Great way to say big thank-you to festival makers
WHAT could perhaps be classed as the final event of the Great Exhibition of the North has taken place – and it proved one of the most emotional.
It was staged as a thank-you to the hundreds of volunteers who made the 80-day festival a huge success as well as to recognise their efforts.
Staged at the Baltic in Gateshead, it was a celebratory gathering in which 10 awards in six categories were handed out, the winners chosen by the number of nominations they received from their fellow volunteers.
Volunteer Programme Manager, Amy Orr, said: “It was a chance for us to say thank-you to them. We couldn’t have done it without them. They just helped bring the whole thing to life.”
Four awards were handed out in the Young Volunteers category for those aged 16 to 25; one for Engaging the Audience to the person who got visitors involved most in activities; and one Hidden Treasure award was presented to the person who worked hard but out of the public eye.
Two awards were given to Unsung Heroes, and one each for the volunteer who thought most Outside the Box and finally the Outstanding Volunteer which went to the person who got the most nominations across all the categories.
Starting with the Pioneer Volunteers who got involved in February before the exhibition began in June, around 800 volunteers in total aged 16 to 77 gave their time free to the event which ended on September 9.
Amy said of the Baltic get-together: “It was lovely and quite emotional for some people. There was a real buzz about the place, celebrating what they were a part of. There was an amazing variety of people involved. From young people from school giving their time after exams or waiting to go to university to retired individuals who had loads of free time and wanted to give something back.”
The one-day event last Thursday also included talks and presentations arranged by organisers of the exhibition, the NewcastleGateshead Initiative, about future opportunities for those attending.
Amy said: “It could be about taking that experience into a career and future opportunities for volunteering.”
Forthcoming volunteering opportunities include a huge rugby union event being staged in Newcastle next May. The Challenge Cup final will be played at St James’ Park on the evening of Friday, May 10, with the Heineken Champions Cup decider scheduled for the same venue the following day, Saturday, May 11.
In between those two fixtures Newcastle Falcons’ Kingston Park Stadium will play host to the European Rugby Continental Shield on Saturday lunchtime, which will be contested by the two teams chasing qualification for the following season’s European Challenge Cup.
Then in August there is the World Transplant Games being staged in Newcastle Gateshead.
Ongoing volunteering opportunities like working for the Ouseburn Trust were also outlined.