What is an 'Open Weekend'
Put simply and Open Weekend is an opportunity for as many scouts, Explorers and leaders to come together for a summer weekend and camp whist doing various scouting and sporting challenges. The event would be run at Bailwood by a central team from the District with leader support.
Following feedback on the 2023 event the Explorers groups will also compete against each other for the Explorer trophy however they will be judged only on a smaller selection of the likely scout challenges below plus they will camp independently of their leaders/group and be expected to manage/cook for themselves during the event. Points will be awarded to the teams for camp management based on random visits to their site during the event.
Timings
The event would run from Friday 5.00 pm onwards for camp set up (with an option for groups to come up on the Thursday evening to set up camp) and the event would finish after prizes being awarded at 1.00 pm on Sunday.
Cost
Normal Bailwood camp fees would apply (£1.50 per member per night) plus a small team supplement of £10 per group for each section to help towards central equipment costs.
What are the likely challenges
Scouting
. Tent pitching
. Pioneering
. Fire Lighting
. Compass Challenge
Sporting
. 5-A-Side football
. Cross Country
. Horse Shoes
. Tug of war
. Archery
In addition, there will also be an independently judged challenge and trophy for the best camp gateway.
How does it work
Friday night will simply be bedding in with a leader meeting with one person from each group to attend to iron out any last-minute changes.
Saturday will see the teams competing in all events starting from 9.00am with the finale around 5.00 pm to be the cross country. Teams of six people will be put forward by each group for each event with an age range across the 10-14 age spectrum in each team. If a group has less than 6 scouts it will be no problem as we will look at other groups to support the small ones with additional bodies.
The central team will be responsible for rostering all events.
The gateways will be built by the scouts (no help from leaders or Explorers) during Saturday and judged after Dinner. Explorer teams will not be required to make gateways.
Sunday will see the Tug of War (All scouts will be weighed and a total per team will be advised) as the final event before groups will be allowed to strike camp prior to prize giving at 12.00 noon.
So, what do the leaders have to do?
The primary purpose of the leaders at the event will be to cook and wash up for your scout section and to ensure teams are where they should be at all times. The scouts will be busy on events so leader support is vital.
However, an event like this cannot run without leaders from across the groups supporting the challenges themselves. We would therefore need volunteers to run each of the scouting and sporting events. The central team would run Cross Country, Tug of War and Archery so we have a need for a minimum of 7 adult volunteers to make the event work. These volunteers can come from the groups participating but leaders from other sections, groups not involved with the event and or the SAS would be more than welcome as, if the number or groups involved is high we may need more than one adult running each event.
