Front Page
Home
Director
Schools Courses
Contact Us
Safety Medical
Team
Gallery
Asheldham
Asheldham Pics
Exhibitions
Links I
Links II
Clients
Testimonials
Retailers
Survival
Tracking
Evidence
Hunter's Values
Logistics
Blog
Booking Details
BELA
Weather & Moon
Scotland WHW
Courses
Research Expeds
BBC News Feed

Director

 Image "My passion is to be out  - acting as an interpreter of the landscape, challenging and motivating people of all ages, Image

moving, living, and working outdoors...in any conditions, any season, any place... giving clients the ultimate outdoor experience."                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                


Barry Howard

Image

B.Ed [Hons.] C.Geog [Econ] FRGS ML Churchill Fellow

Director

HUNTER Outdoor Training


Barry Howard is a professional, full-time outdoor educator, and trained with the late Peter Bradley in wilderness and survival skills as long ago as 1968. By 1974 he was was cutting his teeth in polar exploration as a member of one of the last dog sledge expeditions in polar history to cross the Greenland ice-cap, at one point as a sledge commander. 

Image

He has been formally instructing outdoor pursuits since 1972.

He graduated in the 70's from teacher training at Eaton Hall, part of the University of Nottingham's School of Education, and won Scholarships to study and then do research at the Universities of Bucharešti and Cluj in Romania. Between 1976 and 1981, he led or was a member of seven remote area expeditions per year in Arctic Norway, Iceland, and Greenland. In 1979 he spent four months solo backpacking / mountaineering and wilderness exploring in Finnmark.

Civilian courses and expedition experience includes leading almost 200 overland and/or backpacking and/or high level mountain expeditions throughout the UK and the whole of high-latitude Scandinavia including many remote area/wilderness courses in northern Finnmark.

Barry is  Mountain Leader qualified (Plas y Brenin), Winter Mountain Leader trained (Glenmore Lodge) and a former teacher with 31 award-winning years of experience, 10 years of which was spent as a Head of Geography;  he is an expedition trainer and former Regional External Verifier for 'Sports Leaders UK' - over ten years - for  their NVQ Level 2 Award in Basic Expedition Leadership, continuing now to instruct over 2500 youth and adults per year in wilderness skills, leading expeditions to Iceland and Norway, and winter mountaineering in the Lifjell district of Norway.

He was  proposed by the British Sports Trust to Ofsted as a 'National Example of Good Practice in Outdoor Education', and has been praised and commended in four successive inspections by Ofsted for management of innovative and comprehensive programmes in Outdoor Education and  'Excellence' in educational visits management. In addition he was the UK's first 'Outdoor Education Champion' as awarded by the then National Association for Outdoor Education....for 'productive delivery in the field of outdoor education'.

Proposed by David Cox and being elected a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society in 1974, this was followed up in 2006 as a 'Chartered Geographer' for contributions to geographical fieldwork and outdoor education. In 2002 Barry won a Winston Churchill Fellowship for research into educational visits, expedition, and outdoor education safety in Norway, Sweden and Finland - in that year  undertaking a 10,000 kms solo, overland, expedition to the North Cape whilst en route around Scandinavia, subsequently being awarded the Trust's Silver Medallion.

Currently Hunter are the custodial managers of The Asheldham Centre [see 'Menu'], with Barry as the Senior Manager. This 'jewel-in-the-crown' 26-bed Centre is located in remote east Essex in a 1000 year-old Grade II Listed medieval church - a unique and quite outstanding residential provision. We are very proud to be associated with such a special place. Only when you visit - and stay - will you realise how special.

A major work since 2007 is as Project Manager of the new 'Merrylands Centre of Excellence for Outdoor Education' in a school in Essex, UK, developing a competition standard orienteering course and coaching, an outdoor  'living laboratory' for environmental education, and on-timetable wilderness and survival skills. This is, arguably, the first and only school in Britain where every subject on the timetable has a compulsory outdoor education component.  Cascading this project and its components across other schools in, initially Essex, in less than three years 4,900 youth have undertaken the project in 33 schools, with almost 29,000 pupil-hours of activity. See 'Links'.

This Centre of Excellence Project is the Youth Sports Trust benchmark Case Study in the UK for Key Stage 2 Outdoor Education.

 

Image

Barry Howard

Status

Director, Hunter Outdoor Training

Full time professional Wilderness Guide

Senior Manager 'The Asheldham Centre'

Project Manager: The Merrylands School Centre of Excellence for Outdoor Education

Senior Instructor 'Hunter Medics'

Image

 

Qualifications

Certificate in Education (Cert.Ed.) Eaton Hall College of Education

Bachelor of Education Hons. (B.Ed. [Hons.]) Univ. Nottingham

DCSF Qualifed Teacher

Chartered Geographer C.Geog [Econ]

Mountain Leader. (MLTE) Plas y Brenin

First Aid. HSE. 1986-2010

First Aid AED Operator & Oxygen

Mountain First Aid Qual. Plas y Brenin 1986 & Refreshers

Image

Experience

42 years as an outdoorsman

31 years classroom teacher

Wilderness Guide throughout Scandinavia

Polar experience: trans-Greenland by dog sledge

Arctic experience: southern Greenland, northern Norway

Sub-Arctic experience: throughout Iceland and mainland Scandinavia: All seasons

170+ residential explorations and expeditions as leader

3,000 + day-courses teaching outdoor education as leader

Field-study specialist in glaciation inc. palaeo - and pro-glacial

31 years expedition work in Norway and 33 years in Iceland mostly leading

Teaching 2000+ youth per year outdoor pursuits.

Former Head of Geography Dept King John School '81 -'91

Former Head of Outdoor Education, King John School '91-'06.

Latterly SSCo (OAA) for 30 schools in south Essex

First Aid Instructor since 1998

Written in national media (Times, Times Ed Supp., Daily Telegraph) on outdoor education safety.

Broadcast regularly on BBC radio 2002 - 09 as Expert Witness re: youth expedition accidents.

Adviser to government on educational visits safety

Married, & father of three - all adult 'children'

Image

Professional Memberships

British Mountaineering Council

Mountain Leader Training Association

Institute for Outdoor Learning

The Royal Geographical Society

The British Paramedic Association

BASICS

Image

Awards

Fellow of The Royal Geographical Society. 1974

Outdoor Education Champion’ for determined and productive delivery in promoting excellence. Institute for Outdoor Learning

The ‘National Example of Good Practice in Outdoor Education’ proposed to Ofsted by The British Sports Trust.

Winston Churchill Fellowship Silver Medal awarded February 2002 for ‘Safety Research in Adventure Training, & School Educational Visits’

University of Nottingham Scholarship to Universities of Bucharesti & Cluj  

Highly praised in four successive Ofsted Inspections inc ‘Excellent’ standard.

Image

Image

huntertraining@hotmail.com

 Click on the rolling ball below to go direct to Barry Howard's own website

Image