Annual Report 2008

Cubs have experienced a year of change. In July, Huw Warrington stood down as Cub Scout Leader. An emergency meeting was therefore called in September as Cubs did not have a sufficiently strong leadership team. Luckily Hilary Beech volunteered her services and our thanks go to her. Cub meetings were up and running after the Autumn Half Term break. Since then I feel the Group has run relatively smoothly and the Leaders have put on a good programme of weekly activities, as well as a Camp.

Numbers have been fairly constant between 20 and 25, and we have not had to turn any children away this year. We have had Beavers swimming up at the start of all 3 terms. As far as Leaders are concerned, we’ve had me as Cub Scout Leader, with Mez Merrick, Hilary Beech and Claire Hammill as ACSLs. During the year Simon Haddock was also an Assistant Cub Leader but due to other commitments only made a few of the meetings and has subsequently had to stand down. Huw continues as an Assistant Cub Leader but has been unable to attend on Thursday evenings as he is presently taking a course at College. We are also grateful for the help of 2nd Onchan Scouts, Duncan and Juan Churcher, who are using their time with Cubs towards their Bronze Duke of Edinburgh Award.

I will now briefly summarise the programme and activities over the last 12 months. As you know we have reports and photos of our most important events. Returning to last May, the Summer 2007 programme was, I believe, an outdoor based programme. Unfortunately there were several administrative problems with venues, weather and timings leading to a somewhat more disrupted programme than usual. 2007 was the Centenary Year of Scouting and Laxey attended several of the celebrations, including the Scouting Sunrise on Douglas Promenade and the All Island Camp, which will be remembered I think for the tremendous rainfall. In November we worked on the Road Safety badge and the Entertainer’s, which was certainly … entertaining!!

Our Spring Term programme was certainly ambitious considering the number of badges we planned to get through. We had the Sixers working on the Promise Challenge with Juan and Duncan, the new recruits working on the Membership Badge and preparing for investiture and the rest of the Pack working on a selection of do-it-yourself badges. The idea here was to stimulate Cubs into completing badges in their own time. The are a core of badges and activities we are likely to complete as part of the programme during a Cubs 2 or 3 years with us. However there are a significant number of badges that we simply do not have time to undertake or that are not appropriate to do on mass – I don’t think 25 Cubs riding through the streets of Laxey on horseback would do anything for leadership recruitment either! In the second half of term we did the Global Challenge Award and had an excellent cultural evening, with Cubs sampling the food and customs of various countries. Our thanks go to all who helped with that. We also took the Sixers and Seconders to the Bunkhouse in Foxdale to experience a somewhat basic overnight stay. We were then joined by the other Cubs on the following day, and a great weekend was had by all.

This term we have had an outdoor based programme, covering fitness, orienteering, walking and the local knowledge badge. We also have two camps coming up shortly as well as a Group BBQ on Laxey Beach.

Finally I’d like to thank Mez, Hilary and Claire for all their help and support throughout the year and also thank parents for actively supporting their child’s Scouting. My thanks also go to Debbie Shaw for volunteering to be our Parent Representative on the Exec.

In the coming year I look forward to the Group going from strength to strength with the support of our volunteer leaders and members of the new Executive Committee and hope that all our Cubs will benefit greatly from all that the Scouting movement has to offer.

Thank you.

Nick Kinrade
Cub Scout Leader