Hospitality charity Springboard receives prestigious Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Volunteering Award

Leading hospitality charity Springboard has been awarded The Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Volunteering Award. This prestigious award recognises outstanding work in empowering and helping support 16-25 years old from across the UK.

This is a one-off award created to mark Queen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee and 20 years of The Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service (QAVS), with the awards personally approved by His Majesty The King. Each charity, including Springboard, will be awarded a handwritten certificate with The King’s signature presented at one of the Royal Garden Party events in 2023.

The award commends Springboard’s extensive work in helping disadvantaged and unemployed people of all ages, backgrounds, and levels of society to secure jobs within the hospitality sector – through its training, where applicants can gain the skills, knowledge, and experience needed to flourish in a lifelong career.

The leading hospitality charity has had an exceptional year in 2022, continuing to provide inspiring incentives such as FutureChef – a school-based programme that supports life skills development while inspiring young people to pursue an exciting career in the hospitality industry. Its 2022 competition saw 12,000 schoolchildren across the UK compete for the title of 2022 FutureChef Champion, sparking their creativity and passion for the culinary arts.

The hospitality charity also launched its most ambitious programme to date, Springboard to 2022, which helped secure hospitality jobs for 10,000 young people across the UK. The programme supported people into jobs via a range of employability training programmes that include one-to-one mentoring, and soft and hard skills development, while also providing access to work placements for participants to gain hands-on, practical experience.

Springboard’s efforts have helped leading industry businesses by ensuring they have access to a skilled and engaged talent pipeline ready for the industry when vacancies become available. Upon completing the programme, trainees have secured work within renowned businesses, including IHG, Compass, Hilton, Jury’s Inn, Starbucks, Pizza Hut, and Nando’s.

This work has been supported by Springboard’s network of almost 2,000 industry Ambassadors, who volunteer their time to carry out mock interviews and industry visits for trainees, carry out careers talks in schools, and judge and mentor FutureChef competitors.

Discussing his experience with Springboard, 21-year-old Kevin McGowan from Glasgow said:

“Springboard has supported me by working with me and letting me go at my own pace. I was never judged or dismissed. I would say to anyone struggling with unemployment, don’t give in, or give up. See it through, and you will get there. I would highly recommend a Springboard training to anyone who asks me.”

Commenting on the award win, Chris Gamm, CEO of Springboard, said:

“The recognition of having demonstrated outstanding work by His Majesty the King is an honour for Springboard. We are delighted and grateful to have been awarded The Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Volunteering Award for our work to support young, unemployed, and underprivileged people across the UK.

“The award comes at an exciting time when we are celebrating having helped over 10,000 unemployed people secure jobs as part of our ‘Springboard to 2022’ initiative and as we are close to reaching our target of having 2,000 volunteer ambassadors on board.”