Killinchy Activity Group
Charity Registration Number :--NIC 101086
Address :-C/O 91 Ballydorn Road Killinchy Newtownards BT23 6QB
The registered trustees for the year 2024 / 2025.
Miss Emma Heaney Mr Gareth Brown Mr Brian Drysdale Annual Report 1[st] May 2024 to 30[th] April 2025.
The year covered in our report has proved to be beneficial and productive to all our members. Overall membership numbers for the year have increased again by 18. This is split 72%, 28% female to male. The growing number of females is a trend we have started to observe and continues. The growing number of females to males is a worrying trend and is potentially a fall out from COVID but could also be attributed to a lack of drive amongst young males at that age. The annual recruitment numbers has grown due to our increased activities following the dormant period following our shut down as a result of COVID-19. In our DofE awards programme our young people who complete their various awards, can choose to move to the next level or at completion of their Gold award they can go no further and have fully completed their objectives. An issue, not of our doing, in the last quarter of 2024 around the license that Killinchy Activity Group has to operate Duke of Edinburgh’s Award. This we believe will have a negative and long term impact on how Killinchy Activity Group operates locally but that will not become clear until the end of our next year.
For the year 2024 / 2025 all young people who applied to our DofE programme have not been able to start their award because of the issue detailed above. A number of young people have transferred in from other units to undertake their awards at all levels.
The compliment of volunteer leaders has remained at a similar level to that of the previous year.
The senior leaders continue to improve their own skills through maintaining their qualifications and taking opportunities to better their own levels of education.
Success in the operation of the organisation is gauged on the number of awards that the young people complete and the number of young people that we involve. This quantitative measurement is in real terms good. The total number of awards completed in the year being evaluated was 94 an increase of 18 on the previous year. However this is a very short term measurement as many of our young people take more than 12
months to complete any of the 3 levels of award. A more meaningful measurement of success is to look at the numbers of our young people who complete each level of the DofE Award and our unit has one of the highest if not the highest completion rates in Northern Ireland. Our summer expedition season of 2024 was not just as busy as that of 2023 which was welcome but has been as equally as productive.
The qualitative measurement of our operation is the experiences of our young, and what we might consider to be more valuable, is their life skills and experiences that they acquire from interacting with other young people from their peer groups. The good and not so good experiences from their expeditions through the good weather and the extremes that come when the weather is not so favourable. The current training environment has again stood the organisation in good stead with all those starting an expedition also having completed them.
The associated operations with the younger age groups continues to reap benefits with the regular interaction with them on a weekly basis leading to long term value in the experiences of this diverse group of young people. Our additional activities for this group continue to be well attended and they continue to remain popular. The growing numbers in these other groups has been reviewed and will no longer fall under the operational umbrella of Killinchy Activity Group.
Financial Review:--
Turnover for 2024 / 2025 is down by almost £1000.00 on the previous financial year and is a reflection of the numbers of young people involved in our summer season.
We have been fortunate enough to secure several financial grants in this financial period. Community Foundation £1800.00, Outdoors for all £2400.00 and £995.00 from the DofE. These funds have been applied to provided added value for the young people who make up our membership and have allowed us to continue with the high level of young provision that we strive to achieve locally. Our annual Education Authority financial support of £2000.00 to support our yearly youth programme has also helped to add value to our work.
The nature of the operation is still very much income meets expenditure and the objective is still to deliver a cost affordable programme of activities. The organisations reliance on unpaid volunteer leaders is a resource that would add a lot of expense if the economic value of the experience and qualifications were taken into consideration.
The equipment that the organisation uses to operate is still very serviceable but thought needs to be given to replacing some of the items such as tents and rucksack that see constant use over the expedition season. A programme of renewal is currently being implemented and should result in the sale of used equipment and replacement with new.
It would be considered feasible to maintain membership fees at similar levels unless there is an unforeseen change in circumstances such as increasing fuel costs.
Using our current financial model we would not foresee a problem in funding our programme operation over the coming 12 months.