New ParliaMentors Alumni Awards celebrate outstanding achievements

On Tuesday 11^th November, the ParliaMentors Alumni Committee held its first ever Awards ceremony in the House of Lords. The Awards, hosted by the Lord Sheikh, were held in celebration of the achievements and successes of former students since their graduation from the ParliaMentors programme.

“The ceremony was interspersed with inspiring speeches from the Lord Sheikh, Jon Yates of The Challenge, and entrepreneur Prem Goyal OBE, who is also leader of All Peoples Party. Jon Yates appealed to the idealists in the room with this quote: “Don’t believe that you can change the world. That would be setting yourself up for failure. Believe you can make a change.” In his speech, Prem told everyone that you must master intercultural and interfaith skills to build a global business – “Believe in your skills, not in luck.” You can read Prem’s speech here.

The Positive Contribution to Society Award was presented to Yoni Amias. Together with a friend at university, Yoni worked with local NGOs, fundraised and helped build a new primary school in Chittagong, Bangladesh. Yoni is currently Director of Development for OneVoice Europe.

MP Lilian Greenwood won the Special Recognition Award for a Parliamentarian. Lilian is the Labour MP for Nottingham South and has been a mentor on ParliaMentors every year since 2011, mentoring for a fourth time in a row this year.

The Most Politically Engaged ParliaMentor Prize was awarded to former student Cllr Heather Worman, County Councillor for Ibstock and Appleby in Leicestershire.

Anja Fahlenkemp won the Commitment to Interfaith Work Award and Talia Chain & Philip Engel picked up the Most Inspiring ParliaMentors Project Award for their Red Light Campaign.

Many thanks to Charly, Hashim, Kashif, Aaron, Anna and Catto from the ParliaMentors Alumni Committee for all their hard work. Watch this space to see what the Alumni Committee get up to next!