News

Monday 26 November 2007

Funding to turn young people's passions into community action

A volunteering charity has awarded £300,000 to a collaborative project aimed at getting young people in Nottinghamshire positively involved in their communities. The funding - from youth charity v – will be split between Nottingham Trent University (lead partner), Nottingham Trent Students’ Union and New College Nottingham, and will be used to help 900 students develop and lead community-based projects.

Students aged from 16-25 will focus on providing their communities with support and assistance in a range of community-based projects over the next three years. The new initiative is part of a new £75m national youth volunteering programme called vinvolved, which aims to inspire more young people to volunteer in England.

Andy Coppins, project manager and volunteering projects coordinator for Nottingham Trent University said: "We're very excited to be part of the vinvolved programme. This funding will allow us to invest in supporting students in developing ideas that are based around their own passions and talents. Each of the partners in this collaboration will be purposely recruiting new staff with which to support the project, and help those taking part to achieve outcomes of enormous benefit to our surrounding communities."

He added: "Working in this way provides scope and opportunity that can only be limited by a young person’s imagination".

vinvolved has been designed by and for young people to make volunteering a compelling choice for all 16-25 year olds in England by tapping into their passions and concerns. The charity aims to change the image of volunteering and make it a ‘must-have’ part of young people’s lives.

Terry Ryall, v’s Chief Executive, says: "v is delighted to be able to fund this innovative and youth-led project, which will enable young people to get positively involved in Nottinghamshire.

"Young people are at the heart of this new programme which aims to put them at the centre of our communities. Instead of seeing them as a problem to be fixed, we are giving them the chance to become a positive force for change."

The volunteering opportunities will be available from April 2008. For more information visit www.wearev.com or the young people’s portal at www.vinspired.com.

Ends

Notes to Editor

• v is the youth volunteering charity launched in May 2006 whose mission is to inspire a new generation of young volunteers in England aged 16-25. v is supported by the Office of the Third Sector in the Cabinet Office.
• The charity was set up to implement the recommendations of the Russell Commission outlining a new national framework for youth action and engagement, following a nationwide consultation which included 6000 young people.
• v is led by the cares, interests, passions and beliefs of young people. A Youth Advisory Board made up of twenty young people called v20 is involved in all aspects of the charity’s work. Four members of v20 sit on v’s Board of Trustees.
• v works with and builds upon the current voluntary sector infrastructure, funds the creation of volunteering opportunities through grants rounds and implements programmes to create awareness and positive understanding of volunteering for young people. For more information on v, visit www.wearev.com.
• The new programme will fund 105 vinvolved teams of experts, at least 105 Youth Action Teams and 152 projects run by small and large organisations.
• vinvolved builds on the previous government-funded Millennium Volunteers programme and v’s work to date with more than 200 voluntary sector organisations. It has commissioned 205,000 volunteering opportunities so far. The new programme gives voice to the 6,000 young people surveyed by the Russell Commission who said there needed to be a step change in the quantity, quality and diversity of volunteering opportunities to make it easier for young people to volunteer.

For more information please contact: Matt Wallace, on +44 (0)115 848 8785, or email matthew.wallace@ntu.ac.uk, or Therese Easom, Press and Media Relations Manager, on +44 (0)115 848 8774, or email therese.easom@ntu.ac.uk.