As an Award Leader at this school for the past 8 years, I would count 2023 as being one of the most successful years we have had over that time.

Four students (Keir Wesley, Samantha Soeters, Alfie Buttle and Jack Buttle) have gained their Silver Awards and all are continuing onto their Gold Awards next year. Also, a particular mention must be made of James Anderson, who will complete his Gold Award with his final Adventurous Journey trip in December. We are very proud of the dedication these students have shown towards all of the activities they have taken part in.

We have also had a group of students who have shown great persistence and made up for some of the disruptive time of the “Covid years” to finish off their Bronze Awards, some continuing onto Silver. Several more students started their Bronze Awards this year and are now in the finishing stages.

All of these students commit themselves to completing the four sections of the Award over an extended period of time; completing a physical activity, learning a skill, volunteering their time for the community and going on adventurous journeys in the New Zealand back country.

As this year was the 60th Anniversary of the Award the Duke of Edinburgh (HRH The Prince Edward) travelled around the Globe visiting some of the several countries which have Award Groups. On the 18th February he was in Wellington and presented a number of Gold Award participants with their certificates. This included Dev Pandya, a Burnside High School student, who finished his Award at the end of 2022. The following day he made a brief trip to Christchurch and Keir Wesley was lucky enough to talk to the Duke about his experiences of completing the Award.

Many thanks go to my fellow Award Leader Rhondda Craig and to our main Adventurous Journey Provider, Andrew Smythe at Bushworks.NZ. There is also vast appreciation for the work of the individual assessors for each section for each student - without their tireless work none of the students would be able to complete their Awards.

Photo credit for the Aventurous Journey photos included in this article go to Bushworks.NZ.

Photo credit for the official photographs from the Duke of Edinburgh’s visit go to Woolf Photography.