I would like to thank you all for coming today, another year has flown past and we are back to recognise the hard work done by all our leaders of the group, our parent helpers that without their effort and time this group wouldn’t be able to provide such a good program for your children.

But and there will always be a but, we do need more parent helpers. We are looking for leaders or helpers for our Beaver colony so they could put on many more activities for the young people., without this help they are limited.

We don’t ask for a lot, a few hours a week or every fortnight. Please see me afterwards for a chat if you are interested.

Since the last AGM we have had a change of leadership in Beavers, Spencer Manwaring has stepped up and taken the challenge. Thank you, Kelly, for all the hard work you put into running the colony; Thank you Julia Manwaring, Angela King, Vanessa Blacktop & Grant Baxter for your help this past year and I would like to thank the many parents that helped.

We also welcome Jenny Newman to the Scout section & Shane Homer to the Explorer Unit.

I would like to congratulate all leaders and helpers that had their Wood Beads & awards presented to them this year.

Also, would like to congratulate every Beaver, Cub, Scout and Explorer who this year achieved their Chief Scout Awards, some of them presented this year at St Georges Parade; this is the highest Award in Scouting a young person can achieve.

We have two Explorers and a Leader attending this year’s World Jamboree in the USA, Lily Hussey, George Lock & Ben Taylor. We wish them all the best in this adventure.

Our new project for the coming year is tiding up the pathways & Fence and keeping the grounds safe. So, parents we will need your help with work parties for a couple of weekends, any volunteers? (we will provide bacon and burger butties and loads of tea & coffee)

This year we have had the floor replaced and the hall has been given a new coat of paint. Thank you to John Wood and Paul Brisley.

I would like to thank the Bingo committee, Mark Hardie, Louise Hardie and helpers for the great job they do in fundraising for us this year, without their hard work we wouldn’t have the money for the covering the Headquarters expenses.

I would like to thank Mark Hardie for being my chairman for the last 5 years, he has done a great job, you will be missed, but he isn’t leaving us completely, Mark will still run the Bingo evenings for us and hopefully other fundraising events.

Finally thank you to all the parents for supporting the Group.

I would also like to thank the leadership and helpers for giving up their time to give your children a full and active program.

As you know we are always looking for volunteers who would like to join the Group, the Executive committee or the fundraising, (new ideas are always welcome) & help with maintaining the hut.

Jacquie Wood GSL

1^st Cheriton Scout Group

I am pleased to report that our membership is currently 22, with a couple more on the waiting list and due to start shortly.

We currently have two linking with a number due to also start in the autumn term with Cubs.

Over the past year, the Beavers have been very active in badge work. We’ve awarded 404 badges ranging from: Communicator, Explorer, Creative, Book Reader, Faith, International, Paddlesports. A lot of work has taken place on the Challenge and Stage badges as well.

We also awarded eight Chief Scouts Bronze Awards in this last year. This Award is the highest that can be achieved by a beaver scout and to complete it, they have to complete all Challenge awards and at least four other badges.

The colony has taken part in district events such as the Olympicnic, District Fun Run and Experiment day held here at the hut. This is as well as St Georges Day and Remembrance Day.

The first Nights Away opportunity was held in June with a sleepover at the hut. They all slept in tents, tried fire lighting and lots more besides. In addition a number of Beavers slept out for the Porchlight Sleep Out 2018.

We were very pleased to receive a visit from Shelter Box and All Souls Church which we also visited as part of the Faith badge.

Last, but by no means least I must thank Kelly who ran the Colony up until the end of February, Jacquie, Daphne, Angela, Vanessa, Grant and Andy and parents that have helped or have joined us on hikes and other events throughout the year. Also thanks to Julia who has returned to help with the finance and admin side. In addition we have welcomed Scout and Explorer help with Rosie, Immie and on occasions Matthew. Beth one of our younger cubs also comes along to help….or take part depending on what we are doing.

Over this term we are doing some of the Million Hands project as part of the Kent Beaver Challenge, we have Beavers camp towards the end of June where we’ll be doing scouting skills, firelighting and sleeping in tents. We will be doing paddlesports and will also be doing the builder badge and emergency aid. Hopefully a lot of this term will be spent outdoors!

I’ve really enjoyed the last few months with the colony and look forward to the next year.

Spencer Manwaring

Beaver Leader

1st Cheriton Scout Group

We currently have 40 Cubs and also 3 linking Beavers all enjoying being part of the 1st Cheriton Scout Group and take part in the many exciting activities that we all put together for them to experience.

My grateful thanks go to the ever enthusiastic Cub Pack leadership team who give up loads of their free time each week and weekends and usually consists of:

Matt Cowdroy Kaa (Python)

Daphne Pascoe The Original (and best) Bagheera (Black Panther)

John Wood Hathi (Lead Elephant)

Spencer Manwaring Bagheera (New Black Panther on the Block)

Jonny Robinson Chil (Kite)

Emily Terris Morr (Peacock)

Debbie Hill Baloo (Brown Bear)

Thanks very much to our Young Leaders Jess, Callum & Elliot who are currently helping us run the Pack.

Thanks very much to the Leaders and Helpers of all the other sections who regularly help out with ideas and bodies to run and lead activities and adventures when they can.

6r’s & 2ndr’s Camp this year was at Bexon Lane near Sittingbourne and was the best attended camp of this sort ever – 19 Cubs and recently promoted Scouts enjoyed activities like the automatically rotating climbing wall and discovered the joys of spud guns – Great fun for us all, mostly the Leaders!

We have a busy summer program planned with the objective of enabling us to spend as much time outside as possible, while completing the badge work needed for all Cubs to achieve their Silver Chief Scout award before they make the move up to Scouts.

The best event of the year is still to come, Survival Summer Camp at Rosswood near Canterbury. Each day on camp will be a different survival scenario, Zombie Apocalypse, Shipwreck and Jungle Safari are some of these.

I have added up all of the nights away Cubs could have been at camp, since summer 2009. This comes to 101 in total, like the Dalmatians! This gives an average of slightly more than 10 nights away every year, which is amazing.

There are still a handful of spaces left for this year’s summer camp and if your Cub would like to be there, they need to get signed up very quickly.

Finally thanks to Matt Dickenson who has been my Cub Parent representative on the Group Executive Committee for a couple of years (when he remembered to come!).

I am hoping to have 2 new Cub parents who are willing to help me with this. So if you can spare a couple of hours, 4 times a year please let me know at the end of this AGM and I will tell you what is involved and required.

Thanks for listening!

Bill

CSL (Akela) 1st Cheriton Scout Group