RYLA Case Study

Cirencester Rotary: Rotary Youth Leaders Award (RYLA) Case Study

I met D at the College where she is currently studying and here is what she told me about RYLA. Why she wanted to do it, how she felt when she got to the Brecon Beacons, what it was like and how she benefited.

Due to her home situation she is not able to travel much. She was keen to do RYLA in order to have fun in a new location away from home, to make the best of an opportunity to develop her skills and to gain confidence, meet new people and initiate conversation with them.

Packing up to go to the Brecon Beacons she was quite excited, however, once she was on her way the nerves started developing. When she arrived she booked in and was shown to her shared room and then had to walk into the lounge area where most people were assembled for the Introductory session – walking into a room full of strangers was very nerve racking. However, after the talk everyone took part in group activities and her nervousness started to settle. After this she met her three room- mates, there were four of them in a very small room, they were soon all chatting away and she continues to be regularly in touch with all of them.

Her favourite activity was Caving which everyone did twice. The first time in a small group of three people with one of the instructors leading it and teaching the young people to lead. She found caving quite challenging especially the small narrow passages that you had to crawl through, she struggled quite a lot and sometimes used a by-pass route. That evening she shared a lot about herself with her room-mates (the first time she has ever shared much with anyone) who were very supportive and helped her hugely. On the second day she led the caving and felt much braver and more confident. She completed all the small crawl throughs. She says her new found confidence came from seeing others do it, being used to being there and the way the young people supported each other.

Gorge walking was her biggest challenge. She doesn’t like water, or heights and says she is clumsy. Despite this she did the whole gorge walk. Although she has asthma, she jumped backwards into the water with one of the boys in the group jumping in with her. He had her inhaler to hand so she could use it immediately. Throughout her chat with me, she stressed how invaluable the support of the other young people was, especially a small handful of boys, and how it gave her the trust and confidence to have a go.

Other than the friendships she built and the whole experience D found it hard to identify the ‘best bit’. Her best day was canoeing followed by a late evening walk up Pen Y Fan. The canoeing because it was a proper laugh. She was in a canoe with Z and, somehow, they just couldn’t synchronise their paddles. This led to them going sideways into a bank. Instead of pushing off Z decided to stand up which led to them capsizing and D’s inhaler, D said that if she hadn’t been trying to clear her lungs of water she would have been laughing her head off!

Overall, she feels more confident about herself and meeting other people. When she started at College in September she knew very few people on her course however, due to RYLA, she felt able to approach her classmates and strike up conversation leading to a lot of new friends. Recently she applied for two part-time jobs, got an interview and was offered the job in a customer facing role.

D finished by thanking Rotary for giving her the opportunity to go on such a great trip, to experience new things, make new friends and to develop so many new life-skills. She’d also like to thank the Rotarians who drove her there and those who collected her and took her home