we couldn't help free her quickly.

"The water was freezing and so was the mud. The coastguard arrived first on scene about 15 minutes later. I freed the deer and put it in my boat but sadly it was very cold and covered in mud. We were there for about an hour."

The RSPCA, Fire Service, and RNLI were called out.

From everyone at Hampshire Scouts, well done Craig!