At Sands we place great value on taking trips out. If it snows we’ll go up to Dartmoor for a few hours and get exercise running around having a snowball fight, which also lifts everyone’s mood and sense of family. If it’s a hot sunny day after the exams in the Summer, we’ll all go to a local beach to swim and play beach games. While we’re there we can also think about Geology, Geography, and marine ecology.
Trips to the theatre, cinema, museums, galleries take place as part of subject curriculums. Occasionally we are also invited to visit other Democratic and Alternative schools in the UK and abroad which gives everyone a great opportunity to reflect and learn from others practice.
School camp
Each year, usually in the last week of term before the Summer holidays, most students and staff go away somewhere great for a week of camping, culture, food, and fun. It’s a great opportunity for younger students to experience being away from home, perhaps for the first time without their parents, and for the older ones to show how responsible they can be while practicing independence in an unfamiliar place.
The location is based on a loose rotation of Brittany, Cornwall, Scilly Isles, with occasionally somewhere else like South Wales. Each place has it’s own character, and cost, which is always a consideration.
Brittany involves taking the overnight ferry from Plymouth to Roscoff, then cycling about 10 miles along the coast to a beautiful campsite right behind a secluded beach. While we’re there everyone really unwinds and gets lots of exercise riding a few miles to the local shops and markets everyday. Don’t worry, seeing cars on the road is unusual, and it’s almost totally flat!
Cornwall is a cheaper camp as the travel element is smaller, but it’s still near and beach and while we don’t do cycling there, the coastal walks to get around are wonderful. Obviously it can be easier for younger students as it doesn’t feel as scary as going abroad, and it’s easier to go home if you can’t beat homesickness.
The Scilly Isles is somewhere between the other two. We stay on Bryher, and mostly have the campsite, and indeed much of the island to ourselves! It’s a week of feeling marooned on a desert island, just without the hunger and thirst, and more enjoyment of the fresh air.
The camp in Wales is a change from the norm as we hire 110 acres of woodland for our exclusive use. It makes for a different experience.