After my first time on the tube (no way near as scary as I thought it was going to be) I registered and was given a goody bag and a programme of events for the day. The programme was really varied: there were trips and tours to various places around London, such as the V&A museum and Parliament. There were also a series of workshops and talks on current affairs, politics and Girlguiding’s role in development, as well as more creative things such as dance and poetry workshops.
The first workshop I went to was run by two Girlguiding LaSER ‘Champions’ – members of the LaSER youth panel (Midlands – can we have something similar?). They talked about their roles in developing resources for units to use and making sure girls all over the region got a say in their approach. One of these was an e-safety badge; often children are taught about staying safe online by leaders who don’t have much clue or who aren’t online themselves, so the resource approached the internet in a positive and inclusive way.
Secondly I went to a workshop run by Rachel from the Women’s Equality Party that focused on politics and the changes we wanted to see. She was such an inspiring and down to earth speaker, and the workshop really filled me with hope for the future, as almost everyone there had the same political priorities, such as access to education, equal rights and the NHS.
I then went to a talk by Sarah Croft, the Campaign Manager at CAFOD who told us about three brilliant campaigns that really inspire her in her job: the Green Heart campaign, Everyday Sexism and Greenpeace’s Lego campaign. We also had the chance to ask her questions about her job and how she got there.
After a lunchbreak I went to a talk on mental health by Olivia Stephens from Mind. The talk was really informative – I only wish it had been a bit longer as it only half-filled the hour-long slot it had been given.
The last thing I attended was a workshop run by Nicola Grinstead and the team from WAGGGS. We learnt all about the sustainable development goals and we got to have a go at some activities from WAGGGS’s #TeamGirl resource – including making a hot air balloon out of newspaper and building a human pyramid to display our most important sustainable development goal – for my group this was quality education. We also got special stickers and badges, which I think was the highlight for a lot of us!
Overall the day was incredible; the workshops and talks I went to were so inspiring but I also got to meet so many amazing members of the Senior Section! I had a brilliant time and I really hope something runs like this again in the future!
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