Discussion: Adventure Running Kids Tour and Presentation

Since the spring of 2010, Golden Horseshoe Orienteering's (GHO) Adventure Running Kids (ARK) program has grown to over 550 participants in EACH of its spring and autumn sessions. ARK is now offered in Hamilton, Burlington, Oakville, Niagara, Brampton and together with Stars Orienteering in Kitchener-Waterloo as well.

I will be offering both an "ARK Tour" and ARK presentation at the 2013 Orienteering Nationals in two weeks in Hamilton, Canada.

Thursday Oct. 10th 6-7pm Canterbury Hills, Ancaster, Ontario
(same location as Nationals training and HPP fundraiser)
Join me on a one hour tour of a typical ARK evening and see examples of different activities that ARK athletes participate in each week. Includes time for a Q&A. Registration is free but please sign up by Oct. 6th via email (jmw@dontgetlost.ca) (use subject line ARK TOUR).

Saturday Oct. 12th 2:30pm Ancaster Community Centre
(same location as middle distance arena and Nationals Expo).
Join me for a free 30 minute presentation on how GHO "built our ARK". I will provide an overview of the approach that GHO took in developing the curriculum and marketing of ARK. I will discuss some challenges that we are still facing and some of our future plans as we continue to expand our program throughout southern Ontario's Golden Horseshoe. No pre-registration required. This presentation will take place during the Nationals Expo with many other activities including the silent auction, ARK Zone, etc. as well.

Will you be able to video either (or both) of these and made available for those who can't witness in person?

Sounds good!

I'd like it too.

Copy requested here also.

So, the video is at 2:30 and your presentation follows at 3:15?

Would love a copy, too, but will definitely try to make it to the presentation, too.

Interesting file. Thanks much for sending.

What's tough to gauge is how much time you were investing along the way to get the thing moving. I suspect it's high. It'd be interesting to see some sort of earned value calculation maybe volunteer hours in relative to kids sessions registered or the like as a benchmark on how much return to target relative to effort.

...investing...earned value calculations...benchmark...

Those words imply some kind of business interest.
I understand that a program like this has to be "economically" sustainable ( in terms of money and/or man hours) but...

Don´t we do this for the kids?
The greatest return you can get is a bunch of happy and healthy kids...

Well, the party has been marching on without calculations or benchmarks in 100% or so of U.S. clubs for 40 years, and certainly without much investing, and all eyes are now focused on north of the border as to where the future lies. Perhaps this will be taken as an answer, perhaps not.

Bubo, yes. But that's not to say we can't look at it and see how we can get the most happy and healthy kids for the least volunteer resources.

Of course :)