FISHING FOR KNOWLEDGE

Evaluation Report of a Project led by Solway Heritage

The Fishing for Knowledge Project was funded by:

The Fishing for Knowledge Project was supported by:

The Fishing for Knowledge Project was managed by:

Solway Heritage 7 Church Crescent DG1 1DF Tel/Fax: 01387 247543 Website: www.solwayheritage.co.uk Email: [email protected]

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 2 CONTENTS

1 Background 4

2 Project Summary 6

3 Project Budget 8

4 Activities 8

4.1 Year 1 School Sessions 9

4.2 Year 2 School Sessions 10

4.3 Year 1 Family Fishing Days 10

4.4 Year 2 Family Fishing Days 11

4.5 Local Landowner / Angling Club involvement 12

4.6 Education Pack / Postcards 13

5 Impact on the Community and Feedback 15

6 Lessons Learned and the Future of Fishing for Knowledge 16

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 3 1 BACKGROUND

The idea for this project was developed as a result of a successful pilot project run with Kelloholm Primary School. With funding from the Catchment Management Planning Project and support from Nith District Salmon Fishery Board staff, Borderlines, a not for profit charity, provided classroom sessions and field trips for a total of 53 children, gradually introducing the participants to the freshwater environment and eventually fly fishing on the River Nith.

The feedback questionnaires from Kelloholm Primary School showed that all participants enjoyed the experience and would take part again. 79% said that they would like to take up fishing. The teachers completed questionnaires and said the experience had been very positive. This positive result led to the development of the Fishing for Knowledge Project.

This innovative partnership project involved introducing children and young people between the ages of 4 and 12 from to the freshwater environment. They were introduced to associated animal and plant life and enjoyed angling in their local river catchment through a series of six tried and tested structured sessions with local schools. Solway Heritage coordinated the project with partners including Nith and Annan District Salmon Fishery Boards, Galloway Fisheries Trust, Buccleuch Estates and Borderlines delivering the project.

Borderlines, a not for profit company with the aim of removing as many barriers as possible for all groups of the population, allowing them to participate in angling, took the lead role in delivering all the Schools Sessions and Family Fishing Day sessions.

All School Sessions were designed to build both knowledge and anticipation; they improved not only participants angling skills but also knowledge of their local environment, its history, geography, geology, climate, hydrology, animal and plant life. The object of the sessions was not just to improve standards of angling and to teach youngsters how to fish. It was also to try to instil a caring attitude towards the local environment and get young people to respect the needs of wildlife and other users of that environment, thus reducing littering, fly tipping and disorderly behaviour. It was also important to encourage children out into the countryside and encourage them to take part in healthy sport and recreation.

The project also held Family Fishing Days to give adults and children the opportunity to try out a new sport, along with learning about the freshwater environment. The Fishing Days were held at the waterside and included most of the practical elements covered in the Schools Sessions such as dipping for invertebrates, looking at river flow and plant, animal and birdlife in its natural environment. There was also an opportunity to have a go at casting with rods.

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 4 In summary the project aimed to:

 Introduce children and young people from Dumfries and Galloway to their local environment in a fun, safe and structured manner, using angling as the “carrot” to take part and thereby reach an element of the population who may not normally be interested in such matters.

 Complement the national curriculum and so lead to increased levels of educational attainment among participants.

 Improve the level of skills, education and training.

 Increase levels of confidence and self-esteem in local communities.

 Assist in lowering levels of crime and disorderly behaviour, creating safer environments and reduced fear of crime in the community.

 Introduce young people to new leisure facilities previously unavailable to them, this in itself will have highly positive social benefits not just to their local town/village but to Dumfries and Galloway as a whole, allowing improved access to facilities, the countryside and open spaces. In doing so it will positively affect the wellbeing of local people.

 By raising young people’s awareness of the natural environment it will protect and enhance biodiversity, assisting in the maintenance and enhancement of the nature conservation interests of the river catchment and its enjoyment by all.

 Create new pathways for people to participate in different activities throughout their lives and encourage lifelong learning.

 Enhance access to a fuller sporting life for children and young people and give them the opportunity to develop their talents to the full, improving their quality of life through participation in new sporting activities.

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 5 2 PROJECT SUMMARY

This innovative project involved introducing children and young people between the ages of 4 and 12 years of age from Dumfries and Galloway to the freshwater environment, its associated animal, plant life and angling in their local river catchment through a series of six tried and tested structured sessions with local schools. The project was delivered by Borderlines through a tender process. They were assisted with the practical fishing through in-kind support from the Annan District Salmon Fishery Board, the Nith District Salmon Fishery Board, Buccleuch Sporting and Galloway Fishery Trust. They also assisted with the running of the Family Fishing Days.

Schools were chosen from all five areas – the Rhins, the Machars, Nithsdale, Annandale and Eskdale. Each year four classes from one larger school or two classes from two smaller schools were given the chance to participate in this project.

All of the sessions with the schools were designed to build both knowledge and anticipation; they improve not just participants angling skills but also knowledge of their local environment, its history, geography, geology, climate, hydrology, animal and plant life.

The project achieved the following outputs and outcomes:

 755 children took part in the Fishing for Knowledge Schools Sessions.

 21 schools took part in the Schools Sessions.

 318 training sessions were run for those Schools.

 Four Family Fishing Days were held.

 88 people took part in the Family Fishing Days.

 Education packs with information on angling and the freshwater environment were distributed to 21 Schools.

 An information postcard for children was produced and distributed to each child that took part in the schools programme. Additional postcards were distributed during other opportunities.

 Partnerships were established across Dumfries and Galloway which helped to ensure the smooth running of the region wide project.

 Awareness of the freshwater environment was raised throughout the time of the project through press releases and information being passed through children onto families.

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 6  The project has been selected as an example of best practice in the Leader Rural Awards.

 A short film of the Family Fishing Day on the River Nith was produced as part of the judging for the Leader Rural Awards

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 7 3 PROJECT BUDGET

The project was anticipated to cost £53,880 with Leader providing 50% of the funding (£26,940 awarded). The costs incurred by the project during the two years were lower than identified. This was due to a number of reasons:

• Class sizes were smaller than anticipated and so it was easier to combine several schools in one day thereby reducing Borderlines costs.

• Excessive rain and the resulting rise in river water levels meant that one of the Family Fishing days had to be cancelled in 2009.

• It was not possible to organise one of the Family Fishing Days in 2010 which was hoped to be in .

The total project costs were £39,781.90. The actual amount claimed from Leader for the project was £19,890.95. Solway Heritage had to cover the costs of VAT as it is unable to reclaim this from HMRC for this project but was also unable to include this on the Leader claims.

The remainder of the funding was provided by:

Scottish Natural Heritage £7,140.96

The Catchment Management Initiative £3,000.00

with in-kind support from

The Annan District Salmon Fishery Board £1,925.68

The Nith District Salmon Fishery Board £4,496.08

Galloway Fisheries Trust £1,150.00

Buccleuch Estate £2,544.00

Monreith House £370.00

Dalbeattie Angling Association £90.00

Kirkhouse Fishery £195.00

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 8 4 ACTIVITIES

4.1 Year 1 Schools Sessions

The project achieved the following outputs in Year 1:

287 children from 10 schools completed the schools programme. There was a total of 144 sessions delivered i.e. six sessions to each of the 42 classes during May to December 2009. The ten schools engaged with were:

 Primary

 St Ninians Primary

 Glentrool Primary

 Port William Primary

 Lochrutton Primary

 Kirkgunzeon Primary

 Primary

 Hottsbridge Primary

 Primary

 Hecklegirth Primary Hecklegirth Primary in the Classroom

Port William Primary Kirkgunzeon Primary

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 9 4.2 Year 2 Schools Sessions

The project achieved the following outputs in Year 2:

424 children from 11 schools completed the schools programme. There was a total of 174 sessions delivered i.e. six sessions to each of the 29 classes during May to July 2010. The eleven schools engaged with were:

 Sheuchan Primary

 Belmont Primary

 Primary

 Garlieston Primary

 Primary

 Castle Douglas Primary

 Springholm Primary Kelloholm Primary

 Primary

 Wallacehall Primary

 Kelloholm Primary

 Primary

4.3 Year 1 Family Fishing Days Castle Douglas Primary

Three Family Fishing Days were organised in Year 1:

 The River Nith at Thornhill on 22nd July 2009

 The River Esk in on 5th August 2009

 Powfoot Flounder Fishing Day on 19th September 2009

Unfortunately the day on the River Nith had to be cancelled due to torrential rain during the night making the river too high to provide safe fishing. The other two days were both very successful and people gave positive feedback. For example over 90% of people attending the Powfoot Flounder Fishing Day said they would like to take up fishing.

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 10 A total of 44 people took part in the family fishing days in Langholm and Powfoot.

River Esk at Langholm Powfoot Flounder Fishing

4.4 Year 2 Family Fishing Days

Two Family Fishing Days were also organised in Year 2:

 The River Nith at Drumlanrig on 6th August 2010

 The River Esk in Langholm on 7th August 2010

The sites were chosen to encompass areas where there had been less School Sessions, such as in Langholm or where Family Fishing Days had not been held before, such as on the River Nith where the Family Fishing Day had to be cancelled due to bad weather in 2009. It had been hoped to run a third day in Stranraer but it was not possible to organise this with the local fishing organisation.

The two days were both very successful and people gave positive feedback even though it poured with rain during both sessions on the River Nith.

A total of 44 people took part in the family fishing days in Drumlanrig and Langholm.

River Esk at Langholm River Nith at Drumlanrig

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 11 4.5 Landowner / Local Angling Club Involvement

The Fishing for Knowledge project received tremendous support and encouragement from the local community, landowners and angling clubs who showed Borderlines potential dipping and fishing venues. The owners of some of the venues that were risk assessed were disappointed when the news was broken that their site could not be used. The following landowners provided free fishing as an in-kind contribution to the project:

May to December 2009

 Penninghame Primary, Glentrool Primary and St Ninian’s Primary carried out their river dipping on the River Cree and fishing on Wee Glenamour Loch thanks to Newton Stewart Angling Association.

 Port William Primary dipped on Killantrae Burn thanks to the Dourie Farming Co. Ltd. and fishing on White Loch of Myrton thanks to Monreith House.

 Lochrutton Primary did their dipping and fishing on Loch Rutton thanks to Mr Kirk.

 Kirkgunzeon Primary river dipped on Kirkgunzeon Lane thanks to Mr Thompson and fished at Reservoir thanks to Dalbeattie Angling Association.

 Johnstonebridge Primary did their dipping and fishing on the River Annan thanks to the Earl of Annandale and Hartfell and the Upper Annandale Angling Association.

 Hottsbridge Primary had permission to do their dipping on Penoben Burn and Kirk Burn thanks to Mr Hamilton and fishing on Sammies Pond thanks to Sam Smith. Unfortunately, due to flooding on the burn the dipping session had to take place in the School.

 Mouswald Primary did their dipping on Calf Park Farm Burn thanks to David Reid and fishing on the River Annan thanks to Dumfries and Galloway Council (Annandale and Eskdale).

 Hecklegirth Primary did their dipping and fishing on the River Annan thanks to Dumfries and Galloway Council (Annandale and Eskdale).

May to July 2010

 Sheuchan Primary and Belmont Primary did their dipping on the Aldouran Wetland thanks to Community Association and fishing on Soulseat Loch thanks to Stranraer Angling Association.

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 12  Wigtown Primary did their dipping on East Kirkland Farm Pond thanks to Mr Quigley and fishing on White Loch of Myrton thanks to Monreith House.

 Garlieston Primary and Sorbie Primary did their dipping on the burn at Garlieston Lodge Caravan Park thanks to Rusty Taylor and fishing on White Loch of Myrton thanks to Monreith House.

 Castle Douglas Primary and Springholm Primary did their dipping and fishing on Carlingwark Loch thanks to Dumfries and Galloway Council.

 Kirkbean Primary did their dipping on Kirkbean Burn at Kirkhouse Farm and fishing on Kirkhouse Loch thanks to John McMyn.

 Wallacehall Primary did their dipping and fishing on the River Nith thanks to Mid Nithsdale Angling Association.

 Kelloholm Primary did their dipping and fishing on the River Nith thanks to Upper Nithsdale Angling Association.

 Hoddom Primary did their dipping on the Water of Milk thanks to Barry Armitstead and fishing on the River Annan thanks to Cleugh Head Fishings.

The project would like to extend a huge thanks to these landowners for their involvement in the Fishing for Knowledge project.

4.6 Education Packs / Postcards

An Education Pack was produced and distributed to each school taking part in the Fishing for Knowledge schools sessions. It contained teaching aids for the teachers, which complemented the practical activities taking place. There were also games and puzzles for the children and contact details of the District Salmon Fishery Board in that area.

Towards the end of the project it was realised that the children taking part in the project may not have access to the Education Pack to direct them to a local Angling Club if they were interested in taking up angling after the project. It was therefore decided to produce a postcard to hand out to each child that had taken part in the project.

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 13

Front of postcard Back of postcard

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 14 5 IMPACT ON THE COMMUNITY AND FEEDBACK

The project engaged and enthused children about nature on their own doorsteps. Using angling as the ‘hook’ to catch attention and by promoting active learning, allowing them to get their hands and feet wet, children’s knowledge and understanding of their local environment has been greatly improved, inspiring them to respect and protect it.

Several schools taking part were working towards their Eco-Schools awards and so the project helped to make children more aware of areas in their environment that the School had not dealt with before. As well as making a valuable contribution to many areas of the curriculum, teachers noted that the project also benefited the children's listening, talking, co-operation and team skills. They were more aware of freshwater life in their rural environment, safety at the waterside and as well as having a calming effect, all children achieved success during the project.

Irene Kennedy of Wallace Hall Primary said "The benefit of having a visiting 'teacher' and access to the 'outside classroom' not only expands areas of knowledge regarding 'living things/fishing etc., but is also extremely helpful for the children’s personal development. It has been a most successful and enjoyable six weeks from which we (children and adults) have hugely benefited. It is just not possible to achieve half as much learning in the classroom environment - access to the 'living classroom' awakens their insight into a vast array of things that otherwise they would have had no opportunity to have seen/learned".

Gillian Baldie of Belmont Children's Centre said “ Due to family circumstances many may not have the opportunity or encouragement to investigate their environment and to see it brought to life in this way, this for them is super".

Some individual comments from attendees of the Powfoot Flounder Fishing Day included:

 Kieran Norden aged 14: “I really enjoyed the day the Instructors were very helpful.”

 Daniel Norden aged 15: “I enjoyed the day thank you very much.”

 Sarah Anderson aged 9: “Thank you very much.”

 Andrew Whiteside aged 41: “Good day for the boys, instructors were all very good. Well done!”

 Danny Mundle aged 11: “ It was fun .”

Fishing for Knowledge Evaluation 15 6 LESSONS LEARNED AND THE FUTURE OF FISHING FOR KNOWLEDGE

Some aspects of the project have been particularly challenging. Of greatest difficulty was to timetable the 6 schools sessions for 10 or more schools at once. To be environmentally friendly in terms of travelling, it was timetabled for Borderlines to visit more than one school on the same day although this was a planning nightmare! In Year 1 of the project the planning of the programme was carried out in April/May 2009. It was discovered that schools plan at least one term in advance and so it was difficult to fit all the participating schools into a 6 week block. Some of the schools had to take part in August/September, after the summer holidays. The lesson learned from the first year was to allow for early planning of the schools sessions in order to fit all participating schools into the spring/summer term.

In terms of the future of Fishing for Knowledge there would be many benefits to carrying on this project. If the project could be rolled out across the region with schools monitoring plant, invertebrate and fish life in their own loch, river, stream each year, giving them ‘ownership’ of their own environment, more children would be encouraged to take a greater interest and pride in their local environment and heritage. They would also be given the opportunity to take up a healthy hobby for life .

Fishing for Knowledge was planned as a three year project. Funding for Year 3 (2011) of the project has been supplied by Scottish Natural Heritage, Diawa Sports Ltd and the EFTTA Youth Grant Scheme. This will enable the project to run the full programme for 5 schools and a reduced programme for 2 nursery classes.

Funding is always a major issue in continuing a project, even one as successful as Fishing for Knowledge. It would be difficult to access funding to continue the same project but it is likely that the individual Fishery Boards will use the expertise gained and positive feedback from all participants to help source alternative funding to run similar programmes in their own areas. In this way the project will be transferred to a sustainable fishing programme relevant to each of the Fishery Boards’ own districts.

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