The Duke of York succeeded The Duke of Edinburgh as Executive Chairman of The Outward Bound Trust in 1999. The Outward Bound Trust aims to inspire young people to fulfil their potential and instil leadership qualities through challenging outdoor activities. HRH benefited throughout his education from the chance to take part in outdoor activities to develop teamwork and leadership skills, and has always been keen to support the effort to extend similar experiences to more young people.
The Outward Bound Trust is the UK’s leading provider of financially assisted outdoor learning. Every year it provides support totalling more than £2 million to young people throughout the UK. In doing so, it ensures that young people, regardless of their financial background, can benefit from an Outward Bound experience.
Since its foundation in 1941, The Outward Bound Trust has helped over one million young people use the outdoors to increase confidence, self-esteem, resilience and social emotional well-being. Outward Bound adapts its courses to meet the needs of every young person who arrives at one of its four dedicated centres. Evaluations have shown that 93 per cent of teachers observed that their pupils’ Outward Bound experience had a significant impact upon their personal development and relationships with others.
The locations of the centres (Snowdonia, Lake District and the Scottish Highlands), combined with the talents of Outward Bound’s highly qualified instructors, enables The Outward Bound Trust to create a supportive and challenging environment in which young people can learn about themselves, the environment and ultimately, realise their true potential.
In addition to its work with schools and young people, The Outward Bound Trust also delivers high impact development programmes to apprentices, graduates, teams and leaders to organisations including BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce, HSBC and Unilever. Designed to build delegate’s capabilities for the workplace, these programmes have been proven to impact upon self-awareness, team working skills and furthering understanding of an organisation’s key values and mission.
As Executive Chairman, The Duke chairs regular meetings with the Trustees and the Executive Team and hosts a number of events to promote and support The Trust throughout the year.
In September 2012, HRH led ‘The Descent of The Shard’ – an abseil from the top of Western Europe’s tallest building in support of The Outward Bound Trust and The Royal Marines Charitable Trust Fund. The Duke undertook the challenge, an 820ft abseil from the 87th floor to the 20th, alongside 39 others. The total raised from the event was in excess of £2.9 million.
Outward Bound Chief Executive Nick Barrett recounts the story of the Descent of the Shard.
Detail’s of The Trust’s impact can be found in the impact report. For more information on any of The Trust’s programmes, call 01931 740000, visit outwardbound.org.uk, or email [email protected].
