FLAGS Blogs
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James Journey in Scouting
29th May 2015
I started my journey in Scouting back in 1996 as a Cub, when I was just a mere 8 years old. I struggled a little to start with, but within a few months I was striving! Once I had finished Cubs my family moved home, so I moved to a Scout Troop closer to our new home. I knew A LOT of members through school, other clubs and drama groups etc.
After these years in Scouts, I was approached by the District to see whether I would like to join this brand spanking new section called "Explorer Scouts" and I became one of the first members of "Nomad Explorer Scout Unit".
I realised I was gay at an early (ish) age, around 12 years old. I officially came out to my parents at the age of 16, but what’s this got to do with Scouting I hear you say? Well just before I came out to my family, I had a few months of ups and downs and finally confided in my Explorer Scout leader for someone to rely on and a be a role model to me.
I then started as a Young Leader at my current Scout Troop and I was taken in with open arms. After a year of being a Young Leader, I came out to my Scout Leader (now Group Scout Leader) and again was accepted by her. This open minded way of life was VERY overwhelming for me and now at 26 years old no one batters an eyelid...this is how it should be!!
I can't thank the people in my Scouting journey enough: Dave, Phil, Debbie, Arthur, Heidi, Clare, Peter … THANK YOU XX
I Found out about FLAGS 3 years ago when I joined them at London Pride and I have never looked back since!! I’ve now met my life long partner Joe through an event last year, now 10 months down the line we are living together and ready to spend our lives together!
If I have learnt anything in Scouting, it is that it’s an OPEN and DIVERSE organisation, to be me and believe in myself.
#SCOUTPRIDE #SCOUTING4ALL
Managers Blog - May 2015
20th May 2015
Hi,
Welcome to my monthly blog, which this time I'll try and keep short and sweet !!!
This month I've been focusing on the run up to pride season, as well as membership renewal, and our events calendar. I've also got some exciting news from our international friends.
So, the first key activity of this month was our team meeting, this is a chance for me to find out what's going on around the team, and where the teams focus has been. The main focus of this call was to discuss our budget for the coming year, as well as agreeing our events. You'll be pleased to hear we have a breakeven budget planned for the next year, and we plan to share this with you in the coming weeks. We are also in the process of finalising our financial statements for last year. We're share both of these documents with you shortly.
This month we also had a chance to chat about the plans for our events in the next couple of years. We already have a number of events planned in, and are also looking adding new events including socials, and a focus on Scotland and Wales. We're currently looking for new adult events to attend to promote #scouting4all, if you know any events then please do let Sarah know. More details in the next newsletter.
This month we are completing the membership renewal process, if you haven't yet completed thee membership renewal form then please check out our last membership newsletter. If your not a member of the unit yet, and your eligible then please do join up today by completing an adult information form and return to Dan.
I wanted to update you on our international work, this month I'm in the process of planning my attendance at the WOSM LGBT round table. I have now had to chat with the team about some of the barriers and challenges we face in ensuring LGBT members are represented throughout the association. This will be an exciting event at the beginning of June which I'll tell you about afterwards.
Lastly, I wanted to share with you some exciting news from our friends in Victoria, Australia. Following several conversations their state council have now agreed they can set up a network like flags, and have taken the first step forwards to promoting LGBT equality in scouting. Check out their poster and read what Scott had to say to us last week.
"Our Victorian State Leadership Team have endorsed a poster to be created to show that Scouts Victoria endorses supporting IDAHOT this Sunday AND we form the Rainbow Scouts Network for GLBTI youth/leaders and their supporters. It's a massive step forward and the final green light to move forward.
...and because Victoria and New South Wales are the biggest states and almost always lead by example and initiative, we could well influence Scouts Australia following our lead" - Scotty Harrison.
Well I'm now in the process of packing for an exciting weekend at Birmingham pride, so looking forward to seeing many of you there !!!
Yours in scouting,
Mike
Report from Big Camp
3rd May 2015
The FLAGS events team has been busily coordinating and planning for the West Yorkshire Big Camp 2015 for the last month. All the work in planning activities and organising with the camp team culminated today in the first of two days at the camp. A team of 6 FLAGS members have been onsite today to run the activities on “The Street” promoting inclusion and diversity within the movement with the activities set to continue for another day.
Our activities focused on using fun games and activities to promote a message of inclusion, which were well received and enjoyed by all that took part (young people and leaders alike). Activities included paracord woggles in bright pink and rainbow (a range of the other colour combinations were available), diversity wordsearches containing diversity orientated words, diversity Jenga and Pick-up-Sticks. Photos of some of the activities and woggles are on the Facebook pages. At one point we had a queue of about 20 people all desperate to get a new woggle to wear.
Our location shared a tent with the Value Tree – an activity where leaves on the tree were filled in with messages promoting values that members shared and it was excellent to see inclusion and diversity featuring as part of the words written by young members of the movement.
To top it all we have once again built relationships, this time with members of our West Yorkshire scouting family, which hopefully will extend for many years to come. A big thanks to Marcus Coulson, Andy Cole, Owen Wallace-Williams, Andrew Mitchell and Joanne Mitchell for working on our activities today, especially in the cold and rain.
Yours in scouting,
Rob Sharratt
