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Young Volunteers Recognised in Youth-led Celebration
 ‘Rewarding and celebrating volunteering’ is easier said than done. The words ‘thank you’ don’t always do justice to the gratitude we want to express to the young volunteers we are lucky enough to work with. And is ‘celebrating volunteering’ really an attractive enough tag-line for an event aimed at drawing 16-25 year olds? This is a challenge that Vinvolved Central London were faced with when we decided to put on a celebration night, to recognize the fantastic achievement of all the young volunteers the project had placed into opportunities since it begun running in April 2008. Luckily, we were wise enough to enlist the help of a group young people to design the kind of event that their peers would want to attend. We recruited for a Reward and Celebration Team of young  volunteers, who subsequently met up every Wednesday evening over a period of several months, to plan, develop, organize and ultimately deliver a celebration event with a difference.
Supported by staff, our youth-led Reward and Celebration Team organized every aspect of a fabulous superheroes-themed event: the venue, the catering, the funky decorations, the entertainment (an impressive array of young dancers and musicians who volunteered to perform at the event), the invitations, the press release, the celebrity host, and the framed superhero-themed awards.  The Reward and Celebration Team’s efforts and dedication were themselves rewarded when the big night finally came round, in all its superheroic glory. A crowd of around 100 enthusiastic people of all ages filled City University’s Student Union bar, comprising of young volunteers who came to receive awards, their friends and family, performers, and even a couple of VIPs for good measure. The event was hosted by the celebrity comedian Kojo, and featured speeches from Islington South and Finsbu MP Emily Thornberry and V’s Deputy Head of Programmes Selina Papa. As volunteering awards were being presented to inspiring young people, and physical and vocal acrobatics  performed on stage, a local mediaphotographer was zooming round the bar capturing the action. A few days later the celebration event was featured on the front page of the Islington Gazette EC1, suggesting that ‘celebrity volunteering’ may be a more apt tag-line for promoting future celebration  events!
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| | Youth Volunteering | | Young people 16 – 25 years old across Central London (Camden, Islington, Kensington and Chelsea, Lambeth, Southwark, Wandsworth, Westminster)
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