John Muir Awards for Islay's Young Adventurers
Saturday, July 26 2008
Seventy-four Islay children aged between seven and fourteen, all members of the Young Adventurers Club, have now achieved their 'Discoverer' award, the first level of the national John Muir Award Scheme. The club is run in conjunction with Islay Natural History Trust, and Jeremy Hastings’ Islay Birding is the John Muir award scheme provider in Islay. The Young Adventurers club is supported by Mactaggart Third Fund. Jeremy says, 'Sir John Mactaggart feels that it is important for Islay children to learn to appreciate and understand the wild lands which they are so fortunate to live near.' The Award is non-competitive, open to all and is the educational initiative of the John Muir Trust. There are three Levels of the Award, encouraging a progressive involvement. All levels are based on meeting the same four challenges of: Discover, Explore, Conserve, Share.
Discover: Get out in a wild place. This could be your garden, a nearby park, a high mountain, or a local beach. This challenge is all about discovering your own wild place. Explore: Find out more about your wild place. Look at the plants and animals that live there, travel through it, or spend a night camping out and find out what it sounds like at night. Exploring is about getting to know and experience a place. Conserve: John Muir set up the world’s first national park and was committed to 'putting something back' into wild places. So for this challenge you need to do something to help take responsibility for your wild place. You could be planting trees or plants, maintaining paths, minimising your impact or perhaps conducting a survey of the wildlife that lives there. It’s your turn to look after your wild place. Continue reading.....
Share: A major part of the Award is to encourage people to value wild places. So throughout your Award we ask that you find ways to share what you are doing. This could be a group discussion around a campfire, a display at school or work, or maybe a contribution to a website. It could be artwork, information leaflets or taking other people out to enjoy the places you have discovered. This is the chance to share your experiences with others. Who does the John Muir Award? Anyone can do the award. We work with a wide range of groups and individuals, including schools, families, youth groups, charities, disability groups, outdoor education centres, countryside ranger services and anyone else you care to think of. If you like to work or play in the outdoors then you could do the John Muir Award. The group’s original target was to have fifty children participating, but word of the skills, fun activities and club outings soon got around, and the Young Adventurers membership of seventy four have now reached their first award. It is hoped that approximately fifty children will enter for their second level 'Explorer' award.
This story was published with kind permission of the Ileach local newspaper
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