The Rufus Beldam Bursary 2015

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The National Gamekeepers Organisation Educational Trust are delighted to be assisting Sharon Beldam in awarding three students individual bursaries which will help them to attain important certificates and experience in Game and Wildlife Management. As well as this an entire work based learning course at Newton Rigg has received a bursary which covers a class to complete a snaring course which is delivered by The Game and Wildlife Conservation Ttrust.

The bursaries were awarded to three students across the UK, two students from Sparsholt College and one from Newton Rigg College in Cumbria.

Paul Petty from Sparsholt was awarded the bursary and this was his reaction "I am very pleased and thankful to have been accepted as the recipient of the bursary. Due to family issues I have had to reinvent myself and move away from the stress and strains of management. I would much rather be sat in a land rover at 4am in the woods than stuck on the M3 trying to fight my way into London. I will use the award to help pay for vital tickets I will need to continue my new career as I would really like to work for the forestry commission or the environment agency or any new job where my office roof is the sky and not a fluorescent light."

Paul Butler was the second Spartsholt student who has received the award and had this to say about the Rufus Beldam bursary. "I am currently on the second year of the game and wildlife course at Sparsholt College. I have grown up around the game keeping industry as my best friends dad is a gamekeeper so I have helped them throughout the years. I have also been lucky enough to travel to France and work on an English style shoot out there for a month in the summer. I soon realised that it is very hard to be a gamekeeper out there because of the amount of prey species, for example: pine martin, fox, eagle owl and wild cats. I am very happy that I won the bursary and I believe that it will hopefully help me later in life because I will have the opportunity to do most of my tickets."

Ryan Taylor was the lucky candidate who has won the individual bursary at Newton Rigg College. The worked based learning course leader Derrick Byas has this to say about the generous bursary which was awarded to one of the classes currently studying the course.

"Following in the family game-keeping tradition has led a Newton Rigg College student to success in being selected for a prestigious award.
Ryan Taylor, who is aged 17, has been chosen to receive The Rufus Beldam Bursary awarded by Sharon Beldam through the National Gamekeepers' Organisation Educational Trust. Ryan is in the first year of his Level 3 Diploma in Countryside Management and his aim is to work in the industry. His grandfather is a retired gamekeeper and his father is Head Keeper at the Swinton Estate in Yorkshire.

Ryan had this to say his love for gamekeeping and the course "My focus is to become a grouse keeper because I feel that moorland in Britain is something particularly special and is well worth conserving, as well as my love for the shooting community. I want to gain as much experience as possible and be the best gamekeeper I can possibly be."