YHN volunteer crowned ‘UK’s young achiever of the year’

A young volunteer for Your Homes Newcastle (YHN), who turned her back on crime, has been crowned the UK’s ‘young achiever of the year’ at an awards ceremony in London.

Jodie Wilkinson, 22, who only five years ago was sleeping rough, won the Young Person’s Achievement Award at last week’s Children and Young People Now Awards.

Wilkinson got into trouble with the police when she left school and after becoming homeless she witnessed widespread drug and alcohol abuse and got arrested for being drunken disorderly, causing criminal damage and possessing an offensive weapon.

However, support from Your Homes Newcastle’s (YHN) Young People’s Service, which helps 16-25 year olds who have experienced homelessness or housing issues, helped her to turn her life around.

It also inspired her to use her own experiences to help others and after being trained by Youth Voice as a Peer Educator, she began volunteering on YHN’s homeless prevention programme, a project which involved her going into schools to talk to students about her own experiences of being homeless and encouraging them to seek support if they ever faced the same situation.

Since then, Wilkinson has dedicated herself to helping others and in the past year alone she has completed 1,500 voluntary hours through community activities including young people’s snow sledding sessions, various fundraising activities and beach clean ups.

She said: “I’m totally gobsmacked about winning the award. I wasn’t even expecting to get nominated so to win is fantastic! I’m really proud of myself and the award is a reminder to me of how far I’ve come since I was homeless and getting into trouble.

“Volunteering has really helped me to build up my own self confidence and improve on working with other people. I’ve enjoyed learning new skills and my experiences have really helped me to improve my life and get some direction.

“I’ve loved trying to help other people and if talking about my own experiences has helped to prevent others from living on the street then it has definitely been worth doing.”

Karen Adamson, participation and inclusion manager at YHN’s Young People’s Service, said: “I’m ecstatic for Jodie and really pleased that all of her hard work and volunteering has been recognised on a national level. She’s been on a remarkable journey over the last few years and she thoroughly deserves this honour.

“YHN is dedicated to helping the most disengaged young people in society and Jodie is an example of how someone with enough perseverance can achieve big things if they’re given the right support.”