Testing Safe Space Level 4

This was a very early request for the Level 4 training designed for commissioners, so the training materials were in draft, and it was evident that they had been compiled by different hands. The Power Point was different to the training plan and again there was a difference in the detailed guidance with the training plan itself. I made a conscious decision because the training products were in draft, not to invest time in the power point, but focus on making the exercises work.

There were 2 commissioners who hadn't completed Level 3 and they admitted that they wished they had one in particular mentioned some of the jargon I had used (the other has booked me to go and deliver a L3 in June to herself and some of her leaders). I was aiming to stick as near as possible to the plan but the commissioners had lots of questions they wanted answers too, so it was time consuming just to get to the start of the plan itself. The 1st burning question was how could they find L3 trainings for their leaders in region? The 2nd was what's the difference between school safe guarding and GG safe guarding? The 3rd most popular question was how are leaders and Commissioners supposed to know all of this material - the inference being that volunteer leaders will give up as they don't want to take responsibility. One commissioner  inferred it was easier now to get administers and accounts people rather than leaders who will work with the girls.

The "Assessing Concerns" activity with each scenario split into 4 parts given out at 10 minute intervals worked really well, especially as the leaders were well warmed up by this point by the earlier 2 post it exercises. There was lots of discussion and I really focused on examining the issues around a concern, a compliant and a safe guarding issue. I took the boring route getting each group to feed back on their scenario. To get to this point it took the full 2 hours so all the way up to lunch including a 10 minute coffee break.

Over lunch we had a discussion about the Guiding Handbook - some comms are buying for their new leaders others are sharing it around, some were unaware of the contents. Straight after lunch we started with Data Protection which I was expecting to be the most factual but in reality was the most controversial. Membership cards had just been received that week so people had read the accompanying material but everyone wanted to understand the point at which material became historical and could be sent to Trading for storage - its not clear? There was a lot of concern about keeping residential forms after the event in the light of something being raised at a later date. Also questions about photos & archive materials - how much do they need to be culled and what about leaders who only have paper records and are not on email/IT.

Finally after another 40 minutes we progressed to section 2. To get some time back I speeded up the feedback on "What does a good leader look like?" and skills etc. I used the Infographic (see below) to illustrate Batari's Box which worked well. I also handed out copies of the honest conversation template which hardly anyone in the room was aware of but as a resource it was welcomed. Moving onto discussing the sanctions was the most surprising point for me. The Commissioners asked if it would be possible to have a way to get leaders to agree they have signed up to the Volunteer Code of Conduct and will abide by it? As we moved through the exercises it was becoming increasingly obvious the role of the Volunteer code of conduct could play in changing behaviour. {I had a printed version of the Managing concerns about adult volunteers policy and procedures and referred to them but nobody wanted to read them}.

By this point I was in my last 30 minutes of the 4 hours so the "Keeping yourself Safe" exercise was really rushed and I could have done more justice to it if there had been more time. I only had a few minutes to validate the objectives, give out the traffic light action planning tool and give the survey monkey link. I regret that whilst I had collected lots of concerns from them at the beginning of the training there wasn't the time to review them.

Logistics - my VGA adaptor came into play again for linking my laptop to the projector. The room (the pack holiday house lounge) is long and thin, so not ideal for squeezing in leaders for a training see photo.  I'm obviously very old fashioned, and expect assistance with, at the very least furniture removal and was surprised on arrival to find the door had been wedged open, with no heating, tables or chairs out. I was grateful for the assistance of another trainer to set up, whilst I got the IT working. As usual the participants were really helpful at the end returning resources to me and stacking chairs.

I await the final Level 4 resources sometime in the spring, and look forward to perfecting L4 delivery.

I lust after a normal sized training space, with room to move around!