Student Adventures - Blog

As a Rag Chair who introduced overseas challenges as a fundraising event at Manchester University I have often been drawn into the debate as to whether it is ethically sound to ask people for a donation to a charity to allow one to have an incredible life-changing adventure. The arguments for challenges are typically centred around “the charities wouldn’t have got that money without offering the adventure”, but this doesn’t really tell the whole story.

Anyone involved with student fundraising at the moment will know of a great cultural change in the formation of NaSFA (National Student Fundraising Association). Rags can no longer be seen as purely fundraising bodies and have to work hard to shake the image of the pranks and chaotic capers that used to be a focus of Rag activities. When approaching students unions for funding or universities for credibility Rags need to present themselves as student development organizations, providing volunteering opportunities and experiences that will add value to student satisfaction and job applications.

Rags offer a fantastic range of weird and wonderful opportunities for their memberships, but traditional events only really offer limited scope for boosting a CV for most of those people taking part. Challenges are different – every single participant is developing skills for life from the minute they sign up. It is not possible to take part in one of our events without raising a substantial, yet achievable, amount of money for a good cause and then adventure itself requires a level of determination and achievement enough to stand candidates out from the crowd.

There is a great deal of merit in spending a day standing in the rain and shaking a bucket to raise a couple of hundred pounds, the altruism is admirable but the impact on career prospects is minimal. Students who raise the £750 to take part in London to Paris or the £2900 to sail the South China Seas have so much to talk about in an interview. Setting and meeting personal challenges, influencing others to donate, working as a team and balancing multiple projects simultaneously are all things that will help show a prospective employer why our event participants are the strongest candidates for the role.

It's improved employability and capacity building that we pride ourselves on at Student Adventures - all of our on-campus reps, the Adventure Leaders, are given the opportunity to gain the Chartered Institute of Marketing Development Award. We make a donation to each Rag we work with for them to spend on anything they wish and will gladly offer advice and guidance on how they could run their own events.

If you want to find out how you as a student, rag, students union or university can work with us please contact our Events Director, Jock, on jock@studentadventures.co.uk

In the summer just gone, Sam Brent and his brother Mike took on the adventure of the London to Paris Bike Ride with the aim of raising funds for Breast Cancer Campaign. Sam and Mike were riding in memory of their Mum who sadly passed away from breast cancer and Sam's best friend Sam Yarwood who recently died after an accident in the outdoors.

Sam's story of what motivates him to take on life's challenges and make a difference for good causes in the process is one of the many inspirational stories behind the many adventurers that come our way.

So when Sam and his friend, Ryan Clarke, came to us with a request of capturing Sam's story and journey on London to Paris our spirit and support for student development made our answer an obvious yes. Student Adventures was pleased to support and help facilitate the logistics to enable Ryan and his friends to record the story of the ride for Sam.

Ryan after many hours of filming and hard work in post production has now released his not-for-profit video that truly captures the adventure of Sam on his bike as he makes his way to the iconic Eiffel Tower. Personally we think its a fantastic video and we'd invite you to take a look at the finished article!

We're always keen to support genuine development in many different ways and in turn helping young people to gain real world experience such as Ryan has with this outdoor media project. Our congratulations go to both Sam for completing the adventure and Ryan Clarke and his team for an extraordinary video.

Student Adventures works closely with Rags, fundraising groups, sports clubs and societies to encourage student participation in exciting adventures whilst supporting and raising funds for our worthy charity partners.

A key part of that support is ensuring successful student development in student organisations and as such is an important central aim of Student Adventures. Of course this altruistic aim could be taken glibly; so how do we actually flesh out a cliché in a measurable way and more importantly of genuine benefit to students. With individuals and their personal development we employ a couple of approaches so students can gain real and transferrable skills from working with us and in turn making them more desirable to future employers when they enter the graduate marketplace:

Adventure Leaders our peer-to-peer recruitment and support network, endorsed by the Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM), enables our ALs to gain the well regarded CIM Development Award. Starting with residential training at S.W.A.T School (Seriously Wicked Adventure Training!) ALs are supported throughout the course of the year to ensure success and that they gain relevant skills in sales, marketing and leadership before accompanying their peers on an adventure in the summer.

Summer Placements offer students paid event management experience, which goes beyond ‘making a cup of coffee’ for the boss. The roles offered on adventures are integral to the success of our adventures and a positive customer experience. After a placement our student staff should have gained real insight into outdoor event management and those all-important soft skills graduate employers seek out.

So if you’ve got an interest in adventurous travel and want to develop your skills then working with Student Adventures could be for you – check out our careers section for details on being an Adventure Leader or becoming part of our event staff.