The Discovery Appeal 2011
Our Discovery Appeal in this, our 15th anniversary year, has focused on raising a minimum of £120,000 to fund 100 more young people on The Mark Scott Leadership For Life Award. Thanks to the fantastic response to our Discovery Balls in London and Glasgow, and to grants received from companies, charitable trusts and individuals, we have now raised over £190,000 net.
Given this success, we have decided to extend our Discovery Appeal to March 2012 with the goal of £240,000, double our original target and double the number of young people we can support.
London Committee
In the ten months leading up to the inaugural event for the Mark Scott Foundation at The Hurlingham Club in London we were overwhelmed by the encouragement and support we received. So many people wanted to help because they had heard about the Leadership For Life Award. The Discovery Ball in London raised over £80,000 to help more young people benefit from the Award. We hope there will be more events in London in future to help raise awareness and income for The Mark Scott Foundation.
School Champion
"Capturing the imagination of 17-year-olds is not easy. Finding the Leadership For Life Award is like heaven. Relationships between rival schools have become friendships, tentative first steps become firm decisions, and pupils grow in confidence and maturity before your eyes."
John Dowds, St Thomas Aquinas Secondary School, Glasgow
Award Participants
These two comments made at the end of each Award cycle are typical of Leadership for Life Award participants:
"The Award taught me that my options are not as limited as I think. There's another opinion, another route, another solution to solving every problem. I think this will help me in the future when faced with a difficult situation because I won't give up as easily as I once would have. Thus, I'll hopefully achieve more."
"I think it has made me more confident which is a brilliant quality to have especially for university and future careers. The award has also given me communication, organisational and co-ordination skills which will be very beneficial for me in the future."
What we do
The Mark
Scott Leadership for Life Award takes an innovative approach to
personal development. The Award brings together young people, aged between
16 and 18, from different social, religious and cultural backgrounds. It trains
and supports them as they plan and deliver a project that will benefit their local
community.
Selected participants attend a five day course run by the expert instructors
of Outward Bound Metro at The Trust's Loch Eil centre near Fort William. Here they acquire skills and
confidence that will help them work together for four months to complete the
project.
The Award is unique. The innovative combination of outdoor learning residential and urban
community-based project work helps young people to develop their talents and
self-confidence whilst breaking down traditional barriers and benefiting local
communities at the same time.
What also makes the Award unique and innovative is the close co-operation with
the schools from which the young people are selected. School staff recognise
that the Award creates a legacy of trust and friendship between diverse
participants and their schools. It enhances leadership skills and addresses
sectarianism as well as other socially divisive influences in a subtle way.
The Mark Scott Foundation is registered as a charity in Scotland No SC025254.
Latest Videos
Outdoor Learning Residential
Delivering the Community Project
"Mark Scott is not just Leadership for Life, it's friendship for life".
Megan Swanson and Amina Rafiq, Holyrood Secondary School
"It was at that moment that I started
to believe in myself."
Victoria Renton, St Thomas Aquinas Secondary School, Participant.