Once you reached the end of Scouts around 14 years old, you’ll be invited to join the local District Explorer Unit. Anyone 14-18 years old can join, even if you’ve never been a Scout before. See our page on Explorers for links of how to join.
Explorer Scouts are then invited to be Young Leaders at their local groups. You can choose to support Beavers, Cubs or Scouts sections, and you may be moved between sections to give you lots of experience. This is a role with a lot of responsibility, and you’ll be acting as a leader, assisting with the sessions, planning, and delivering the programme with the Adult Leaders rather than just taking part. It’s a very fun and rewarding role!
The main difference is that you are no longer a participant in your section meeting, but part of the leadership team delivering the programme. The Scout Association provided a training programme for Young Leaders, which is delivered by our District and supported by our section leaders.
You can see details of the training programme here
Our leadership team facilitate Young Leaders attending weekly meetings, events and planning sessions. Our Group supports the Young Leaders by paying their UK HQ (circa £47 a year) and for us to include “where possible” the cost of trips so events do not cost you any money to attend. This puts our Young Leaders in the same financial position as our volunteer Adult Leaders who attend and sets the expectation that our Young Leaders “lead” rather than just “take part” as they would have done in Beavers, Cubs and Scouts.
We also expect that all our Young Leaders be involved in planning and delivery of the programme. The Section’s Adult Leaders really want to incorporate your feedback, especially if you were previously a Scout. Your experience and opinions as a Young Person are so valuable in helping shape and organise our weekly meetings, to prepare a top-quality programme for all our Scouts.
If you have any queries or want to sign up for our Young Leader programme, please contact us.
An explorer, adventurer and TV presenter, Dwayne's been seen in BAFTA nominated Channel 5 series Race to the Pole, on BBC Springwatch, Countryfile, National Geographic and Disney+.
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