Ringing Forums

we once offered taster sessions — John Harrison

Taster sessions where they have a go for (say) 30 mins are one thing, but RftK is something else entirely as the intent is to train people to ring for an important national event. I'm not interested in doing that unless there's a strong commitment from people to stay on afterwards, preferably backed by some sort of financial incentive to do so.

As I said, if someone turns up and just wants to RftK and go no further then I'll turn them away, no matter what their age.

As it happens, I will hopefully have two 12 year olds coming for the first time tomorrow, both of whom expressed an interest which had nothing to do with RftK and I'm going to do my damnedest to retain them. I also have two adults turning up, I'll have to find out what their intentions are.

If people just want something for their "bucket list" then I'd consider it if they paid the going rate for such things, and if they weren't blocking someone who wanted to take up ringing seriously. Based on other "experience" offerings, the going rate would be north of £250.

All the talk about a shortage of ringers and needing more to Ring for the King probably hasn't helped either — John Harrison

I have wondered if the long term effect of that pitch is positive or negative. Yes it clearly has been bringing people in, but how many will stick at it, and how much of our limited teaching resources will be burned with no long term return?

I think we need to make it very clear to people from the start that learning to ring requires regular attendance and a long term commitment. Personally, if I get people who turn up because they just want to RftK, I'll turn them away. Which is the call I'll be making tomorrow when 4 people turn up for the first time.

All quite impressive stuff, I think! — Nigel Goodship

Not particularly, unless you think robo-plagarism is impressive. For example, a very quick search reveals that a lot of it is lifted from here, with some light rephrasing:

• Stress relief: The rhythmic motion of bell ringing can be meditative and soothing, making it a great way to relieve stress and tension.
• Improved focus and concentration: Bell ringing requires concentration and focus in order to keep time and execute the proper techniques. This can help improve focus and concentration in other areas of life.
• Increased confidence: Learning a new skill, such as bell ringing, can boost confidence and self-esteem.
• Socialization: Bell ringing is often done in groups, which can be a great way to socialize and make new friends.

If there's anything impressive it's the accuracy of the search targetting and the ability to present the results in a readable way. But there's no insight or understanding, it's only as good as its training data - and that has come from humans.

So the leaner generations of ringers have to work through the learning curve of more advanced ringing with less support and greater risk that it might go wrong and this means bands advance at a slower pace. — Lucy Chandhial

I think some generations of ringers aren't just "lean", they are completely absent. Ringing is suffering the consequences of decades of complacency around recruitment and it's going to be difficult to recover from that.

It needs leading from the association level, as my branch isn’t even ringing quarter peals. — Martyn Bristow

Don't get your hopes up, associations are just a collection of branches, it's the same people and mindset.

Martyn, I don't think associations are very good at this. It's best to organise things yourself if you can. It's helpful if the branch is organising surprise practices but why not try to get that "critical" mass together yourself. Ringing doesn't have to be under the auspices of the branch or association. — Phillip George

I've lost count of how many times I've seen that suggested and it's completely unrealistic. There are few ringers in my area at my level or just above, then there's a huge "hole", then a small number of "black zone" ringers (see my comment above). And the numbers at each of those groups is falling. How are people to get "critical mass" when increasingly there simply aren't enough ringers to do so?

while a motivated individual may be able to make his/her own opportunities, that can't be done in a vacuum — John Harrison

Quite.

Martyn, I agree, of course. Have you canvassed your local branch on this. Part of their role is to help ringers at all levels. — Phillip George

Many of them seem to have lost sight of that and are (literally) just Old Boys clubs.

Umm, the bong is in the wrong place. It's as the rope is going up, not down.

I have a learner who is struggling with dropping the last coil, I often tell them "Relax!" anyway, but I'll make sure so emphasise it at this point in the raise - good tip.

Their handling is good enough that they can complete the raise and set the bell one-handed without dropping the last coil, but I've told them that's not really a good enough excuse! :lol:

I think for practices at this level to work they have to be focused rather than general, and have to have experienced ringers specifically invited to go to them. We gave up general practices in the St Martin's Guild some time ago, and we now only have practices which are for specific purposes or for specific people, and the helpers are invited. A practice would not go ahead if there were insufficient experienced helpers. It is quite common to have very experienced ringers at such practices because they know they will be of value. — Simon Linford

I think it's difficult to stress just how important that is, I don't go to "general" branch practices as they are of little use to anybody, be they neophyte or wizard.

However even focused practices need careful management to avoid the same problems. Recently two of the associations round here have both set up their own Surprise Major/Minor practices. Unfortunately they both quickly became a waste of time if you weren't a Major ringer, as all the people trying to learn Minor ended up being rammed together into the same touches, with predictable consequences. I quickly stopped going to those as well.

So, targeted practices are a must, but they need to be well organised ones.

When we went to the HLF "How to write your bid" session, they made it clear to us that if we put "We don't need contingency, we have everything covered" in our bid it would result in it being rejected. And they were right, we used it all - and them some. Nobody's fault, until we started to take everything apart we didn't find some pretty significant issues.

I may be telling you something you already know, but don't forget the "VAT hole". Suppliers will charge you VAT and although you'll be able to claim it back, there will be a delay and in the meantime you'll have to cover the difference.

have we really moved so far away from the original purpose — Mary Jones

You could make a good case that we are moving back closer to the original purpose because if you go back beyond the Victorian era, in many places bells were rung primarily for secular purposes. "Bells are just for services" was very much an Oxford Movement thing.

https://funwithbells.com/gareth-davies/

We followed the Heritage Lottery guidance:

A contingency is only used to pay for unexpected costs required to deliver your project. The total contingency figure may be up to 10% of the total costs of the project, unless you have a particularly complex capital project where a higher level may be required.

The figure we used was around 7%. But if you don't have any contingency at all then I wouldn't sign it off either - sorry.

Indeed. I was a participant in the last AI "revolution". I think "Deja Vu" best sums it up...

If this was a nautical environment, rotten old hemp ropes would be going straight in the skip :wink:

I was concerned about that but no, they didn't. And it was only a temporary expedient to keep the bell going until we got new bellropes.

my "favourite" bit of bellrope splicing was having to splice a right-hand laid top end onto a left-land laid bottom end... :scream:

The key skill is striking, which is a combination of physical bell control, accurate listening and good teamwork. — Rosalind Martin

Yes, and I'm sure the best ringers consider all of those to be a "work in progress" and never stop striving to improve them. I think how they do that are skills that could be transferred to less rarefied levels of ringing. Rather than focusing teaching Method X or Y, perhaps teaching "How to improve your ringing" is more important?

And the people who are best at that are.... (around here) the Peal Ringers. — Rosalind Martin

There are no peal ringers around here.

So John, if you are offered a rope in a peal and you are fit enough to do it, I would encourage you to say yes! — Rosalind Martin

I can't ever see that happening to be honest - even QP opportunities are infrequent and I've had quite enough after 45 mins anyway - the physical side isn't an issue, it's a mixture of boredom and not wanting to stuff it up as it get close to the end :lol: And as a late starter I don't think I'll realistically progress much beyond Minor ringing anyway.

The best and most challenging ringing I do is in peals, because most of the best ringers I ring with also ring peals for the same reason. — Simon Linford

The top level of peal ringing that you describe is impressive and it would be sad to see it become even more niche. Although I think it gets a publicity that's disproportionate to the number of participants, perhaps that's no bad thing as it is aspirational in the same way that the top level of any activity is.

that ringing is not putting much back (generally) — Simon Linford

I'm fortunate to ring regularly with people who's technical standard I am unlikely to ever approach, but what I've gained most from them is mindset and approach - perhaps that's something that can "be put back"? I see a lot of people at my level struggling to make progress and I think a big part of it is because of that?

thanks, that's similar to the list I came up with. I can see the appeal (pun intended) for composers & conductors, but for others the benefits seem marginal at best, and I think difficult to justify when compared to QPs. Although some people clearly enjoy being a "rank and file" peal ringer, I think the importance of peal ringing is a difficult pitch to recent starters, although of course it will be attractive to some of them.

I have heard people claim that the striking in a peal only really gets good after the first couple of hours (!). If true then perhaps it would be better to work on striking well from the start of all performances?

The original question was if the decline in peal ringing mattered. If the definition of "what matters" is the overall participation levels in ringing, and the standard of what's rung, perhaps the answer is "No, not really"?

p.s. I thought you only had to ring a QP to name a method, or are you referring to the naming the peal composition rather than the method(s)?

I think "pushing peals" is flogging a dead horse. I'm sure some people will still ring them, including a small proportion of "newbies" but none of my cohort (recent-ish starters) are interested, and indeed most of the long-timers of my acquaintance who have rung them in the past aren't interested any longer. I can think of only one person who still rings peals, but they've been unable to persuade me of why anyone would bother.

QPs however are a different matter - I think I'd get far more out of ringing 4 QPs than I would of ringing one full peal.

I'd love to hear what the benefits are, other than bragging rights and masochism?

That's not actually true. Consent is only one of the legitimate reasons for holding data, and not the first choice advised. — John Harrison

That's not what I meant, I meant that GDPR compliance is often considered to be so scary it prevents people from doing things like setting up electronic membership systems, or email distribution lists.