St Edmund's

The recent death of HRH the Duke of Edinburgh gives us the opportunity to reflect upon the impact the DofE Award has on the pupils at St Edmunds School. Through the volunteering, skill and physical sections the Award gives our pupils great opportunities to get outside, meet people and gain life experience. Many of our past pupils favourite memories come from the DofE, especially the expeditions and the teamwork, challenge and of course fun that they have. There isn’t many opportunities in schools where pupils are effectively self sufficient and mostly without direct teacher supervision for a series of days. These experiences have hugely valuable outcomes (often with a few hilarious stories). Throughout the Award, teamwork, communication, leadership, responsibility, friendship are all tested and often enhanced and for these reasons we see the Award as a hugely valuable part of the education delivered here at St Edmund’s. Throughout the Duke of Edinburgh’s life and schooling he hugely valued the power of being outdoors, the DofE Award will be a fitting legacy as it will continue to allow future generations to experience this. The future of the DofE Award at St Edmunds looks incredibly exciting, there are over 120 Bronze participants in both the M5th and L5th which is the largest cohort the school has ever had. Although we have faced many challenges during the last year we are looking forward to running expeditions again soon, we will be offering a new canoe expedition for the Silver Award and a new mountain expedition in Snowdonia for the Gold participants from next year. We will aim to continue growing numbers and interest in the school and hope to have many more St Edmund’s pupils achieving their Gold Awards over the coming years.