Students at West Nottinghamshire College got their hands dirty in the name of Student Volunteering Week (SVW).
SVW is a national celebration of student volunteering. Now in its thirteenth year, SVW celebrates the volunteering efforts of students from universities and colleges across the UK.
West Notts on the level 1 in painting and decorating diploma donned gardening gloves and wellington boots and used forks and spades to prepare the college’s new allotment plot based on Westfield Lane, Mansfield.
The group spent five hours each preparing the plot for planting potatoes on the football pitch-sized allotment plot.
The allotment is set to become a large-scale project and will involve students from all areas of the college who will help to develop the site, which will include a vegetable garden, a wildflower patch, an insect wall, fruit cage and a reflection garden with seating.
Throughout SVW the college’s Students’ Union delivered tutorials across all college campuses to let students know about the many volunteering projects that they could get involved in at the college, including picking litter at The Big Tidy Up event in April, working at the Mansfield Barnardo’s donation centre, and providing holistic therapies treatments at Hetty’s drug and alcohol support service on Woodhouse Road.
Students who choose to volunteer for the college and their community can log their volunteering hours with the Students’ Union for the volunteering awards ceremony on 22 May, when top performing students will be rewarded for their efforts.
Student participation officer, Karen Dunnill said: “We encourage students to get involved in volunteering both at the college and out in their local communities. Our new scheme is designed to record and recognise the time and dedication that students are committing to helping others.
“We’re very excited about the new allotment as eventually we’d like to be able to grow enough fruit and vegetables to fill boxes to donate to the Joint Forces Alliance – the charity which supports ex-servicemen and women and their families.”