1st Clayton-le-Moors Scout Group

06/10/2026

Brand new Squirrel section at 1st Clayton-le-Moors - our first St James Squirrels have been invested tonight, and then rounded off the night with a campfire and brioche toasting alongside one of our Beaver Colonies. Great night, and welcome to Scouting!!

21/09/2026

The review by Prof. Fonagy into the mental wellbeing of young people in this generation highlights the difficulties that they face that older generations did not. It describes how participation in activities with others can help, but that national investment in youth services has dropped.

1st Clayton-le-Moors Scouts is an excellent place for young people aged from 4 to 18 can get together to take part in adventurous activities and become part of a unique movement. That sense of belonging massively improves mental health, and is exactly what Prof. Fonagy is referring to.

We are growing all the time, but we still have 42 young people on our waiting list to join us. If you want to help us to provide more young people with better opportunities in life then please contact us to volunteer.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cqzrz0z4plk1o

23/07/2026

Harry, one of our Explorer Scouts, is attempting to cycle a total of 500 miles over the summer holidays. This may turn into a magic 1000 miles if his body doesn't get injured and his bike can manage.

He is raising money to support him on the County Explorer expedition of Eurotour27.
He will be joining forces with other Explorers from the county to embark on visiting 4 cities next August. Cities are Berlin, Copenhagen, Gothenburg and Oslo. Possibly working, volunteering, sightseeing, cycling, kayaking, meeting new scouting friends and having lots of fun.

The aim is for Harry to fundraise as much as possible with something he enjoys.
If anybody would like to sponsor him on his challenge please follow the link below. If anybody would like to join him he would welcome the company.

https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/john-allen-1985

14/07/2026

Huge congratulations to Harry, who picked up his Gold Duke of Edinburgh Award recently!! Harry came to our Group 12 years ago as a Beaver and stayed all the way through Cubs, Scouts and Explorers, growing and gaining life skills all the time.

Very well done - the Gold DofE is a fantastic achievement and great work, requiring a huge commitment in Volunteering, Skills, and Physical Fitness, as well as challenging young people in a gruelling 4 day expedition, and a residential project.

03/07/2026

Good luck to our Explorer Scouts about to take part in the prestigious Dragnet competition! A gruelling 45 mile hike in 36 hours evading capture throughout. They start at midnight tonight and will cross the finishing line at 11:30 Sunday morning, all being well. Congratulations making it this far!!

02/04/2026

Great meeting tonight to progress our two new Sections. Loads of new volunteers, all eager to get stuck in with a second Squirrel Drey and second Beaver Colony!!

Looking forward to the exciting times to come - watch this space...

If you want to join the adventure, visit www.1stclaytonscouts.uk/join and get involved!

25/03/2026

What a great last term! Well done to all our young people for being such amazing Squirrels, Beavers, Cubs, Scouts and Explorers, and thank you so much to all our adult volunteers and young leaders who have put on a fab programme.

From the fantastic achievements of our Squirrel Scouts at their one year birthday, and gaining their first five Chief Acorn Awards in March, to the Beavers learning to make fruit kebabs, tying shoe laces, and plenty of other skills for life. We've seen our Cubs work on water sustainability as well as bake gorgeous Easter Bread crowns, and try their hands at golf. One of the Scout troops went SCUBA diving as well as training for an expedition challenge next month, and the other troop learned all about model rocket science and built their own rockets to set off. Finally our Explorers have had a whale of a time hiking, building bird boxes, defusing eggsplosives, and learning campcraft skills. To cap it all off, every section attended our winter Disney camp at Bowley International Scout Centre earlier in the term, and loved every minute.

Next term will be superb, with tonnes of summer activities planned for all sections, including a birthday bash and camp for our Squirrels, Beavers and Cubs, an expedition for our Scouts, competitive hiking and scout skills for our Scouts and Explorers, and a trip to Blackpool Pleasure Beach for everybody!

Not to mention that we are also growing again! Watch this space for news about a second Squirrel Drey, and a second Beaver Colony, aiming to open mid-way through the term to make the most of summer.

If you want to join the adventure, then please check out our website at www.1stClaytonScouts.uk/join for more info. Watch out for our Open Day in June if you want to experience some of our activities - this will be bigger and better than previous years, so make sure you're there.

18/03/2026

You may have seen our Scout Group in the papers or online, following our massive surge in popularity over the past two years. 55% increase in membership, and double the number of Sections.

If not, a link to the Lancashire Telegraph is below. In the meantime, why not join us and be part of this great success story as we push to grow by another 45% in 2026 through opening a second Beaver Colony and Squirrel Drey in the Group. We need another 10 volunteers to achieve this, and one of them could be you!

To join us, visit www.1stclaytonscouts.uk/join.



https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/25936667.clayton-scout-group-surges-55-per-cent-two-years/

An East Lancashire scout group has seen a huge surge in popularity, as numbers rise by 55 per cent in just two years.

14/03/2026

13/03/2026

We're bursting at the seams!!

Our Scout Group has grown massively in the past 18 months. We've added a second Scout Troop, a Squirrel Drey, and recently an Explorer Unit. Our volunteer base has grown too, but we still can't keep up with the huge demand in the area.

We have a waiting list of around 70 young people, 58 of them are aged from 4 to 7. The other Scout Groups in our District all have waiting lists for this age group as well, so there is nowhere for them to go.

We want to increase capacity by up to 48 more places by opening a second Squirrel Drey (age 4 & 5), and a second Beaver Colony (age 6 & 7) by September. To do this we need two new teams of volunteers, with up to 6 or 7 volunteers in each. We're getting quite experienced at this, having started three new sections recently already, and it really does work. We just need volunteers to sign up to help out.

Our volunteers give up their time - as much as they can, and we all understand that not everybody can guarantee every week or even more than once a month - and we make sure that they get something for this. As well as being part of this massive adventure that our young people are on and influencing their development by teaching them skills for life, we get to take part in all the same activities and have tonnes of fun while doing it. We get training (internal and NGB) paid for, free uniforms and branded clothing, all expenses paid, and free admission to anything we're doing.

We don't expect prospective volunteers to be experts at Scouting. You don't need any experience or expertise at all - just the motivation to do your best for the young people, and be able to pass a DBS check. We will teach you what you need to know, and you'll get out of it as much as the kids do!

If you, or anybody you know, are interested in volunteering, then please check out our website for more information or message us for a chat.

Please share this post to your networks!

Join as a Youth Member If you are aged from 4 to 17 you can join Scouting at 1st Clayton-le-Moors as a Youth Member. Take a look at our website [...]