Outdoor & Environmental Education

Staff organising residential visits to North Yorkshire should be aware of the following article that appeared in the press recently:

“English Heritage will close a number of historical sites across North Yorkshire during winter weekdays.  Locations such as Clifford’s Tower in York, Scarborough Castle and Whitby Abbey will open only at weekends from November until April.”  

Staff may still wish to contact the attractions to see if they will remain open for organised school groups.

Hopefully this will be an isolated occurrence but staff will need to stay in contact with attractions they intend to use for their ventures just in case the closures spread.

As you will no doubt be aware, the DfE released its new 8 page guidance on the conduct of educational visits to replace the existing 2001 version.  The new guidance focuses on the reduction of unnecessary bureaucracy and strongly supporting out of the classroom learning, this is something with which we can all agree.

In the new DfE guidance, Health & Safety remains the responsibility of the employer as does the need to provide guidance and training for staff. At present this guidance is contained in Code of Practice No. 11 ‘Guidance for the Conduct of Educational Visits and Adventurous Activities’. All establishments should continue to use this document in its present form for the planning and conduct of all ventures.

In the coming weeks we will revise Guidance/Code of Practice No. 11 to reflect the new situation and all establishments will be notified once this task is completed. The process will not be immediate since there are a number of stages the guidance will have to pass through (Legal Services, Insurance Services, Pupil Health & Safety, Trade Unions etc.) but we will complete this as quickly as possible.

The HSE have produced new guidance called School Trips and Outdoor Learning Activities – Tackling the Health and Safety Myths.

Further to our previous post warning staff of potential street crime in major cities, there has been another instance of a member of a school party being the victim of pick-pocketing in Barcelona.

There is always a risk of street crime when visiting any city, either in Britain or abroad. Party members should be reminded to take sensible precautions when undertaking city visits – keeping valuables concealed, avoiding conspicuous shows of wealth and looking out for each other where pick-pockets may operate.

In our article posted on 30^th March, we gave the Highways Agency contact number as being 08457 504030. If you continue to use this number your call will be transferred to the new number, but please advise staff that the new number for the Agency is 0300 123 5000.

Crisis Line phone numbers have now changed.  The new number is 0800 953 1515 and is a 24 hour number.  New cards are currently in the process of being printed and will be sent to schools as soon as possible.

The stepping stones near the weir in Bamford (SK 204 833) are becoming very eroded and in bad weather may be unusable – there are notices at either end indicating that the stones are closed.  Whilst it is possible to cross the stones with great care and close supervision, we strongly recommend that they are avoided until further notice.  If you do choose to cross the stones, under no circumstances should participants be allowed to cross without staff being present. There is a crossing further down-river and a permissive path up through a garage which will rejoin the original route.  The true public right of way is just below the weir, but nobody uses it for obvious reasons.

Please contact the Educational Off-site Visits Team at the planning stage of ski trips or overseas expeditions.

There have recently been several occasions where there have been issues (insurance, waivers etc.) with ski trips and overseas expeditions which could have been avoided if dealt with at the planning stages.

We are therefore asking that party leaders contact us as soon as they begin planning these types of trip and certainly before paying any deposit or committing to a booking in any way.  This applies to all ski ventures and overseas expeditions (visits to remote regions), whether self-led or organised through a commercial provider.

One of our groups has notified us of an incident where two groups were attacked by a horse while walking across a field near Mountsorrel.  Three participants were knocked to the ground, one of whom was also bitten.  The field runs from the River Soar to Mountsorrel Lane near the junction with Slash Lane (587154).  

Leaders who have groups using this footpath may wish to check it out prior to their groups using it and have an alternative route (possibly via Mountsorrel Lane to Sileby Mill) in place should problems be encountered.  The horse in question is a black and white piebald.

We have been alerted to issues concerning footpaths around Manton in Rutland.  Staff supervising groups between Manton and Edith Weston should be aware that although the OS map appears to show both a footpath and bridleway running from Stonefield Farm SK885049, this is not the case on the ground.  We have been informed that:

At Stonefield Farm there is a “No Through Route” sign at the start of the Bridle

Way and Footpath.  Both the Bridle Way and Footpath are waymarked to the points shown by the green dashed lines on the 1:25000 map.  The footpath stops at SK883051 on the southern edge of the wood on the shore of Manton Bay.  The Bridle Way stops at SK887052 where there is a metal gate onto the access track to the aforementioned wood.  This metal gate is from the original route that is now submerged under water.  This gate is within 50 metres of one of the Nature Reserve hides on the edge of the water.  There are no signs and it is physically possible to walk east along the track to the visitors centre car park at SK894055.  At the car park the track enters via a padlocked field gate in barbed wire fencing.  It is possible to walk onto the access path to the nature reserve and exit through the reserve entrance which has signs requesting that a permit is purchased at the visitors centre.

As a result we suggest that groups avoid using these two routes and ensure that groups use Lyndon Road and the cycle path which meet at SK898049 for ventures between Manton and Edith Weston.

If you are involved in outdoor activities which take you into the countryside or parks and gardens with lots of wildlife (such as squirrels, hedgehogs and deer), you may be at risk of tick bites. Ticks can carry a number of infective organisms which can sometimes make people and pets ill if they get bitten. Simple precautions can help to keep you safe.  For more information follow this link: www.bada-uk.org

In order to better meet safeguarding requirements on educational off-site visits, the local Authority has decided to ‘strongly recommend’ that on all off-site visits at least one member of staff has attended a Group Leader Training Course and for residential ventures, the Certificate of Residential Leadership Course.

The aim is to ensure the safety of children and young people and to improve the experiences they have.  Clearly it is impossible to train staff quickly enough in the short term, so it is proposed that we are ‘working towards’ a position in the future where all visits off-site will have one member of staff who has completed either the Group Leader Training and/or the Certificate of Residential Leadership.

The courses we offer have been revised accordingly from January 2010 with the introduction of the Group Leader Training Award and the intention is that in the near future the Certificate of Residential Leadership will be revised to be a follow-on from that course.  

Current holders of the Certificate of Residential Leadership or the Group Leader Training for Day Visits will automatically be recognised as Group Leaders and will not need additional training to meet these requirements.

The Local Authority also ‘strongly recommend’ that for all ski ventures, at least one member of staff has attended the Snowsport Course Organiser (SCO) as of next skiing season – 2010/2011.