What to do about ongoing problems with groups of Duke Of Edinburgh students?

[GunkyAndGungey]

We live on a large farm, and a well known footpath crosses past the end of our garden and then through two of our fields. Its a popular route with DofE expedition groups and a lot of them pass through. I've lived here nearly 10 years and whilst occasionally they get lost and end up in the garden (which is fine, we just show them the right path) and sometimes they're quite noisy as they pass (which I don't mind, it's quite nice to hear teenagers enjoying being outside tbh) we've never been bothered by them. Until this summer...

I don't know why, but this summer they all seem to be complete fools. In the last month alone:

• we have found one group climbing on farm machinery whilst taking photos of each other

• we have found two groups that have wandered off the path, through a closed gate, and into one of our fields, where they've gone into the little living willow shelter we have built with table/chairs/firepit and settled down for a picnic (leaving food strewn around and litter behind).

• my dad caught another group poking round inside a derelict and dangerous barn (again for photo opportunities 🙄)

• we have spotted several chucking litter over the hedge into our garden - each and every time we have caught them we have made them pick it up but obviously we don't catch them all and there is definitely much more litter than in previous years

• and to top it all, today I found yet another group off the path messing around trying to open the manhole cover that forms the lid to an old (unused) cess pit. This is not only off the path but it's invisible from the path, you can only see it once you are about 100 yards along our drive (which is very clearly marked PRIVATE) and they had to climb over barbed wire to get to it. Their excuse was that they "thought it was an old bomb shelter and they learned about them last week".

We always ask what school they're from and about half the time they do tell us, in which case we complain to the school. But I feel like we should start complaining to the DofE scheme itself now? Because clearly the students aren't being taught the basics before they're let loose in the countryside! Would there be any point though?

*Just to make clear these are all definitely DofE groups - we have also noticed an overall uptick in other walkers doing stupid shit (trying to put up a tent in a cow field without permission or letting their children into our garden to use the garden toys like it's a park, anyone?), but there's nobody to complain to about them!!

I live very rurally (no footpaths across our land thank god) and I have noticed much worse littering this year than ever before. People are just chucking their cans, fast food bags etc into the hedgerows. It wasn’t like this before.
I notice much more anti social behaviour when I go into big cities too. Which isn’t often I admit.

I’m not sure that any of these things are a good excuse though? I’m middle aged - we didn’t have y6/7 celebrations/bonding trips or special transitions to secondary. The economy was bad (late 70s/early 80s up north was pretty grim!) and we missed out on several school trips because of teacher strikes. It didn’t give us the excuse to behave like twats.

Maybe that's the difference between urban + rural kids ie as a rural child we knew how much work went into building a dry stone wall so would never have dared climb all over them, especially to the point of collapse.

Clearly not though because the poster you responded to was also a rural child/teenager and climbed them.

So they were just entitled/ignorant then

I grew up in an urban area then later moved to a semi-rural area as a child and though far from perfect, I wouldn't have dreamed of trespassing or damaging property. Urban dwellers can be considerate too.

I have to say that I don’t think these are normal developmental stages. It’s pretty basic to learn that machinery (for example) is not to be climbed on because a) it belongs to someone and b) it is dangerous.

i Really don’t think d of e has any “status” on a uni application these days. Having seen teens do the minimum to tick the boxes, and often get the boxes ticked for way below minimum - just so they can put it on their UCAS form, be nursed/managed/gamed through it, it’s overall a toilet paper qualification. It’s a shame for those who have done new stuff, done it respectfully and actually really given to the community. The ones I know have managed it carefully to tick boxes and the community has gained nothing for sure.

op in your position, I’d consider a camera warning sign (or several). Maybe even a CCTV setup depending on cost. And I’d report the whole lot to the relevant D of E authority and perhaps ask for d of e stuff to be banned on your land. They might not do that, but it’s worth a go.

My daughter has just done her dofe bronze she's used to the countryside, walks a lot and has always been taught how to behave. She basically ended up supervising the others as they had absolutely no idea, she said she was glad she wasn't in some of the other groups as they were behaving like idiots.
They did one walk prior to there actual expedition to practice which I didn't think was enough, she knows what she's doing but the others didn't have a clue, many teenagers just don't get outside nowadays and have no respect

Local farmer's response to my teenage brother knocking a wall down was 'Right, you're going to rebuild that.'

I slightly resent the tea and scones they gave him when he'd finished. However, job done and lesson learned.

We live on a farm too. Thankfully, only ever had one lost DoE group. We do have a footpath past our house/barns and across a field, but it's down hill to get to anything interesting, which I think puts most people off it because they'd have to walk back up the hill to get out of the field and they are probably too lazy for it.

But we have a track that comes up from a woodland between our garden and a field. We had a whole group of them emerge from the woodland and cross the river and over a gate and come up the track a few years ago. How they even got there, I have no idea. That woodland is nearly impassable, like knee deep bog, and someone decades ago ran loads of barbed wire through it (belongs to the neighbours but not sure it was them, as they have probably never ventured in there either), so it's literally like a good mile walk from the nearest footpath, through knee deep mud, with surprise barbed wire about every 50 feet as a booby trap (maybe to ward off DoE kids from long ago!). I can't even get back in there when the dog tries to run off. How they managed to get through it and pop out where they did, I have no idea. It must have taken them hours and a few must have lost some boots.

I live in the countryside and have adults fly tipping on our land, walking dogs around our private fields, and parking in our drive way to have a picnic oblivious of the fact they are blocking access despite good signage, so I am very much on the side of the op here…

…BUT as a child of the north and of the 70s, I don’t think it’s quite the same missing out on something you never anticipated having in the first place compared with missing out on something you were looking forward to doing, and that your older friends and siblings have experienced. The two things aren’t quite the same!

I have teens and while not excusing these DoE students who should know better, I do think the pandemic has had a massive unacknowledged impact on them and mine who were previously very studious have gone slightly wild at uni as a result, well more wild than they otherwise would I think having missed out on so much previously!

Posted too soon…

… it’s that and the effects of spending hours in bedrooms interacting with a screen rather than the living breathing countryside!

BUT as a child of the north and of the 70s, I don’t think it’s quite the same missing out on something you never anticipated having in the first place compared with missing out on something you were looking forward to doing, and that your older friends and siblings have experienced. The two things aren’t quite the same!

Exactly.

And my cohort in the late 1980s definitely did behave like twats on school trips, and in school generally.

I think social media has ramped a lot of this behaviour up as well.

They all want to take and post pictures and videos of themselves doing stupid shit, to portray an 'image' of themselves whether true or not, and it has them doing some really stupid, dangerous, rude, disrespectful shit to other people and other people's property.

As an aside, why are they taking photos on farm machinery (or anywhere)? I assumed phones were left behind as they can just use GPS rather then map read!

They can take a phone to be used in case of emergency

Unlikely that they stick to that rule !

Last time I checked you're allowed to use GPS navigation. It's a skill set.

Dc wasn’t allowed one last year for navigation purposes.
They had one for emergency calls only.

(And no they didn’t stick to the letter if the rule either)

Good point raised above - they should be allowed phones with them in case of emergency but these should be wrapped up in paper that shows if they’ve been unwrapped & used (other than in an emergency). If the phone’s been used you shouldn’t pass - so the assessors/leaders are failing here too….

There’s a backlog of d of E because of covid which may have increased the number as well.
yes it’s a given at dcs school that you do it, it’s not cheap and the extras are not cheap either.

I think for generations the countryside code (it was taught ant my school) and access to it has been dwindling, and with that comes common sense and how to behave. I was at a wildlife trust place a few years ago, it was set on a farm. Big signs to stay in the set areas. Some girls clambered over gates and into the farming area. They pulled some fencing over and it fell on them. Dh had to pull it off then it was so heavy. Parents couldn’t have given less of a shit that their kids had dismissed clear rules and put themselves in danger. Parents were only aghast at the possible danger to the children, not that the children actively sought it out on a working farm.

I don’t think planned trips like PGL etc help it’s a
false sense of outside.

I'd go straight to the top and write to Prince Edward new Duke of Edinburgh.

Not true. That's a myth.

Read the actual rules, not some school or group's made up byelaws.

Rules imposed by a school or group do not hold the same standing as the actual rules of the scheme.

It's the rules set out by the DofE charity that count.