Scouts hit city as part of annual camp
We see a lot in the media about new initiatives to put Belizean youths on the path to productive citizenship. But without a lot of profiling, one programme has been producing positive results for decades. Patrick Jones reports that the scouting movement is about more than just building campfires and tying knots.
Patrick Jones, Reporting
The parading boys and girls are in the middle of a week of activities for the twenty-fourth Annual Scouts? Camp.
The group of one hundred and eighty-five campers were welcomed to Belize City this morning by Mayor David Fonseca.
David Fonseca, Belize City Mayor
?We have been behind the Scouts movement for some time now. We have worked together in partnership in getting projects done. As you know, we have the scouts involved in raising and taking down the flags at the Flags Monument on a daily basis. Also, we support them financially in other projects that they have and they work along with us in other community projects. So it means that we need to give them a support and show them that we are behind their movement as Scouts, but also as individual citizens, particularly young citizens of Belize City.?
But the youngsters ranging in age from eleven to fifteen are not only city dwellers with adventure in their eyes. National Activity Director, Ricardo Alcocer, says scouts from all six districts are taking part in this year?s camp, which includes today?s ?Experience the City? tour.
Ricardo Alcocer, Field Executive, Scouts Association.
?Experience the City? is part of the twenty-fourth National Scout Camp Programme under the theme ?Scouting – Live the Education Adventure?. What we are planning here in the city is to have the participants to get a feel of Belize City. We have three objectives. One of them is the orientation navigation in Belize City by themselves in patrols. The other objective is to have a visibility of scouting. You know, with the presence of violence here in Belize City especially, we want to do away with that. The last one is to let the scouts that come from Corozal, Orange Walk, Toledo have a feel that Belize City is safe, it?s not all what is portrayed out there in the media.?
Other areas visited today included the House of Culture and the studios of Channel 5 on Regent Street. Patrick Jones, for News Five.
On Saturday, the scouts will go on field trips to Altun Ha and the Community Baboon Sanctuary. They will be joined by their parents on Sunday for a family day and on Monday take part in various sporting activities at Camp Oakley. The scouts? summer camp ends on Tuesday.
