Who doesn’t love a badge?

Despite challenges of the last year or so, the team in Girlguiding Hertfordshire has gone from strength to strength.  Units have been meeting online and many returned to face-to-face just as soon as it was allowed.   

During Lockdown, we introduced flexible units to allow girls to take part when their local unit might not have been able to offer anything.  We aim to continue with these units to enable girls to start their guiding experience when a place is not yet available to them.  Flexible units also help us to ensure we are inclusive, when girls can’t get to a unit, for whatever reason. 

Our social media presence has increased massively since our PR team grew in numbers and they gave themselves the challenge of getting involved in all the different platforms.  The “Meet Our Leader” posts are designed to support recruitment by showing that our volunteers do other things, not just Guiding!  They have been very successful. We have also used social media to celebrate our volunteers’ awards and long service following our virtual presentation evening. 

Following the success of our Thinking Day challenge, we have exciting plans for the year ahead.  We are launching a county book challenge in the autumn term and have a golfing challenge in planning for the spring.   

Our Walking Team have been encouraging us all to get outside and keep well by introducing the marathon badges and mini mid-week challenges 

The Great Patrol Hunt has been running for many years and continues to bring guides together from all across the county to take part in challenges and team building over a series of events throughout the year. This will start again in October ending in a camp in the summer term. 

Teamwork is really important to us.  With such a big county, we couldn’t function without working together as we do.  We try to recognise our volunteers and the dedication they have and what better way to do this than with a badge!   

Contact Details 

County Office – Countysec@girlguidinghertfordshire.org.uk 

www.girlguidinghertfordshire.org.uk 

Facebook: GirlguidingHertfordshire 

Twitter: @gguidingherts 

I want to send my continued thanks to everyone who has completed First Aid, Safe Space training and DBS renewals over these last few weeks. Thanks also to all those who have delivered training sessions and supported the completion of the many DBS renewals. We are now reaching the compliance deadline for DBS renewals for those who have been on hold. Please make sure these are completed and alert your local commissioner if you are having any difficulties.

There has been lots of activity as we prepare for the new term to commence. I also have seen lots of social media posts about the activities which have taken place with units over this summer, always great to see the smiley faces of our girls having fun.

You will see in this newsletter we have just launched our Amazzzing Anglia Birthday Party event pack, which you can use to celebrate with your unit, as a district or division or even as a group of leaders. Whatever you decide I hope that you will have fun and celebrate together.

As part of this event, we have set up a region wide birthday card swap for all units to take part in, if you would like to find out more and get your unit involved in this event, you can find the full details here on our website.  I am really hoping that we receive cards from all units so that we can swap cards from across the region and maybe beyond!

We are still adding a whole variety of new activities to the Buzz about Anglia challenge, as well as the penultimate theme, Bee a Leading Light, which is also launching today! Buzz about Anglia has been designed so that you can pick this up and use the resources your units whenever you wish, there’s so much for our members to do with lots of suggested activities, some of the activities even link with UMAs and other aspects of the programme. I would love for you all to take part, create a buzz and of course as always have some fun.

If you have always liked the look of our ROVE virtual events, but not had a whole day to commit to it, Rove: Spotlight Sessions could be the training for you! This will be virtual training sessions offered monthly with the dates release quarterly, of course these do not take away from the value of face-to-face raining, but we recognise how important the virtual offer has become. If you are interested in this event, you can find more information in the newsletter or go directly to the bookings page here.

One final thought from me, is that I have really missed meeting you all from across the region over the last 18 months or so and I hope that I can get to see some of you very soon. Andrea and I always do our best to come too events and activities we are invited to, and we both look forward to a time when we can see you all again soon.

Take care and keep Smiling,

Tracy