We’re excited to announce that the winner of our MoS DJ Academy course competition is Koko Owusu!

On top of that, our friends at fairsharemusic.com have compiled a vInspired Volunteers DJ Mix of our top-ten favourite selections – available to download now!

The winner

Koko Owusu

Koko’s 18 years old and lives in London. She’ll be coming along to the Ministry of Sound DJ Academy on 31 August to learn skills and tips from some top-notch Ministry of Sound DJs. Well done Koko!

Here’s her winning comment:

Probably not reaaaally MoS style but NONETHELESS it would have to be

Sun Is Shining by Bob Marley (and do a mashup with either Jamie XX – Beat For/Far Nearer or could simply be the Bob Sinclair remix).

The song is ALL about sharing positivity, enjoying ourselves and living and loving life to the fullest no matter what. I think young volunteers would appreciate the message and most importantly love rocking out to this tune!

Why it was a winner…

We loved the song she chose to dedicate to young volunteers but more importantly, we loved the reasoning behind her song choice.

We too believed that young volunteers would appreciate the message of positivity behind this Bob Marley hit – and most importantly love rocking out to it!

Ministry of Sound DJ academy were particularly impressed with her mash up/remix idea for Sun Is Shining!

The Playlist

We teamed up with MoS DJ Academy to pick our top ten tracks from all the entries and complied a playlist for you all to download from our friends at fairsharemusic for £8.99 - with 50% of all profits donated back to vInspired to help us continue our work with young people.

Plus, everyone who entered the competition gets special discount- check your inboxes if you entered for your discount code!

Thanks to everyone who entered the competition and helped create the playlist. Enjoy!

How much for the pants?

From auctioning underwear to visiting terminally ill patients, the celebrities who give their time to volunteer get a ‘thumbs up’ from vInspired. It’s time to shine some light on celebrities who practise a little less conversation and a little more action…

Justin Bieber

On Valentine’s Day, JB didn’t canoodle with his ‘boo’ – Selena Gomez, instead he flew six-year-old cancer patient Avalanna Routh to New York whose parents started a Facebook campaign to meet her favourite celebrity; the duo feasted on cupcakes, played board games and just had a fun time. Jealous much?

Kate Winslet

After witnessing the troubles undergone by a friend and her autistic son, Kate Winslet started The Golden Hat Foundation, which works towards helping people with autism lead fuller lives. She also launched a book filled with poetry and quotes on autism from her famous friends; celebrities include Justin Timberlake to Ricky Gervais , all wearing a hat that has been passed along.

Prince William and Duchess Kate Middleton

The whole world was turning their wedding into the spectacle of the season, but instead of reaching for the wedding registry the royal couple graciously requested their guests to donate money to their charity – The Royal Charity fund; the proceeds went to support 5 charities of their choice. The couple finalised on Action on Addiction, East Anglia’s Children’s Hospices, The Art Room and the National Portrait Gallery.

Emma Watson

Emma wants to be known for more than her Harry Potter image and is doing a jolly good job of it. Emma Watson launched a sustainable clothing line for fair-trade company People Tree. The initiative saw Emma travelling to Bangladesh to dabble in a bit of dress making and see how the clothes were made. The profits made by People Tree go into running the local school and day care centres.very vInspiring!

Johnny Depp

When not engaging in his movie personas (you know facing headless horsemen, slaughtering people to use in his delicious baked goodies and all that) Johnny Depp provides support to children in need. The deed that wins the gold star is recording an encouraging tape message for a seventeen year old girl, who was in a coma. Johnny also auctioned his knickers – the winner bidding £1600! The money went to Helen & Douglas House – a children’s hospice in Oxfordshire.

Take action!

There’s a good chance your knickers may not even sell for a penny or your last experience with DIY fashion involved knitting with your gran, but if celebrities can take up volunteering in their hectic schedules – so can you!

So get started and get thinking; if you could start any volunteering opportunity of your choice, what would it be? Please share your comments below!

Aged 14-25 and have a great idea for a community project? We’re handing out grants with vInspired Cashpoint! Find out more and apply.

If you’re 13-25 and have a simple project in mind or just need to get in touch with like-minded volunteers visit Junction49 – the place where young people share and develop ideas.

Want to make a lasting, positive change in the world? Have an idea for a community project in your local area?

vInspired is delighted to be working with Disney and Youth Service America (YSA) to offer you the opportunity to receive a £750 grant to develop and run your project.

We are looking for projects that highlight your creativity and commitment to make a positive social change and meet the needs of other people. We want you to show that small actions can add up to a big change.

Whether you are passionate about protecting the planet, providing meals to those who need them, or giving kids just like you the resources to star in their own play, be an athlete or an artist, you can be a Friend for Change! Whatever your interests, a Disney Friends for Change Grant can help you make a difference for people, communities and the planet.

Young people aged 5-18 located in England are invited to apply for the £750 grants. The Disney Friends for Change Grants programme encourages all applicants to identify a responsible adult (e.g. parent, teacher, youth worker) to support the application and to give all Friends for Change projects the best chance of success.

Get involved

Applications are due by midnight 21st June 2012

Begin the online application process now.

Learn more about Disney Friends for Change on its website.

Cutting your carbon footprint, wearing a seat belt and jogging; apart from their impact on our environment do you notice any similarities?

I didn’t either until the other day. vInspired staff became the lucky recipients of a presentation delving into the world of ‘Behaviour Change Campaigning’ as part our ‘Innovation Lunch’ series. Delivered by the impressively qualified Hugh Mouser, whose repertoire of work includes Amnesty International, Global Witness, Age Concern UK and 38 Degrees, this was guaranteed to be better than a jam sandwich.

Behaviour Change Campaigning

Short of sounding like something a visit to a hypnotherapist promises; behaviour change campaigning is fast embedding itself into the third sector’s social artillery and achieving an impressive range of outcomes.

Through researching and tapping into your target groups’ current influences, behavioural patterns and value systems in order to introduce new patterns of behaviour for social good.
Examples range from 10:10’s focus on individuals, schools and workplaces to take action in combatting climate change; the invention of the ‘jogging’ craze’ by Nike; Time To Change’s fight against mental health discrimination through promoting public discussion, ‘salon chat’ and human libraries.

To me this sounds like marketing with a social conscious; which gets me excited. The government may be well versed in legal frameworks and policy yet bottom-up approaches can remind us that we to are able to step up and shape the world around us.

What would you change?

So what would you change about today’s behavioural patterns in order to make a positive impact on the community and world you live in?

I was thinking about my general dislike of consumerism and waste, which is always then followed by a guilty feeling epitomised by my rather large clothes collection – enough for a small family with only about 2% of them in use.

So I thought why not make a pledge to not buy any brand new clothes for a whole year and only buy from Charity Shops. This consumerist cleanse is bound to transform me into Charity Shop Champion, supporting local causes as well as finessing my recycling and patchwork skills.

So what about you? Where do you see that a simple change in your actions and behaviour could make a lasting difference to your communities, world and beyond?

Answers on a postcard please (or a simple comment will do)!

Joanna Mayes, 20, recently won the 2012 vInspired National Award for Bringing Communities Together.

Here, Joanna shares her powerful and inspirational story….

Have you ever felt so alone that it hurt? Thought about the future and wanted to harm yourself? Felt the pain that you are causing to other people was too much and that they would be better without you? I have.

Four years ago, after a traumatic experience, I was sitting in an isolation room at school crying, feeling worthless and unable to see a future with me in it.

I was being bullied, wasn’t doing well in lessons, self- harming and completely and utterly lost. Every time I thought I had hit rock bottom – I would fall further .

There have been three pivotal events since then that have helped me turn my life around.

Firstly, through volunteering as a football coach I was given the opportunity to represent Bedfordshire at the FA National leadership and volunteer camp. It was my first time away from home. The 99 other young people that I met that week accepted me for who I was as they didn’t know about my past.

I realised that I maybe wouldn’t be able to rebuild my school life – but there was a whole other life to be had. I could change things and I found that I could be liked for who I was outside of school.

I started doing a lot of volunteering. Next thing I knew I had applied and was accepted to be part of the UK Youth Healthy Young Adults Transitions Project (HYAT). It meant that I would have to travel up to Chester for a weekend residential. I had not been on a train on my own before. I was going to a place I had never been before to meet people I have never seen before; and not only that I had to use the tube!

But I managed it. This project carried on for another two and a half years. It allowed me to grow in confidence. I found acceptance from people who knew and understood my situation.

Most recently I was lucky enough to be able to go on the Rotary Youth Leadership Award. What a hard week! But something positive changed in me that week and I haven’t looked back since.

I could write pages and pages about what volunteering has done for me.

People ask me why I volunteer when I don’t get paid, but for me I gained something that cannot ever be valued by money.

It wasn’t an overnight thing. Some days I really did feel like I didn’t want to get out of bed, and there were times when I question why I do it. But I stick with it.

I will never be able to put into words just how thankful I am to the people who helped me along the way.

I just hope that the fact that I won the 2012 National vInspired Award for Bringing Communities Together and have done over 5000 hours of voluntary work can go some way to saying, in my own way: “thank you”.

Joanna is currently setting up her own mental health project called Mind the Gap. You can also find them on Twitter.

Discover the power of volunteering for yourself on vinspired.com.

It’s Mental Health Awareness Week 2012 between 21-27 May. Find out more on the Mental Health Foundation website

Visit YoungMinds for further information and support on young people’s mental health and wellbeing.

We’re absolutely delighted to have received recognition for our youth involvement work, by winning the British Youth Council’s (BYC) Youth on Board, Youth-led Award!

The BYC said:

“The BYC is rewarding vInspired for the role it has played in making itself youth led through its team of young advisors, advocates and ambassadors…They have enabled the voice of young people to shine through as the board supported vInspired to develop vInspired.com,vInspired.org and a range of innovative social media platforms connecting young people to volunteering opportunities in their local community.”

At vInspired, we’ve always had a history of putting young people at the heart of all our work, at all levels. It’s part of our culture and organisational DNA, so this award means a lot to everyone involved.

Youth on Board or YOB Awards are an exclusively youth-led rolling award scheme that recognises both young people and the projects and organisations that support them. The Youth led award recognises youth-led organisations that are providing a platform for young people and young voices making a difference at a local, national or international level.

vinspired’s Youth Advisory Board plays a major role in the development of the charity and its work. The young people on the advisory board act as a constant sounding board for us, making sure we hear young people’s voices loud and clear.

Some of biggest and best projects have resulted from suggestions which came out of the Youth Advisory Board, projects such as our youth-funding programme, Cashpoint, to high profile campaigns like ‘I ♥ Volunteering’ and many more.

vInspired aims to create a collaborative partnership between staff and young volunteers, recognising that we can all learn from each other. In order to ensure youth participation we flex our working practices and culture in order to accommodate the inclusion of young people in decision-making processes.

If you would like to hear more about youth involvement at vInspired, please feel free to contact me.

You can also follow updates from the YAB on Twitter.

Over the last four years, he’s given over 1,500 hours of his time to volunteering. Tom tells us all about his extraordinary story so far and why volunteering is so important to him….

My name’s Tom and I’m proud to be a volunteer-aholic. Why? Because I find volunteering to be great fun, really rewarding, and beneficial for myself and others. For me, volunteering isn’t just something to put on my CV or something to do when I’m bored; it’s a huge part of my life and my volunteering experiences have really shaped my view of the world.

My addiction to volunteering has taken me from Leeds (North England) to the amazing Amazon rainforest and to South Africa, to music festivals and government meetings, and to allotments and beautiful countryside.

It started when I moved to Leeds in September 2008 for university. I soon discovered that volunteering doesn’t mean doing boring work for free, it’s about having the opportunity to do something you’re passionate about, having a great time, and meeting lots of fantastic, like-minded people.

In my first two years at uni, I volunteered as part of a human rights and environmental campaign group, People and Planet. I had great fun running a ‘bottled water funfair’ as part of our successful campaign to make Leeds University Union the first in the country to replace all bottled water with re-usable bottles.

After several successful campaigns I realised that creating real change and having tangible impacts locally is a huge motivator for me. So much so that I realised that’s what I want to do with the rest of my life!

That’s when my volunteering addiction got really bad/good…

I decided to take a year out to volunteer as an Environmental Education assistant for a local community charity, Groundwork Leeds. I helped on all sorts of fantastic projects in schools and communities, lasting from a few hours up to 10 weeks.

I’ve also volunteered doing scientific research in Ecuador and helping with conservation on a game reserve in South Africa with GVI.

While in Leeds I’ve also done peer mentoring, first aid, conservation, youth work, festival stewarding and loads more… the choices when it comes to volunteering are pretty much endless!

Here’s what I learnt:

There is very little on Earth that is more rewarding and gratifying than seeing the happiness of others grow thanks to the time and effort you spend with them.

What’s more, through my volunteering, I have finally found a career that I really want to follow in Environment Education.

So my advice would be to really embrace volunteering and do as much as you can – whatever your interests there will be something to suit you.

Try new things. You’ll experience so much more of what life has to offer, you’ll meet loads of interesting people and gain some new friends, and you’ll probably learn a lot about yourself along the way.

So do what I did, get out there and volunteer… but be warned, it’s so good you’ll soon get addicted!

It’s staggering that nearly a fifth of the people on the planet live on less than a pound a day for all their food, fuel, shelter, clothing. Going to bed hungry every night, in fact, being constantly hungry all week, certainly makes you think about the vast inequality and unfairness of the world. The fact that we have an obesity crisis in the West while people are hungry in the South, to me, represents a global system in chaos.

So, has the campaign made me think? Yes. Have I raised awareness? I hope so. Have I raised money? Some.

But, to my surprise, the Live below the Line campaign has made me think far more about food poverty in the UK. I was aware of the issue, particularly because Team v ran an amazing food poverty campaign last year to tackle the problem.

On Sunday morning I was walking backwards and forwards between Sainsbury’s and Tesco because economy beans are 47p at Sainsbury’s and 44p at Tesco and that makes a difference when you only have 500p for your weekly shop. It’s brought home to me just how hard it must be for the millions of people in the UK who are living on, or below, the poverty line. To eat a well-balanced diet would be tough, to eat your 5-a-day would be nigh on impossible.

I’m not pretending to have any answers to global food security, obesity, food poverty, underpaid farmers, food subsidies and the whole host of other complex issues that surround the seemingly straightforward business of feeding ourselves but I do know we all need to think more about it.

For more information on poverty in the UK check out this Joseph Rowntree Foundation report. Join ONE’s campaign on food security.

Which issues or campaign would you care enough about to give something up?

If you’re aged between 18-24, you can have the chance to lead your very own campaigns by applying to be part of Team v!

At first glance, John-Paul’s credentials don’t mark him out as someone who wants to change the world. As an experienced journalist, writing for the Financial Times and Sunday Times among others, it’s easy to imagine Flintoff as a cynical old hack, with little interest in making a difference. However, it’s clear within minutes that Flintoff is different.

Indeed, it was precisely his own journalistic investigation into sweatshops in Manhattan that inspired him to learn how to make his own clothes – and then encourage others to do the same. ‘These days, we don’t make things, we just buy them,’ he explains – an approach which dulls our own sense of agency and our understanding of how clothes are made.

He shows off his attire, and explains how with the help of his Great Aunt Peggy, a YouTube group called ThreadBanger and a second-hand treadle sewing machine, he learnt how to cut patterns and sew his own shirts and jeans. The results are impressive and Flintoff is fiercely enthusiastic about the learning and discovery process that underpins his new hand-made wardrobe.

He explained how a network of friends, relatives, a local seamstress, a haberdashery and online resources helped him to perfect his art: ‘Every time I made a mistake, I thought YES, I’m one step closer to getting it right.’ And when you find out that he now grows hemp and nettles so that he can spin his own yarn to make Y-fronts, you can see how far he’s come.

Changing the world

Flintoff’s latest project is no less awe-inspiring – he’s out to change the world and to share his world-changing tips with others. He’s the first to acknowledge that it’s a pretty ambitious goal, and that anyone who says they want to change the world runs the risk of being laughed at – or at least perceived as a bit odd. But he’s steadfast in his view that we all have the creativity, resources and passion to make positive change happen. As Flintoff points out, ‘We all make history, all the time – through the infinitesimally small actions that we take (or don’t take) every day.’

We’re already change-makers, whether we know it or not, and Flintoff’s latest book, ‘How to change the world,’ is designed to help us direct our energies towards the things we most want to change. ‘Be clear about what needs fixing’ advises Flintoff – once you know precisely what the problem is, you’ll be better equipped to identify possible solutions.

He also encourages a step-by-step approach to making change happen, by crowd-sourcing ideas and solutions, cherry-picking your favourite ideas and taking action. ‘Don’t over-think the problem – it will become huge, alarming and too big to deal with,’ he explains. ‘Each step leads you further down the path of change, so start now and get on with it!’’

So, who cares if people laugh or think you’re a bit odd? You CAN change the world. Starting now!

John Paul Flintoff’s new book, ‘How to change the world’ is available now.

Here, she explains why children’s literacy is so important to her and why she wanted to get involved in Team v’s latest campaign to improve children’s literacy through the power of story-telling at a recent reading workshop run by Team v Harrow…

“The more you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.”
Dr Suess, I Can Read With My Eyes Shut

As this Dr Suess quote suggests; learning to read is empowering and takes a reader on a journey of discovery. In this day and age, where we have so many distractions; computer games, ipads, iphones. It is easy for reading practise and reading for pleasure to be sidelined.

There are SO many reasons for why learning to reading is essential and a skill which cannot be overlooked in a child’s early years. Books introduce a whole new world for children; one they can learn from, one they can enjoy.

As a child learns to read, they will learn new words and develop their own imagination skills, which will directly impact on their own writing and storytelling skills. Therefore, it is essential that parents and caregivers, support reading skill development and find the time to do so.

Learning to read is all about, “Practise, practise, practise”. Not only reading school books, but also signs on the road, words on packaging, headings on a newspaper. It’s all about trying; trying to recognise letters, familiar sound groups, familiar words, wherever you are in your environment.

I recently took part in a reading workshop run by Team V in Harrow. It was wonderful to meet the children that attended the workshop and hear about the stories they like to read. I read them one of my books, Jake Monkey-Tail; I enjoyed hearing each child’s responses to the story and also what part of the story they enjoyed the most.

This always interests me because whatever a child enjoys most is what they will take away with them, and this is what will then inspire them in the future. Perhaps when they need to write a story or perhaps, depending on the context of the story, when they need a boost of confidence in their own lives.

On hearing about Team V, I was immediately impressed by the initiative and hence keen to be involved and help out in any way. Patrick, who represents Team V Harrow, impressed me with his confidence and enthusiasm in supporting and encouraging the literacy needs of young children within his community.

The Team V volunteers are not only a caring and passionate group of individuals but also inspirational role models for their own peer group and younger children within their community.

Priya Desai

Speech and Language Therapist and Children’s Author

Team v leaders have done an amazing job running reading and story-telling workshops all over the country, just like this one in London:

Year two of Team v is now open for recruitment – if you want to change the world, one brand-new campaign at a time. apply now!