9 May 2024 Community

The Kirkwood support production of exciting youth volunteering podcasts

In November 2023, Youth Social were successful in an application to the Kirklees Council Community Plus fund to produce a series of podcasts promoting the benefits of Youth Volunteering. These podcasts are now available on all the main podcast platforms including Spotify and Apple Podcasts – Search ‘Youth Social Podcast’, click the links below to listen to some of our amazing volunteers and why they chose to volunteer for The Kirkwood.

Podcasts are one of the fastest growing communication tools for reaching young people, and they provide a perfect mechanism for providing information in a relevant and personal way to young users.

In a recent survey conducted by Youth Social with 16-19 year olds, over 50% of responders stated that they had listened to a podcast in the last 3 months.

In total 21 young people aged between 16-20 were interviewed for the podcast and their volunteering experience ranged from working in the A&E Department at Dewsbury Hospital, supporting a local Library, sorting old school uniforms to be reused and working in a charity furniture shop.

Organisations that took part in the project and provided staff and/or young volunteers to take part included:

C+K Careers

Creative Steps Future Creative

Fresh Futures

Forget Me Not Trust

Greenhead College

Kirklees Libraries

Locala

TSL Kirklees

The Kirkwood

Uniform Exchange 

Graham Sykes, Senior Director of Youth Social and co-host of the podcast said: “I am immensely proud of this series of podcasts. We set out to make episodes that told the real story of youth volunteering and would demonstrate the benefits that can be achieved by taking advantage of the many opportunities that exist both in Kirklees and wider afield.

“I would particularly like to thank the interviewees for giving up their time to talk to us. Many of the young people interviewed said that prior to volunteering that they wouldn’t have had the confidence to be interviewed on a podcast, but they all did a fantastic job and I can’t wait for people to hear them.”

Episode details All episodes hosted in the studio by Verity, Katie (young volunteers) and Graham Sykes (Senior director, Youth Social)

Episode 1: What is Youth Volunteering? Becky Bracey – Volunteer services lead at TSL Kirklees/Creative Steps Taylor – Kirklees Libraries 

Episode 2: Youth Volunteering and Education Claire Barnes - Volunteering and placement manager at Greenhead College Holly Mae – Locala

Episode 3: Youth Volunteering and Employment James Davidson – Careers adviser at C+K Careers Madi – Forget-Me-Not Trust

Episode 4: Talking to Youth Volunteers (Part 1) Alfie – Dewsbury Hospital A&E Department Mariam – Kirklees Libraries Finley & Estelle – The Kirkwood

Episode 5: Talking to Youth Volunteers (Part 2) Martha – UnIform Exchange Omar & Freya – Fresh Futures Robyn, Mosan, Henry & Imogen – Future Creative

Episode 6: Talking to Volunteering Organisations Louise Sykes – Volunteering services manager at Locala Chris Newberry – HR & volunteering services manager at The Kirkwood Julie Peel – Library area manager at Kirklees Libraries Daisy Whitby - Volunteer support officer at Fresh Futures

Episode 7: What makes a great volunteering opportunity? Zara, Joshua, Holly, Reuban and Annie – Students from Greenhead College

Hear what our volunteers had to say through apple HERE or Spotify HERE.