Ten Year 11 students from Olive AP Academy – Nene Valley are set to achieve their Duke of Edinburgh’s (DoE) Bronze Award after taking part in a weekend camping expedition. Along with peers from Olive AP Academy - Cambridge, they are the first students from our academies in Cambridgeshire to achieve the award.
For many of the students, this was the first time they’d ever been away or spent the night under canvas. Students spent a thrilling weekend in the heart of Thetford Forest, taking part in a wide range of activities including kayaking, mountain biking, campfire cookery and more.
In the lead up to the trip, students practiced camping skills as part of their outdoor learning to enable them to manage any challenges in a familiar environment.
To complete the Bronze award, students also needed to develop a skill and volunteer. For most students, their skill development has been cooking, which involved building skills in preparing and cooking a meal for International Food Festival in Wisbech held in February this year.
To meet the criteria for volunteering, most pupils have participated in the Gauntlet project, a Cambridgeshire charity that enables young people to learn how to ride and maintain motorbikes safely. The volunteering involved helping to repair and maintain the bikes, offering further skill development for pupils.
Millie Andrews, Outdoor Learning Coordinator for Olive AP Academy – Nene Valley, said:
I am so proud of how hard everyone has worked to get to this point – the students should be very proud of all they have achieved. For many, this was their first time away from home and certainly their first time camping.
We’re extremely grateful to Olive Academies Foundation for funding and to the DoE’s Access Without Limits programme for providing additional funding for camping equipment.
This may have been the first Duke of Edinburgh experience fo our academies, but it certainly won’t be the last. Discussions are already underway regarding future participation in both Bronze and Silver Awards – watch this space!
Working towards the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award provides a great foundation for the next steps towards education and employment, as it helps to develop many of the soft skills required by colleges, universities, and employers such as resilience, teamwork and problem solving. It also benefits students physical and mental wellbeing and allows them to give back to their local communities through volunteering.