Climate Action through Saving Nature, Learning life skills through Bushcraft and Survival activities and having fun through connecting with the local Canals and parks, these were the main themes of the SCYAP Summer Programme 2025. The highlights included the opening of the Environmental improvements and community arts project at Camelon Railway station on Wednesday 16th July when Tracy Stevenson Scotrails Community Rail Executive joined local organisations including: The Fire and Rescue Service, FEL, Falkirk Council , FVSC and local community activists, when the new artwork was officially opened with the ribbon being ceremonially cut by Lucy Auld. Lucy gave total commitment to this project , giving up lots of her own time to work on the project and she was supported by other members of our Youth Action Group, the original designs had been worked up by her P7 Class at Carmuirs Primary School. Lucy will gain a Dynamic Youth Award for her outstanding contributions to this Project along with her friend from school Oliver Mcarthur who will gain a High 5 Award.
The days celebrations then moved onto Nailer Road Park where SCYAP hosted a community active travel day which presented a number of different and fun approaches to active travel. This included our regular partners the Falkirk Wheelers who provided inline skating around the park. FEL again supported our activities with their adapted and led bike rides also around the park , which encouraged a wide range of participants including families and older people. Falkirk Council Energy and Climate Change Team also provided a stall in the park on the theme of sustainable communities. This active travel event was linked to the illustrations detailed on the mural at Camelon railway Station and these ideas are also aligned to our community climate action plan, similarly young people’s priorities for local climate action were also picked up by our Summer Programme arts project when we supported 12 young people to Campaign For Nature.
Standing up for Nature, Appreciating Nature , Helping Nature, Understanding Nature, and Calmness in Nature were all statements from the group of young community artists when we began to plan our summer arts project. The Climate Action Events that SCYAP facilitated back in February and March had clearly demonstrated that young people were most concerned about how climate change was negatively impacting upon the plants, forests and animals around them, this in fact was a clear priority for young people in terms of taking positive climate action. We identified 4 aspects to the natural world around us: Sun, Water, Earth and Air, and we began to explore the areas around Tamfourhill and at the YAG bench on the canal. The Group developed their sketches into 4 large banners which depicted these aspects of nature, and this enabled them to learn new skills in screen printing, calligraphy, drawing and sewing. One of the group Anya was particularly interested in digital creativity, so she got further involved with the project and designed the poster which is detailed below. These images will be displayed around the community in the coming weeks along with a wider #Youthaction visual campaign called: Standing up for Nature, so please look out for the group’s creations appearing in public spaces around Camelon and Tamfourhill, we plan to run a competition where you can report your sightings of any of these images and win climate action prizes.
When I heard the storm and looked out, I made haste to join it: John Muir
SCYAP has formed a really good working relationship with the Well Wild project, and we have successfully developed programmes and activities that have an excellent synergy with our key outcomes, and which take an innovative approach to experiential learning. Our Bushcraft and Survival programme ran over a week and cumulated with the overnight survival experience at the Well Wild Project in the Rough Castle Woods. I would like to congratulate and acknowledge the resilience and adaptability of our group on the overnight experience when they had to contend with a period of prolonged overnight rain, a gathering storm and a degree of discomfort. Their skills were put into action, teamwork and supporting each other were critical, fire lighting and their shelter building were all put to the test. The night was filled with screaming owls protecting their territory, startled foxes passing through the woods and difficult weather conditions. John Muir the Scottish conservationist and explorer famously exclaimed in response to a rising tempest in the Sierra Mountains in North America that: “When I heard the storm and looked out, I made haste to join it” The SCYAP Group in their own fashion did similar and their learning was consequently substantial and will have impact well beyond the 18 hours they spent over night in the woods, with a plethora of life skills being developed. Each young person remained focused on achieving their personal Dynamic Youth Award learning targets and it will be an absolute pleasure to later present their certificates.
Summer Programme 2025 in a compendium of photos:
Unfortunately, some Bad news:
Everyone connected with SCYAP were absolutely deflated and disappointed to be informed that the only Community Orchard in Camelon has been wiped out by extensive ground clearance on the canal towpath. The planting of this orchard was a joint project that was planned and implemented with Scottish Canals and involved considerable SCYAP funding and resources. The members of the Carmuirs Youth Action Group along with our community volunteers who planted and then maintained this orchard are upset and angry with this inexplicable action. I want to reassure the community that as an organisation we are looking into the circumstances that have led to this, our understanding is that Scottish Canals now have a team investigating this incident which they view as an act of vandalism which has been carried out on their Land. We will off course follow this matter up until some sort of resolution is found, we will report back through our social media and other channels when we have an unequivocal explanation of who was responsible and what actions are being taken.
Let’s conclude with some good news:
We are very pleased to announce that we were successful in our application to the UKSPF Community Empowerment Small Grant Fund and we will therefore be implementing two new opportunities for local young people 10-18 years old. These projects will run from September through to December and will involve creativity and community improvements through an arts drop-in initiative and also the delivery of an accredited groupwork programme. The funds are administrated through Falkirk Council and are well aligned to the SCYAP five key outcomes and aim to also address aspects of the recent Camelon Community Action Plan. A central aim is to include young people and volunteers who are not regularly involved with any of our current project’s and especially those that are linked to National Youth Awards. I will in next month’s blog explain how young people and volunteers can take part and highlight the benefits to young people and the wider community.
And finally, we were also successful with our second round of funding from the Volunteer Matters Action Earth Fund, which is resourced by Nature Scot and the National Lottery Community Fund. This is all about tackling climate change and promoting volunteering in the community and we will be linking the activities to our Climate Action Plan and the priorities identified by local young people earlier this year. This Project will be taking place in the autumn and again we will highlight in a future Blog how you can get involved.
Safer Communities Youth Action Project 