Rutland junior volunteer army contributes £7,500 of work to the community as part of Voluntary Action Rutland scheme

A junior volunteer army has been recognised for their efforts which saw 500 hours of unpaid work dedicated to the community.

Voluntary Action Rutland (VAR) launched a pilot scheme involving six Rutland primary schools this spring and summer with 110 Year 5 pupils helping out within their home and local community to do things for others.

Altogether 500 volunteer hours were clocked up collectively by the pupils, which VAR chief executive Tom Walters estimated added a £7,500 boost to the economy, based on the work costing £15 an hour.

Activities involved helping at home, making meals, caring for relatives visiting people in hospitals or care homes and one boy even helped at a homeless shelter. A total of 180 bags of rubbish were collected by the considerate pupils and £150 was raised in bake sales and donations.

Pupils from Catmose Primary School and Brooke Hill Academy in Oakham, Edith Weston Academy, Leighfield Primary School in Uppingham, Cottesmore Academy and Langham CE Primary School took part in what VAR hopes will expand to 10 schools next year and become an annual part of the curriculum for Rutland’s primaries.

Activities involved helping at home, making meals, caring for relatives visiting people in hospitals or care homes and one boy even helped out at a homeless shelter. Altogether 180 bags of rubbish were collected by the considerate pupils and £150 was raised in bake sales and donations.

Mr Walters said: “I just had no idea we have so many amazing people who are doing stuff. I deal alot with a lot of volunteers and I see a lot of stuff, but I found it so eye-opening and so humbling that we have this amazing junior volunteer army, who are doing all this stuff, but not telling ayone.

"We want to say a huge thanks to the school and the teachers and all of the kids who participated.”

Oakham School sponsored and supported the Rutland Young Volunteer scheme, which was finished off with a prizegiving recently at the school, with presentation by High Sheriff Richard Chesterfield and Lord Lieutenant Dr Sarah Furness. Award nominees had been put forward by their school for going the extra mile.

Mr Walters had come up with the pilot project as a way to help embed volunteering as a way of life from a young age.

He said: “The older we get, the more daunting volunteering can appear and I think we forget that a lot of things that we do are for other people. One of the things I wanted to reinforce to the young people was you do a lot of this anyway, then we take it outside the home and realise that it is extremely rewarding.

“We know that the volunteers that drive for us, or the ladies that answer our telephones, they know they are making a difference because they are helping somebody.

“It is recognising we are a really small rural community and we do have a growing older population and that going forward we need more and of our young people to be coming through so that in 25 years, they are the volunteers in the county.”