Don’t forget people who have no one to introduce them to the great outdoors
For me it was my dad who started taking me on progressively more adventurous days out and journeys from an early age. I’m not sure my mum knew half of what we got up to.
For others it may have been an enthusiastic youth leader, family friend or just a group of friends who enjoy being outside together.
One thing we have learned from the past pandemic year is that many people have realised the value of being outdoors, enjoying outdoor space and fresh air and the benefit to our physical and mental health and wellbeing. But what happens to the person who doesn’t have a parent, youth leader or friend to introduce them to the great outdoors? We hear of young people who rarely venture beyond their street or local area.
‘Nature deficit disorder’ is a thing and some of those people visiting our outdoor places clearly haven’t learned to treat them with the respect our beautiful country deserves.
There is an opportunity for all young people to learn outdoors and learn about the outdoors. It is embedded in Curriculum for Excellence. Learners who engage with learning outdoors are more likely to meet the Scottish Government's education priorities including; raising attainment and achievement, reduction of the poverty related attainment gap, improved mental and physical health and wellbeing outcomes and better engagement with learning for sustainability and the natural world. This sounds great but there are some issues.
Local authority budgets are constantly under pressure and not all will commit funding to outdoor learning, leading to an inequity of opportunity. Increasingly, opportunity and access to quality outdoor learning experiences are being determined only by establishment or teacher enthusiasm, third sector organisations or private business aim. It is also affected by locality and parents’ affordability.
The Scottish Advisory Panel for Outdoor Education (SAPOE) is the network of local authority representatives to support best practise in the development and safe delivery of outdoor Learning. The overarching ambition of SAPOE is for outdoor learning to become truly embedded and to ensure that a progressive outdoor learning journey from 3-18 years is secured for all young people in Scotland in the years to come. To support this we have made a number of proposals including the need for dedicated outdoor learning lead officers in education services, development of a Scottish outdoor learning workforce plan, ensuring adventure activities are part of the outdoor learning progression and ensuring equitable access to residential outdoor centre experiences for all young people.
A secure future for quality outdoor learning will see more early years outdoor experiences lead to confident individuals, more young people learning new skills and building resilience through adventure activity and expeditions, more activities tried at an outdoor centre leading to a lifelong involvement in the outdoors and for some there will simply be magical memories.
That seems like something worth fighting for and so we support the OSS call for a ‘National Conversation on Sport’s Role in Society’, which we hope will help us to widen understanding of the benefits, and how we can work more effectively in partnership to secure the future of local authority outdoor learning provision.