Running through woodland, cooking on a campfire, sleeping under the stars: for many of us these are our strongest childhood memories.

Getting away from the mundane experiences of home and school life even for short periods provide opportunities to look at the world afresh, make new friends and grow that little bit more.

For young people growing up in Newham these chances are all the more crucial. Many of our children are confined by the urban landscape and have no independent access to the outdoors. Poverty is a huge additional restriction. Many families do not have the opportunity for extended holidays.

School residential trips, Duke of Edinburgh Awards and uniformed and faith groups have historically enabled young people to get out and into the countryside albeit for few and short occasions.

A year six trip to Gorsefield might be the only chance some of our youngsters have had to challenge themselves outside the comfort of their immediate family.

The pandemic and its lockdowns have hit these youngsters hard. Many trips have been cancelled. Some will have missed their only opportunity for residential excursions.

The value in terms of mental well-being of these breaks is proven: what we don’t know is the detrimental impact of their loss. Without actions to address this situation we will have a generation of youngsters growing up who have not stayed outside their family home.

Woodcraft Folk has been working in Newham for nearly a hundred years – providing group night meetings and residential experiences for young people of all ages.

Over the last decade groups of local young people have been camping locally, hiking in Wales, meeting other groups in Europe and even visiting youth providers in occupied Palestine.

Alongside this Woodcraft Folk enables young people to use their voices in support of campaigns for social justice whether this be getting military recruitment out of schools or stopping the arms fair from coming to the Excel Centre.

In 2022 the focus is to get young people out of the city and into the wild. There is a programme of bushcraft workshops, a medium sized camp at Newham’s excellent Debden Green Campsite and local young people will attend an international camp in the midlands in August.

The group is looking for young people to join and also for adults who can become committed volunteer youth workers. There will be training and appropriate support. Anyone interested should contact newham@woodcraft.org.uk

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