Take the opportunity to meet with family and friends in the outdoors, in parks, at the beach, in the garden and enjoy an activity together. True connectedness with other people will have a much greater influence on our wellbeing, so why not use this time of year to set some dates aside to spend [...]
Take just a few minutes out of your busy day and try a mindfulness exercise in nature, like a walk in the park, running on the beach or climbing a tree. Time spent outdoors can drastically improve your mental and physical wellbeing. However, if access to the outdoors is difficult, you can gain similar [...]
There are many ways to become more sustainable. For example, learning to garden and grow your own vegetables can help reduce air pollution and provide a healthy food source. There are also many ways to recycle materials to create habitats in the garden, reducing unnecessary waste and creating homes for different animals. Gardening not [...]
Dear Friends, I am writing this in sunshine and blue skies after our freezing cold spell in the UK recently. British weather is a great reflection on life in general – how quickly things can change and how we need to be ready for all eventualities. This analogy sums up our year here at the [...]
Dear Friends, Writing here, from our offices in the Essex countryside the heat is palpable and the temperature is 36 degrees indoors. Sun beats in through the windows and the hot wind brings little relief. The impact of a changing climate could not be more palpable and overwhelming and brings tidings of our need [...]
Dear All, What a year 2021 was and how grateful I am writing this, looking back at the challenges we have overcome and mountain we have climbed. I am incredibly proud and humbled by the charity and the team I get to work with every day. Rewind to March 2021 when we were [...]
Dear Friends, It has definitely been quite a year of change and adaptation. We have all experienced the same trends on a local and national scale that are out there internationally – including covid, climate change, equality and diversity awareness, political ups and downs, impacts of population, conflict, migrants, and increased urban and industrial [...]
Dear Friends, We have the smell of freedom in our nostrils at the moment as the 19th of July looms as a date for lifting our Covid restrictions. I wonder what this will mean for us all - but sense we will all adapt in different ways -some of us revelling and partying, others [...]
Happy Earth Day to our Friends, Funders and Supporters, The guillemots fly over my head in two directions, reminiscent of a busy avian airport. Some fly so low over my head, as they come across the waves, that their wing-beats drum in my ears and I imagine the wind from their wings tickling my [...]
Dear Friends, Funders and Supporters, As I write, the office is alive with staff and outdoor therapists all streaming back in from their various programmes in the woods and fields surrounding our office. Those stuck indoors welcome the smell of woodsmoke that follows them around, as if hinting of the outdoors and the experiences [...]
Dear Friends, Funders and Supporters, Thank you for taking the time to read this first blog post, which is all very exciting. I have some fantastic news to share with you all. We have recently received funding from the Ernest Cook Trust to fund the position of a 'Green Mentor' (that's me). The role [...]
The Youth Strategy Groups for Braintree and Chelmsford have joined forces to fund places for secondary aged students struggling in mainstream education
Out There Academy We are now taking referrals for a 6 week outdoor and personal development programme for young people aged 13+ in the Chelmsford and Braintree area who are: struggling to engage and stay in school at risk of suspension leading to exclusion finding that behavioural and emotional wellbeing are big issues in their [...]
The Wilderness Foundation UK are working in partnership with organisations and individuals from across Essex who offer programmes of environmental education and Education for Sustainable Development for the benefit of schools, other groups of young people and the wider public known as the Essex Learning for Sustainability (ELfS) group. We are delighted to be delivering [...]
Last week the Wilderness Foundation exhibited in the Royal Highland Education Trust Children's Discover Centre at this year's Royal Highland Show. As part of the programme to give children the opportunity to take part in new activities and learn more about food, farming and the countryside, staff and volunteers from the Wilderness Foundation UK led [...]