1st alrewas scouts · cubs leader sarah oldfield ... as a group we thank her for everything that...

1st Alrewas Scouts AGM Report 2010-2011

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1st Alrewas Scouts

Annual General Meeting

Report and Accounts

20th May 2011


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CONTENTS

Introduction.............................................................................................................................................. 3

Leaders and Committee .......................................................................................................................... 3

Chair’s Report – Steve Herriott ............................................................................................................... 4

Treasurer’s Report – Kevin Wilkinson ..................................................................................................... 5

Income and Expenditure ...................................................................................................................... 5

Financial highlights .............................................................................................................................. 5

Group Scouting Leader’s Report – Andy Cheadle .................................................................................. 6

Scouts Section Report – Paul Warren .................................................................................................... 6

Cubs Section Report – Janet Lord .......................................................................................................... 9

Beavers Section Report – Katharine Pearce .......................................................................................... 9


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Introduction

The Annual General Meeting of 1st Alrewas Scouts was held in the Scout Hall, William IV Road,

Alrewas on 20th May 2010. It was attended by the Group Committee, Parents and Members.

Leaders and Committee

Scouting Leaders

Group Scouting Leader Andy Cheadle

Section Leader – Scouts Paul Warren

Section Leader – Cubs Janet Lord (Resigning, to be replaced by James Roddick)

Section Leader – Beavers Katharine Pearce

Scouts Leader Derek Lord

Scouts Leader Sally Mylrea

Cubs Leader James Roddick

Cubs Leader Sarah Oldfield

Beavers Assistant Leader Lizzie May

Beavers Assistant - Jo Rainbow

Young Leaders

Young Leader – Scouts James Marriott

Young Leader – Scouts Dan Bradley

Young Leader – Scouts Rob Brown

Young Leader – Cubs Natasha Masters

Young Leader – Beavers Tom Peach

Committee

Chair Steve Herriott

Treasurer Kevin Wilkinson

Webmaster Kevin Wilkinson

Parent Member Mark Ruttley

Parent Member Steve Parker

Parent Member Chris Edwards

Parent Member Sean Stanley


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Chair’s Report – Steve Herriott

The Scout group has continued its integration this year to become a key element in Alrewas village

life. Whether that be when taking the lead as with our highly successful annual bonfire event and

Duck Race or providing support to other organisations as requested throughout the year.

The excellent work in ensuring a financially sustainable head quarters has largely been as a result of

having inviting other organisations to share the use/running costs of the hut and astute use of

generated funds. During the summer holiday this year new damp coursing will be installed along with

repairs to the brickwork and internal redecoration.

The small but dedicated committee have continually provided very valuable support again this year,

but would benefit from some additional members, especially a secretary.

The highlights for me this year from a non-scouting point of view were the establishment of

guidelines/budgets for the sections to encourage future activity planning and the bonfire which was

extremely well organised, and well-received by the wider community, in addition to providing a healthy

injection of funds.

Congratulations are well deserved for Andy Cheadle, Group Scouting Leader, on his Medal of Merit

Award for his dedication and support for all areas over many years.

Finally looking forward, now is the time to start the planning our centenary year programme for 2012.


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Treasurer’s Report – Kevin Wilkinson

INCOME AND EXPENDITURE

Description Income Expenditure Net

Subscriptions and Capitation £7,655.50 £2,392.50 £5,263.00

Section/Group Activities £3,010.23 £5,843.04 -£2,832.81

Scouting Expenditure £0.00 £4,174.40 -£4,174.40

Fundraising Activities £7,631.87 £4,212.47 £3,419.40

Gift Aid £1,531.94 £0.00 £1,531.94

Utility and other bills £0.00 £2,081.39 -£2,081.39

Hall Rental and Upkeep £962.00 £193.07 £768.93

Other Income and Expenditure £964.62 £1,416.07 -£451.45

Total £21,756.16 £20,312.94 £1,443.22

Total Income-Total Expenditure 2010-2011= £1,443.22

Total Income-Total Expenditure 2009-2010= £1,992.11

Total Income-Total Expenditure 2008-2009= -£617.39

FINANCIAL HIGHLIGHTS

Capitation paid for 87 members March 2010.

Scouting Expenditure includes costs for new Scouting equipment, bought with proceeds from the

annual Bonfire and fireworks displays held in 2009 and 2010. The main items were;

Trailer (£1,800.00)

Range Cooker (£656.82)

Canopy (£600.00)

The main fundraising events in the year were Duck Race (net £798.42) and Bonfire (net £2,610.50)

Gift Aid (£1,531.94) was claimed for the year 2009-2010.

Hall Rental has significantly increased in the year, and cleaning costs reduced through arrangement

with Alrewas Youth Club.

Plans for 2011-2012 will need to include budget for extensive works on the Scout Hall, to alleviate

problems of damp and poor ventilation, and to allow for the hall to be redecorated.


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Group Scouting Leader’s Report – Andy Cheadle

I would like to start by saying how proud I am to be the Group Scout Leader of such an active group.

This a group that increases its numbers each year - this year we have a record number of 87

members not counting those on the waiting list.

This would not happen without the commitment of all the Leaders who produce such a varied and

interesting programme and the support you as parents give to your children, whether it is bringing

them to weekly meetings or becoming part of the parent help rotas.

The Beavers are now well established under the capable leadership of Katharine Pearce and her

team.

It is brilliant that Cubs have managed to work hard at reducing the waiting list. Janet (Baggy) has

been their leader for 11 years. In July Janet is stepping down and James (King Louis) will become

Akela. As a group we thank her for everything that she has done for 1st Alrewas Scouts down the

years.

Scouts have had a fantastic year with a wide range activities and a significant increase intheir

numbers. Derek is no longer going to be the Scout Leader in charge; Paul is going to undertake this

role.

We started an Explorer group January, as a satellite of the Lichfield District Explorer Unit. I thank

Paula Bennett for joining me in starting up this section, which enables our older Scouts to stay with

the group for a few more years. We are keen to increase our numbers of youngsters (the age range is

from 14-18 years) and another leader would be great, please see me if we have any potential leaders

here tonight!

The group could not run without the support of the fantastic committee that we have, in particular:

Steve Herriott as our Chairman with his background in business has brought lots of new ideas to the

committee.

Kevin Wilkinson as our treasurer and webmaster is keeping an excellent reign on our finances in this

current economic climate.

Future Plans for the hall: Extensive works are planned in the coming year to deal with problems of

damp and poor ventilation, and to completely redecorate the hall.

Our Fundraising Events in the coming year will be our annual Duck Race in July and Bonfire in

November.

The Bonfire Night has been a resounding success over the last 2 years, not only as a fundraising

venture but as a village community event. There are many people who have made this possible but

James Roddick has taken the lead on this I would like to thank him for this on behalf of the group.


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Scouts Section Report – Paul Warren

Scout Section has continued to grow in the last year from the 16 reported at the 2010 AGM to a

current 28 scouts with both male and female members. Given the number of active scouts and the

need to accommodate cubs as they reach scout age, we have recently had to close scouts to new,

“off the street” applicants. For the first time it may be necessary to start a waiting list.

The increase in numbers has not been a continuous rise and unfortunately we lost some older scouts

at the end of 2010 because they felt they had outgrown scouts. It should be recognised that providing

a programme that has equal appeal to young 11 year old scouts and 14 year olds is a challenge.

Recognition of the potential loss of older scouts was a catalyst for action and after hard work and

persuasion Andy Cheadle has finally got District Consent to the formation of an Explorer Sub Unit

based at Alrewas. This means in future our young people will be able to continue their scouting

adventure over the age of 14.

For those older scouts that stayed with us we were pleased to see them awarded their Chief Scouts

Gold Award, the highest award our scouts can aspire to. Congratulations to Jake Harper, Megan

Mylrea and Jess Webster on this great achievement. We are pleased that Jake and Megan are

founder members of our new Explorer Sub Unit.

Our leadership team continues to consist of Paul Warren, Sally Mylrea and Derek Lord assisted by

young leaders Dan Bradley, Rob Brown and Tasha Masters. Paul Warren has formally taken the

Scout Leader role with Sally taking increased responsibility for administration. Derek has obtained

activity permits for canal boating and hill walking which enables us to undertake these activities as

part of our programme.

We aim to make our programme fun but it also has to be challenging, interesting and lead to the

award of Challenge and Activity Badges. Our scouts have continued to work towards and be awarded

a range of badges both as a group, in their patrols and individually.

Among the highlights of the year the annual survival hike on Cannock Chase took place last autumn.

Scouts made their own shelters and cooked backwoods style over open fires. Fortunately the shelters

were sufficiently watertight to withstand the monsoon rain which started at 05.00 on the Sunday. We

were very pleased with the way they carried on and with good humour despite the rain.

Our second main weekend away also suffered from weather problems. Our first attempt to undertake

a hillwalking and biking weekend in early December was aborted due to heavy snow which cut off the

access to the Edale Youth Hostel. The rearranged weekend in February went well with scouts hiking


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up to 10 kilometres on a number of routes over hilly terrain up to 500 metres in height. This was

followed by cycling a full circuit of the Howden reservoirs on the Sunday.

Another first was a link up with the Buddhist Temple at Kings Bromley. Abbot Lau came to the scout

hut to meet our scouts who put on a demonstration of scouting skills and told him about scouting. We

then went to the Temple to learn about Buddhism. Scouts took gifts of fruit and vegetables . We hope

to continue a link with the temple.

As usual we have supported District Activities and one team came second in the District Quiz.

As you can see we have done a great deal this year and will continue in the year ahead. However we

can do even more with additional help and support, especially with skills we do not have. If anyone

would like to join us you will be most welcome.


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Cubs Section Report – Janet Lord

The last 12 months have seen another busy year for the cub section. We are now at full capacity, with

36 cubs in the pack and a waiting list. Our leadership team has been steady at 3 fully warranted

leaders (Myself, James Roddick and Sarah Oldfield) and an explorer scout young leader, Natasha

Masters. However due to increasing work pressure I have decided to resign as cub leader as from the

end of July 2011. This has been a hard decision to make as I have been involved in scouting for

almost 40 years and have been a leader at Alrewas for 11 years. I will however remain connected

with the group, helping with training of new leaders and coming to cub camp when I can.

We have again experienced problems this year with the parent help rota, with several parents missing

their slot on the rota. One night we had no help at all and came close to sending the cubs home as we

just did not have enough adults to supervise the activity. Can we remind all parents that we have

to have at least 2 parents per night to ensure we can supervise the children adequately and

keep to Scout Association regulations.

We have been working towards several progress badges, with Athlete and 9 cubs this year gained the

highest award of the chief scouts silver badge – our highest number to date. There have been several

highlights, including one six writing to the Queen and getting a reply. We also entered two teams in

the district quiz and they came third and 1st and we also took the leaders prize!

We ran 3 successful camps last year: the summer camp was a county wide camp with 500 cubs at

Beaudesert (watching the film at midnight on the camping field was surreal!). In November, we had

our winter camp on water, taking 24 cubs on 2 canal boats – amazingly they all remained dry! Finally,

in March we held our Sixers and Seconds weekend at BP house in London. The 9 cubs had an

amazing time, visiting the Natural history museum, HMS Belfast, Buck House and generally running

amok in the waterfalls at London Bridge.

Finally we transferred 11 cubs to scouts and at last have a girl cub again!

I would like to finish by giving special thanks to James, Sarah and Tash for being a great team of

leaders to work with. They put up with my whacky ideas (I have the ideas, they have to implement

them) and my frequent absences through work. I wish James well as the new leader in charge – look

out cubs King Louie really is King now!!!!! Thanks also to Andy Cheadle for being a great GSL and for

giving support when needed but otherwise leaving us alone to get on with our scouting.


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Beavers Section Report – Katharine Pearce

Over the past year we put on our first public performance of Thriller for Halloween last year which was

excellent and the boys (and parents) really enjoyed it. We have had visits from the bug man, a karate

instructor and some hip hop dancers and we have been to the Buddhist temple, Pets at Home and

Tamworth Bowl together with lots of Thursday sessions outside learning tag rugby, kwik cricket, canal

art etc.

We have been concentrating on making sure all the beavers achieve their challenge badges – we

have had 4 this year who have gained their Chief Scout Bronze Award and this is our aim for the

majority of the boys.

We have been on a group visit to the Sea Life Centre and a district visit to Snibston as well as a joint

Beaver camp to Consall earlier this month which was very successful. We are planning on attending

the Beavers 25th

Birthday County Day ay Beaudesert next month.

We had a well attended Remembrance parade but were excused from St Georges as it clashed with

camp.

We still have the same leaders – Katharine, Jo, Lizzie and Tom (as a young leader) and have gained

a new assistant leader with Paul (one of the parents) who all do a brilliant job. We have lost Jackie as

Assistant Leader.

Our current number is sixteen which the leaders have decided is a full colony

But we do need the support of parents with keeping to the rota and responding to messages to

ensure that we can deliver the programme

Thank you to all the leaders who run a varied and fun Beaver Colony

1st alrewas scouts · cubs leader sarah oldfield ... as a group we thank her for everything that...

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