1^st Claygate Scout Group - Membership Requirements (Parents)

 As a voluntary organisation the Group relies on help from parents/supporters in order to deliver the programme of activities, experiences and training.  This can be help on meeting nights, weekend activities (camps, Claygate clean up, etc), transport and the like and these are usually requested by the section leaders.  It is hoped that these events are enjoyed by the young people and volunteers and that this help is offered in order to assist the young people to get the most out of an activity.

 In addition, as a voluntary organisation, we have to be self-funding and this is basically achieved on the basis of subscriptions, but only provides the base level of Scouting.  In terms of providing ‘added value’ to the sections and in order to fund the level of equipment replacement programme required to meet the Group’s needs and other developments, our finances have been set around a level of fund raising over and above subscriptions.

 Whilst we seek grant funding wherever we can, we are very fortunate to have a number of small teams of people who do all of the organising in advance of a number of events during the year.  This means that we are only looking for parents to provide 1-2 hours help at an event.  The fund raising typically raises around £14,000 a year which really adds value to the Scouting provide to the young people.

 Our advance expenditure plans and budget are based on the following events

With the current membership standing at approximately 210 (2013) families, if everyone met the requirement of 2 fund raising events we should have about 35 helpers at every event.  Many parents DO support the group over and above what is required and this is one of the reasons we have managed to continue the current level of fundraising which provides the added value we need.  Unfortunately not everyone offers assistance and the membership requirement is about sharing the load!

 It is hoped that by making it clear that the membership requirement to help with the fundraising events is separate from the requests made for help with the sections, which is seen as normal parental support, that the right level of help will be forthcoming for the fund raising events indicated in the table above.

 We do not want to get to the stage of holding records of help at the events and monitoring this on an annual basis and it is of our belief that the community of Claygate has more community spirit than that!  However, collectively we need to make this work so that the Section Leaders continue to have the equipment and facilities to provide high quality Scouting.

 As Group Scout Leader I do know of other Groups locally who do operate a more rigid system of monitoring, with sanctions for those who do not meet their requirements.  These Groups do run some very large fund raising events which require large numbers of people in attendance on the day.  I am confident that we should not need such a time consuming and wasteful process, but we do need to get a better response to requests from the Section representatives who phone or e mail requests for help to ensure this confidence is not misplaced.

 Offers of help can always be provided to Harriet Lay, who currently (2015) coordinates the parent representative team.
Email: parent_coordinator@claygatescouts.org

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