IOF Young Leaders Academy report
Earlier this year we gave a grant to Alasdair Pedley to attend the IOF Young Leaders Academy (see news article). He has now attended and come back full of great ideas and contacts across the orienteering community. You can read his report on his own website here.
In summary, the IOF's inaugural Young Leaders Academy was held alongside the Italy 5 Days in the Dolomites. The idea was to bring together keen young orienteers from all over the world for a week of learning about all the things that surround and support orienteering: mapping, coaching, planning, organising events, developing the sport in new areas etc. 24 young leaders from across 12 countries were represented and mentored by top coaches from across the IOF. The program included workshops, discussions, presentations, and sharing experiences from competing in the Italian 5 days, with plenty of time for valuable adhoc conversation outside of the main sessions.
The programme was changed slightly from what was initially advertised, and the packed schedule didn't allow time for work (and collaboration) on individual projects. However, Alasdair had already been working on an idea for an automatic start list generator for World Ranking Events (which have complicated rules and can currently take hours of manual effort). He has a prototype program taking entries, British Orienteering rankings, and IOF rankings, and plans to further develop it - watch this space!
As well as Alasdair's writeup above, you can also read the IOF report.