Walking Friends Wales Walk Leader (10 positions)

Organisation

Living Streets Cymru

Role Title

Walking Friends Wales Walk Leader

Closing date

Closing date is open-ended.

Training will be 2 days (dates to be confirmed)

The walks will start in February/March 2020.

Organisational aim for the project

Living Streets is the UK charity for everyday walking. Our mission is to achieve a better walking environment and inspire people to walk more.

The Walking Friends Wales project aims to help older adults to start walking in their communities and to: 

• build confidence
• develop healthy habits
• overcome isolation.

Location

Walks will be held across Cardiff and Newport

Reporting to

Project Coordinator

Purpose of role

As a Walk Leader you will be using your passion for walking and interest in supporting others to help older adults to find their feet.  

Activities

You’ll be leading walks for groups of people who have been referred to the project as they may be facing a variety of barriers to keeping active within their community.

These will be short walks within the community that aim to develop the confidence of participants. 

Before starting the walks, you’ll spend some time indoors getting to know the participants and understanding what support they might need. After this, you will then start planning the walks with the needs of the participants in mind.

During the walk you will be leading the group, supporting the walkers and making sure they are safe and happy.

Time commitment

Training will take place over 2 days

Walks will take place once a week. We ask you to commit to a minimum of 12 weeks of volunteering so that participants really benefit from the project.

Walks will take place during daytime and, including preparation and paperwork, will take around 2-3 hours.

Personal skills and qualities

You don’t need any experience but we do love for our Walk Leaders to be:

• enthusiastic about walking and keeping active
• friendly and approachable
• good communicators
• confident to work with groups of people
• sensitive to people of different needs and different backgrounds
• willing to work within Living Streets policies, values and procedures 

Volunteering benefits

• Using your enthusiasm for walking to benefit the community
• Knowing that you are making a difference by helping older adults to get active and healthy
• Staying active and healthy yourself
• Working outside in the fresh air
• Gaining experience of how to run led walks 
• Developing confidence and skills
• Ongoing support from the Project Coordinator

Training and support given

You will receive full training before starting and will then receive ongoing support, advice and guidance from the Project Coordinator.

Reimbursement of expenses

• Public transport up to a maximum of a daily ticket cost
• Other out of pocket expenses to be agreed in advance with supervisor

Application procedure

• Register your interest
• Application form
• Informal interview
• References
• DBS check

Contact information

Sian.regan@livingstreets.org.uk