We are now well into the new year and Tyne Tour our first big trip on the year is well and truly in sight! With all this the committee has been working to being implementing developments within the club. And after meeting on Thursday we thought we’d share some plans for the year ahead. 

Trips & Socials

With the new events organiser Will joining us for his first committee meeting in his role, the discussion about trips was well underway, Finalising plans for Tyne Tour. We are exciting to say this year we’ll return to producing our own t-shirts as a team, allowing for a more personal souvenir from this weekend, while designs are still being finalised we are having a maroon colour and we’ll be aiming to get these supplied at the lowest cost possible. The events organisers have sent an e-mail out already about attending Tyne Tour, so please check your inbox about that.

For further than Tyne Tour, discussions were made about future trips, these including the dates of NSR in March (4th – 6th March) and the Easter trip, which is usually a week long trip to Newquay, discussions were made the split these trips and take the chance to take the club to a new destination, and spend a weekend surf-kayaking at a coast location nearer Lincoln. While no plans were set in stone, something exciting can only come out from this!

Kit 

With a new Kit Supplier for the Students’ Union sports clubs this year, the committee have decided in the interest of the SU aims of a new supplier to go with such supplier in providing the teams hoodies this year. While we costs will be more, the dramatically increased quality of garment and sense of union with other sports teams in Lincoln will outweigh the price increase.  It was decided it’s key to keep the L.U.C.K Identity on the new kit as much as we can, as such Ted the Kit Seretaty is to speak to Player Layer and discuss the options of keeping the L.U.C.K logo on the new kit. We’ll be getting these ordered as soon as we can but in the meantime we ask members to refrain from ordering Kit from the Player Layer website individually as these don’t feature the L.U.C.K logo.

It was also decided that new Kit was needed for the club to paddle with. Ted has already ordered new paddles to replace the outdated paddles and ones we lost last year to damage (Adam.. 😉 ). The cost of these came to around £200 and this is for 5 brand new paddles.  It was also decided the club needed to update its CAGS. As well as to address the shortage when large groups attended and the age/effectiveness of the current club ones. Ted is to source some quotes for these. DECKS also was discussed from last years committee, due to the essential need for decks to paddle within the club, it was discussed if to apply for development fund to pay for these. However due to the essential need for these kits it was not worth risking not getting new decks by relying on a un-gaurenteed source of money.

Communications

After asking for feedback from last years members about communications, Josh (Web & Media Officer) received 10 responses, and 90% agreed the current method of communication is sufficient, however Josh pointed out that some members are still unaware of what’s happening within the club. As such Josh addressed the importance of making sure that e-mails are sent out at a timely manner and that all activities are placed of the Facebook members group, the public Facebook Page, and the Twitter account.  But due to the 90% satisfaction rate, no new forms of communications  or dramatic improvements need to be pursued at this time.

Coaching/Development

Feedback from last year showed that some members lack the interest in developing personal boating skills, and as such find it difficult to remain interested in the club. To keep people intrested this year the committee have decided the create a skill sheet, this simple checklist allows members to keep a track of the skills learnt and what they need to know in order of achieve a British Canoeing 2* paddler award at the end of year assessment. Overall we are hoping this low cost & simple methord will achieve greater interest in learning skills. Members should get this later this month in an e-mail.

And that’s it for now! All this work is done by your committee members, all the time they give is free and for the interest of the wider club, and if you think there is an issue to address or have an idea you think we need to know, just get in touch 😀 ! One of us it always at a pool or Brayford session just come say hello! We also have an e-mail address canoe@lincolnsu.com or drop us a Facebook message.

Happy Paddling!