Staffing extra-curricular activities
Posts submitted in this thread require the moderator's approval
| Author | Message |
|---|---|
|
Paddy 22 September 2011, 5:26pm |
Hi, This discussion thread under the Extra-curricular activities forum will be where you can post your questions, ideas, suggestions, good practice, challenges and inspiration about everything to do with staffing the activities you offer young people. There will be other discussion threads in time. And I'm hoping that people who attend the training days will start some of them. If you feel you want to discuss another topic, please don't hesitate to contact either Adam Zulawski or me if you aren't sure how to do set up the thread. Well, the first extra-curricular training day and the peer-to-peer session took place on Wednesday in Birmingham. I'm hearing that it went pretty well but I'll leave that to members to decide whether they want to post any comments about the day here. Pat Morgan, my colleague from ContinYou who was at the training day, told me about a discussion people had about the safe ratio of adults to young people in extra-curricular settings. There doesn't seem to be any hard and fast guidance out there, but Pat is going to contact Rospa (Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents) as soon as possible and will come onto this forum with whatever information she gathers. Meantime, if you have anything wise to tell us about this issue, please do. And remember: to discuss absolutely anything related to the ins and outs, the ups and downs, the cost (or not) of staffing activities and clubs - this is the place to do it on the Learning Exchange. And if you do post questions - remember we'll answer them almost immediately (unless you post at a weekend). And if we don't have an answer straight off, we'll find you one, or find you someone who can help - as pronto as we can.
|
|
pat.morgan 23 September 2011, 6:50pm |
Yes Paddy, we had a really good day in Birmingham at our first of three "Improving outcomes through extra-curricular activities" training seminars. The morning training session delivered by our partners, the UFA, was excellent and really energised us all! This first one concentrates on the planning & delivering of sustainable ECA and we discussed lots of good practice and how much everyone wants to see these activities grow in variety and quality. We did discuss minimum staffing ratios and it was comforting to know that, in the absence of any specific guidelines, we all agreed on "as a rule of thumb":- 1 - 8 for the under 8's and 1- 14/15 for the 8+ age range. Obviously these depend on the needs of the children/young people and of course the type of activity involved. We also discussed the use of volunteers and also peer tutors and agreed it would be useful to explore this topic further. I will definitely do as Paddy suggests and contact ROSPA to see if we can get further clarity for our members, but in the meantime I'm sure we would all greatly appreciate any information or observations any of you may have to offer on this subject. Will report back on the outcome of my enquiry to ROSPA. |
|
karlah
26 September 2011, 9:37am |
This question always comes up and in Middlesbrough the policy is 1:8 for under 8's and 1:14 for over 8's. If children have additional needs this can change the ratio and it also depends on the actual activity. eg. if it was a high risk activity such as canoeing the ratio may be more adults than the usual 1:8 for under 8's etc. Hope this makes sense, it's Monday morning! |
|
victoria asprey 16 January 2012, 8:15am |
Forgot to ask...who provided the training? Im trying to find a provider for a half day INSET day session in June and any additional info about ECA and how they help children would be great. Thank you V |
Please login or register to participate in the forum.