Volunteer of the Year 2006 - Pete Kennedy
Pete Kennedy first began volunteering in sport when he took his son to Bingham Town Football Club and was asked to help out himself. Initially Pete helped out with the Under 7’s team before becoming their manager. In order to do this Pete completed an FA coaching qualification and continued his development by taking the FA Coaching players with disability course, both of which were funded by the club.
Since then Pete has been involved with turning Bingham Town FC, from a small club with minimal structure, to a club meeting the requirements of a Community Standard Club (accreditation scheme by the FA).
Pete’s achievements are varied and vast. In his role as Marketing and Sponsorship Co-ordinator, Pete has guided the club to achieve sponsorship exceeding £6000. He has also organised fundraising events, including a Christmas pantomime, which has raised in excess of £4,000.
Pete’s biggest achievement in the year 05/06 was to create the Butt Field Sports Club in Bingham, brining together Bingham Town FC, Bingham Town Youth FC and Bingham Cricket Club, who all use the same facility. He has produced the initial constitution for the club and is currently renegotiating the leasing rights with the local Council. Pete has played a pivotal role in securing over £400,000 from Bingham Town Council and preparing an application for £400,000 from the Football Foundation that will go towards building a new facility and providing new pitches for the Butt Field Sports Club worth over £850,000.
Pete’s varied role within the club highlights the need for non sports specific volunteers within clubs and the extra skills and knowledge business minded volunteers can bring to an organisation.
Despite the amount of time that Pete puts into the club, he recognises the need for all volunteers, whether they put in 1 hour or 15 hours, they all make a positive impact.
Pete describes his experience as a volunteer as “fantastic”, saying that he loves “seeing the enjoyment and the development of the kids” as a result of the work you’re doing and would advise anybody to “get up and get at it”!
Junior Volunteer of the Year 2006 - Alice Bullas
Alice first became involved in volunteering by chance when the Carnarvon Basketball Club where Alice was a member was running a Level one coaching award. Various other people were taking part so Alice went along too. This was just the beginning for Alice. She has subsequently taken her Community Sports Leaders Award and has also attended the one day Step into Sport Conference, which is designed to train Young Leaders in a variety of leadership and coaching skills. From this Alice was selected to attend the National four day Step into Sport Volunteer Camp at Loughborough University.
Alice is committed to her voluntary work and helps out at various school and community clubs including summer camps, the schools basketball club, Radcliffe swimming club, Dayncourt dance club, Shan Jones School of dance, Carnarvon school basketball team and a fundamental happy hour club. Alice has now received the Step Into Sport Gold Award for completing 200 hours Community Volunteering. (For more information on Step into Sport visit the Young leader section of the website).
Alice has also been recognised for her volunteer work by claiming the Dayncourt’s Dedication to Sport Award, Rushcliffe’s Community Sports Leader of the Year (2006) and the Nottinghamshire Junior Volunteer of the Year (2006).
Although winning awards for her work is a nice added extra, Alice doesn’t volunteer for this reason. She does it to “give something back to the community” and for the “feeling of satisfaction”.
Alice hopes to go on to be a teacher in the future and believes that the skills and confidence she has gained through her volunteer work will aid her in doing this.