Duke of Edinburgh Award

The term seems to be flying by now, with our second expedition completed over the weekend of 11th-13th June, and the trialling of our new format for Bronze, the Combined Bronze Award.  This was borne out of the necessity to ensure that students finally completed DofE awards started pre-Covid, by condensing the Practice and Assessed expeditions into one weekend instead of two.

On Friday after school, the student teams undertook training, covering areas such as pitching a tent, safe usage of Trangias and the creation of a route card for successful navigation.  The next day, we set off from School on the Practice expedition, i.e. each team walking separately with a member of staff in tow to offer tips, support and motivation whilst the students took turns map reading in pairs along a predetermined circular route.  Once back at School, the students demonstrated what they had (and hadn’t!) remembered from Friday’s training session by setting up camp on the School field.  That night, students worked on their route cards at home as well as brushing up on the online training modules created by St Olave’s.

On Sunday morning, we reconvened but this time the students set off without staff in tow, relying on their newly acquired map reading skills to navigate different footpaths to Sevenoaks station.  Staff appeared without warning at various points along the routes to monitor progress.  After a final Q&A session and debrief, the students returned home for a well-deserved rest!

As always, we couldn’t run such a successful weekend without staff giving up their time and providing support so generously. Sincere thanks therefore to Mr Holland, Mrs Andrews, Mrs Attwood, Dr Carpenter, Mr Carroll, Miss Difford, Mr Jewson, Mr Masters and Frau Probodziak for their encouragement to the Year 11 students.