The Platinum Champion Awards are an official Jubilee project to celebrate outstanding volunteers across the country who are making a difference every day.
The Platinum Champions Awards, launched by Royal Voluntary Service in honour of Her Majesty The Queen’s 70 years of service, have given us the opportunity to celebrate the remarkable contribution of all volunteers, who truly are the backbone of our country.
Congratulations to all our Platinum Champions – and my heartfelt thanks to you and to the millions of volunteers across the UK who give their time and talents so generously. – Her Royal Highness, The Duchess of Cornwall.
Thousands of people aged from 16 to 101 from all over the UK and supporting a range of causes were nominated and from these nominations, 490 volunteers have been hand-picked by a judging panel presided over by The Duchess of Cornwall, and crowned Platinum Champions.
All 490 Platinum Champions received a specially designed pin and a signed certificate from HRH The Duchess of Cornwall. The 70 most outstanding volunteers were also invited to celebrate at a special edition of The Big Jubilee Lunch in London on the 5 June.
Wendy Davis, an ex-Primary School teacher, founded ‘Andover Trees United’ in 2012, a volunteer-led group working with schools, businesses and local authorities to improve access to natural spaces and promote wildlife conservation.
Wendy won her award in the category of Children and Young People for her tireless work with Andover Trees United (ATU) over the past decade. It has been her mission to bring environmental education and nature connectedness to all, but especially to young people, and as she often says, “no child should be left behind”.
To date, 10,000 children from Andover and villages have planted trees through the ‘Harmony Woods’ project and an annual Schools’ Tree Planting Fortnight has now been established in 30 local schools. If that wasn’t enough, thousands more children and adults have been involved, informed and inspired by the huge array of ATU community projects and opportunities that Wendy has spearheaded along the way and, last year, over £110,000 was raised to build an off-grid, sustainable, field-study base and volunteer room in Harmony Woods.
As a result of her work, Wendy was invited to attend the Platinum Party at the Palace on 4th June and to the Kia Oval cricket ground on 5th June for the Big Jubilee Lunch – an event hosted by the Eden Project and the Royal Voluntary Service.
Guests included Their Royal Highnesses The Duke and Duchess of Cornwall, the 70 Platinum Champions, plus special guests and celebrity ambassadors.
As we mark the final day of #NationalVolunteersWeek, we wanted to share how proud we are of what Wendy, and the rest of the trees team have achieved together. They have done so as volunteers, put simply, as people who care about their community.
Over 4 million people volunteered for the first time during the pandemic. Of these, several million have said that they would like to continue to volunteer. Do you feel inspired to get involved? If you do, we would love to hear from you. Email ATU at volunteers@andovertrees.org.uk
