FEARLESS students have raised £2,000 to support a Vietnamese girl through school after being dropped off in the middle of nowhere and making their own way back to Malvern College.
The ‘Lost’ experiment was designed to take the youngsters outside their comfort zones and to become more independent and resilient.
Eleven pairs of pupils, each representing a different boarding house at Malvern College, had volunteered to be blindfolded and dropped in unfamiliar surroundings, some 40km from town.
They then had to camp overnight and use their integrity to find their way back as quickly as possible.
Each pair started with £50 but incurred a five-minute time penalty for every £1 spent.
Students could use public transport with a maximum of six miles per trip and could ask passers by for information.
The young participants had raised £2,000 for the experiment and the first pair home would win the money for their boarding house’s chosen charity.
Jayda Khimji and Chioma Anazoda, both aged 15, came home first after being dropped off near Leominster in Herefordshire.
The pair, representing Ellerslie House, arrived back at Malvern College in just over 14 hours, more than a hour ahead of their nearest rivals.
The money raised will now help a girl in Vietnam get an education.
“It was a real adventure and we were first sent the wrong way but soon realised we needed to ask people where we were and head for the nearest public transport,” said Jayda.
“We’re used to camping and cooking for ourselves through Duke of Edinburgh expeditions.
“Once we’d borrowed a map we made a detailed plan and only took one train, from Leominster to Hereford, paying £13 for us and the teacher, so we served our one hour, five-minute penalty in Hereford station.
“We then located the listed parents closest to our route and organised three lifts, arranging to be picked up near the previous drop-off point.”
Abandoning children in the middle of nowhere sounded like every parent’s worst nightmare but several safeguards were built into the challenge.
A teacher followed each pair at a distance, not to help but to ensure they followed the rules and intervene in an emergency.
Hitch-hiking was banned as was travelling more than a single stop on a train.
However, each pair had the phone numbers and addresses of schoolmates’ parents and teachers who had volunteered their help, if asked, to give lifts of up to 6km by car.
“It was a big ask for children of 14 or 15 years old,” said Jay Watts, Malvern College’s outdoor pursuits co-ordinator who devised the challenge.
“Many of our pupils fly academically but they’ve never been ‘lost’ in their lives, always having a mapping app to hand and surrounded by technology.
“The scheme made them take the initiative, plan strategically and cope with setbacks.”
