Great Success at the First Volunteering Awards
Last week Sheffield Volunteering hosted the first Volunteering Awards, which hopes to become an annual event. The event recognised the hard work of all individuals volunteering through Sheffield Volunteering as well as presenting ten awards for outstanding projects or individuals.
Awards included: Sports Volunteering Project of the Year, New Volunteer of the Year and Most Innovative Volunteering Activity.
The awards were hosted by Activities Officer Nabil Alizai who said 'We've been crying out for an event to recognise our student volunteers and it was a fantastic celebration of our already award-winning Volunteering programme. The students and projects recognised make such a tangible difference to the local community, so it was lovely to have some staff from the projects present at the awards ceremony as well.'
The Volunteering Photo of the Year award was decided by an online poll that received 1237 votes, the most ever on the website and was won by Sheffield University Maths Society (SUMS) for their photo depicting a 'Willy Wonka's Workshop' session which teaches Sheffield school children to solve maths puzzles, practice addition, subtraction and fractions by weighing or counting out sweet treats and measuring the factory floor.
The final award of the evening, the 'Inspire & Be Inspired' award, based on the Sheffield Volunteering mission statement, including inspiring stories from five shortlisted individuals and was won by Kiran Malhi. Kiran volunteers with 'Two Troughs Allotments', Kiran went above and beyond expectations of a student volunteer by completing tasks including: creating volunteer agreements, researching and applying for funding, creating a business plan, securing site materials and organising volunteer days with two SU societies.
Last year (2010/2011) 1,504 students and staff from 55 departments volunteered through Sheffield Volunteering, benefiting 123 local charities and voluntary groups.
To find out more about Sheffield Volunteering drop into the Volunteering Office in the Sports and Activities Zone open 10am-5pm (Monday-Friday) or check out our website www.sheffieldvolunteering.info
