Red Cross Blogs

A quiet weekend in Hampshire

By Chris Jefferies
November 20, 2009 at 2:38 pm

The market village of Botley, Hampshire; situated on the River Humble this village is renowned for its picturesque views and tranquil country atmosphere.

Lovely.

However, last weekend, Botley was the scene of something different. 35 young volunteers from throughout Hampshire, Isle of Wight and Surrey descended on a local campsite. The reason? To take part in our 2009 area youth conference.

I’m proud to be a part of the Youth & Schools department in Hampshire, Isle of Wight and Surrey. We have over 100 young people who volunteer as peer educators. They do amazing work running first aid awareness sessions and workshops on humanitarian issues such as HIV and AIDS. In addition, we have an enthusiastic team of adult volunteers who support our young volunteers and help them develop their skills and confidence.

This year, we’re on track to reach around 50,000 people with first aid and humanitarian education. Wow!

To support our volunteers, every year we hold a residential conference open to all volunteers who work with young people.

This year, to kick off the weekend, we ran an activity where young people had to design and build something that, to them, conveyed a message about the Red Cross. Equipped with a collection of old newspapers, straws and Red Cross stickers our next generation of creative geniuses set to work. Needless to say they came up with some impressive creations (see right!).

Saturday, we held a variety of workshops for young volunteers. These ranged from casualty simulation (learning how to make fake wounds using make-up), ambulance skills (all about working on Red Cross ambulances) and emergency response (the role of the Red Cross in a major incident). In the evening, we played a ‘Crystal Maze’ style game. Teams of young people had to tackle various activities and gain points. Examples of activities included designing a stamp to raise awareness of World AIDS Day and creating a poem themed around our seven fundamental principles.

Sunday saw more workshops based around Inclusive first aid as well as HIV and AIDS. Finally, to finish off the weekend, many of our young volunteers were presented with awards to recognize their hard work over the past year. Well done to all!

Overall the weekend was incredibly successful. All the young people involved left equipped with skills and confidence to allow them to become successful peer educators. After all, these young people are the future of the Red Cross!

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Tags: First aid, hampshire, hiv and aids, inclusive first aid, isle of wight, Peer Educators, surrey, World AIDS Day, young people, youth and schools

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