Lancaster company awarded £60,000 to help get young people outdoors

Monday, 11 March 2024 11:11

A Lancaster-based company has received a £60,000 grant to help get young people outdoors.

The Where The Wildings Are! project (WTWA), which helps schools redesign their grounds and curriculum for outdoor learning, food growing and wildlife has been awarded the grant from UK educational charity The Ernest Cook Trust.

Spread across three years, the grant is helping to fund the salary of an Outdoor Learning Officer to run WTWA PermaWarriors after-school and holiday gardening clubs.

The project is open to around 1,300 young people and their families, reconnecting them to the outdoors. Using school grounds, the project engages children in fun, exploratory and inspiring outdoor activities that can reduce isolation, rebuild confidence and self-esteem and connect communities.

Targeting activities at young people from underserved communities, WTWA PermaWarriors seeks to remove barriers to outdoor engagement ensuring every child can enjoy being outdoors and is given a chance to develop a lifelong love for nature.

WTWA project coordinator Alex Hall said: “We’re absolutely delighted to have received this grant from the Ernest Cook Trust. In just 2 years we’ve made a great start on the project, planting over 1,400 trees on school grounds and delivering outdoor learning sessions to over 2,400 pupils across North Lancashire. But there’s lots more still to do!

“Launching the PermaWarriors network of nature-based gardening after school and holiday clubs will help us take the project to the next level by creating a space beyond the constraints of the school day, so more children can experience the outdoors more of the time.”

LESS CIC was among ten charities and non-profit organisations to receive a grant from The Ernest Cook Trust, which combined, totalled more than £588,000. Each organisation was awarded up to £20,000 per year, for three years.

This was the fourth cohort of Outdoor Learning Officers to be funded by The Ernest Cook Trust. In this funding round, the Trust was looking to support organisations in the Lancashire/Cumbria, Leicestershire, and Wiltshire/Gloucestershire areas.

Ed Ikin, Chief Executive of The Ernest Cook Trust, said each of the organisations receiving the grant had demonstrated their commitment to helping young people get outdoors to become better connected with nature.

“At The Ernest Cook Trust, we’ve developed real expertise and have a growing body of evidence to prove that our principles of Outdoor Learning genuinely improve the lives of young people. We share this approach through our Outdoor Learning Officers Grant, which supports organisations to employ inspirational role models for young people in outdoor settings.

“We want to see national recognition that being in nature is a fundamental good for everybody, that everyone deserves the chance to spend time in nature.”

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