Bronze

Notes for new participants

• The following information, including parental permission form, is available to download here (PDF).
• Download the Bronze Award 'Bitesize Planner'.

The St Ives Duke of Edinburgh open group runs in close partnership with Cambridgeshire County Council. We keep our fees as low as possible and have decided to keep our fee the same for the fifth year running. We offer a discount for those who choose to pay the full fee in the Autumn term.

Participants who are students at St Ivo school need to pay the fee to St Ivo School via their business centre (cash or cheques at morning break) or via the online payment system ParentPay. Participants who are not students at St Ivo School can pay by BACS, standing order or cheque.

The total annual fee is £195(discounted to £180 for full payment at enrolment), which includes the following:

• Welcome pack
• Participants will need a welcome pack for the level of D of E they are undertaking. The cost (included in your annual fee) of the pack includes third party insurance whilst taking part in all D of E activities. 
• Annual Duke of Edinburgh fee
• A contribution to cover all Wednesday sessions, the day walk(or cycle) training in March and all the expedition weekends
• Expeditions/weekend commitment
• A 1-day walk training day in March.
• Cyclists at Bronze will be expected to attend additional cycle training & safety sessions
• A 2-day training expedition weekend in May
• A 2-day qualifying expedition weekend in June

Payment schedule

	Payment in full (saving £15)		Instalments
	Full fee by Nov 1st	OR	1. By Nov 1st	2. By Feb 1st	3. By May 1st
St Ivo student	£180 to St Ivo Business centre or via ParentPay	OR	£65 to St Ivo Business Centre or via ParentPay	£65 (as per first instalment)	£65 (as per first instalment)
Non St Ivo student	£180 payable by cheque( to St Ives DofE Open Group)  or BACS	OR	£65 payable by cheque (to ‘St Ives DofE Open Group’), BACS or standing order	£65 (as per first instalment)	£65 (as per first instalment)

Other expenses

Participants are expected to provide the majority of their own expedition equipment. The group has a limited amount of equipment (tents, backpacks, stoves, etc) which we can loan out in exchange for a small hire charge, if anyone has difficulty buying or borrowing equipment.

Expedition equipment can be costly. Please check the equipment list and ask for any advice you need on any purchases. Please be aware that D of E walking expedition participants MUST wear good quality walking BOOTS with strong soles and ankle support.  D of E participants can obtain reductions at many outdoor stores provided they take their D of E reward card along and show it to the manager in charge at the time. The stores generally offer a 10% or 15% discount. 

Any money paid in fees will be held in The St Ives D of E funds. No refunds are payable to anyone who decides not to complete their D of E. Please don’t allow the cost of things to stop you having a go at The D of E. If you have financial difficulties we have a small contingency fund to help if you are keen to join.
  
Attendance

• You will be given a complete itinerary for the DofE Annual Programme. 
• Please make sure you put the expedition dates in your family calendar so that you are not double-booked for anything. We cannot change expedition dates for anyone, so make sure you are available for the expeditions before committing yourself to D of E.
• All meetings take place on Wednesday evenings, term-time only at the Broad Leas Centre, Broad Leas, St Ives 6.30pm to 8.30pm (please arrive at 6.20pm for a prompt start). Occasionally sessions are shorter. We have the use of the whole building for our sessions as no other groups use the premises on a Wednesday evening. This gives us access to a large hall and several group spaces of varying sizes. Please make sure you are available for the full 2 hours at each session. 
• Please bring a pen or pencil (and rubber) and notepad to jot down any important information.
• You must attend all sessions for your D of E level. Please be aware some of the sessions may fall during internal or external exam periods. Your attendance at these sessions is still compulsory. You have your exam timetable ahead of time and should be able to plan your revision around DofE sessions.
• You must attend one of the Expedition Training Day Walks/Day cycle dates during March. You will be expected to walk/cycle with your expedition group and so you need to liaise with your team to decide which weekend would be most suitable for you all to attend together. The walks form part of your expedition training and are a vital part of the expedition section of your D of E. Bronze DofE Cyclists will have additional weekend training and safety cycle rides.
• We will use the campcraft session to deliver training on camp cooking, use of stoves, tent pitching etc. It is essential you have ALL your expedition kit by this date as we will be checking everything. Anyone without suitable kit at this point might not be allowed to take part in the expeditions.
• You must attend your Practice expedition weekend (May) as well as the Assessed expedition (June) in order to pass the expedition section of your D of E.
• A register of attendance is kept for each session. Anyone who misses a session or sessions may not be allowed to take part in the expeditions.
• If you need help with any section of your D of E, staff are available each week at some point during the evening to give advice on the skill, volunteering and physical sections of your D of E. You will be expected to show that you have completed or are in the process of completing at least 2 of these sections of your Award before the Assessed expedition in June. 

Conduct

Good behaviour is expected at all sessions and during all expeditions. Anyone falling below our expected standard may be asked to leave the Award group. In these instances there will be no refund of any fees paid.

Application process

The St Ives Duke of Edinburgh group has an upper limit on the numbers of Bronze participants that we take on each year.

Staffing has become increasingly difficult in recent years due to extra requirements laid down by Cambridgeshire County Council; consequently it is becoming more and more difficult to recruit qualified volunteers to help with the expedition section.

A limit on our numbers also means that each individual is getting better training from The D of E, as the staff are not spread as thinly. We have a maximum of 63 places for Bronze participants.

We have decided to put in place a simple process which will help us to gauge each individual’s commitment to completing their D of E, rather than simply offer places to those who are the first to enrol on enrolment day.

We will set each prospective Bronze participant the following task:

“Prepare a short piece of work, explaining why you want to take part in the Bronze Duke of Edinburgh Award and how you think you will benefit from your involvement. You can submit the work in any form e.g. song, story, poem, music, video, Powerpoint, recording, cartoon, drawing, collage etc or simply a written statement. Maximum number of words 100.”

The piece of work MUST be submitted at the time you enrol.

If we are oversubscribed then the work will be examined and those people who have shown the best examples of the task will be successful in gaining places. If any participant is unsuccessful we will make sure they are notified before the first training session.

Adult volunteering

Lastly, if as a parent/carer you would like to volunteer to help with group please see one of the volunteer staff and they will be happy to let you know what volunteering involves. The more adult volunteers we have, the more participants we can accept onto the programme.