Matthew Thurlow:
Conservation through Knowledge and Education
"We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking
we used when we created them"
Albert Einstein
Non-marine volunteering
Hockey Coaching, Blackawton Primary school, Hockey England
Whilst Playing for Dart Hockey club I got involved with coaching the junior sides to help out the other people in the club who could not always be there. Through this we started a programme with Hockey England where we would visit the surrounding primary schools who did not necessarily have access to hockey kit or facilities on which to play on.
This was to increase participation as a whole in the country but also to help our club in the future. We visited Blackawton Primary School once a week for 3 months, taking with us shin guards, mouth gaurds and sticks supplied by hockey England and ran a 40 minute PE lesson for the year 6 class. This ranged from basic dribbling skills to passing and shooting, the end goal was to take a team to a tournament held at our club pitch between all the other primary schools to celebrate their participation.
Expedition/Safari Experience
Africa field course, Kenya, Msc Conservation and Biodiversity
As a part of my Msc course we went on a two week safari in Kenya visiting several reserves and parks to experience the difficulties faced by park rangers in protecting such large spaces. I chose to focus on animal behavioural ecology during my stay and at the end produced a paper on my observations.
We had to deal with basic living conditions on many different campsites, often in tents where all manner of creatures could gain access to your belongings so being cautious and forward thinking was very important.
Observing animal behaviour on such
a large scale was hard work and
demanded a lot of perseverance and
patience. On occasions it involved a lot
of awareness as well so as not to put
yourself in danger around predators
whilst observing the target subject.
Curriculum Vitae
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download my current curriculum vitae
