The UK’s Top Mentors Announced at the National Mentoring Awards

The UK’s Top Mentors Announced at the National Mentoring Awards

Over 350 of the UK’s top mentors and mentoring organisations covering all sectors of business, education, sport and society were honoured for their outstanding mentoring achievements in a red-carpet awards ceremony on 1st March.

The National Mentoring Awards launched to honour ‘Mentoring Excellence’ to those who mentor across all walks of life, whether in their business, community, personal or professional lives, were hosted by three times BAFTA winner and the UK’s top impressionist Rory Bremner and founder of the National Mentoring Awards, Chelsey Baker at the Jumeirah Carlton Hotel in London.

Award categories included: Youth, Business, Education, Sport, Armed Forces, Diversity, Disability, Health, Music, Fashion, STEM, Women, Charities, Mentoring Programme of the Year, Mentor and Mentee of the Year. Rory Bremner adds, “It was a pleasure to host the National Mentoring Awards and great to see so many people making a difference.”

Elizabeth Emmanuel best known for designing the wedding dress worn by Diana, Princess of Wales, presented the National Fashion Mentoring Award, “Mentoring is very important in this day and age, the awards will help inspire more people to become mentors which is much needed.”

Chelsey adds, “The National Mentoring Awards matter because they recognise the life changing work of mentors across the UK and we are proud to be able to honour them and celebrate their mentoring achievements.”

The Rt. Hon Lord Young, a Patron of the initiative states, “The National Mentoring Awards play a really important part in raising the profile of mentoring activities across all walks of life.  In a fast changing world mentoring is of ever increasing importance.” Chelsey adds, “Our aim in launching the awards is to create a new generation of ‘real’ relatable mentoring role models across business and society to encourage more people to mentor.”

Sara Ali, winner of fashion mentor of the year said: “I am incredibly proud to receive this award. I came into fashion thanks to the guidance of a brilliant mentor at The Prince’s Trust over twenty years ago. How surreal it was when I had the privilege of telling HRH this very story on a fashion assignment in Clarence House recently!“ The Prince’s Trust were in attendance and won the National Youth Mentoring Award for their mentoring programme Mosaic.

Speaking about her win, Mentor of the Year winner Nichole Higgins said: “The great thing about mentoring is that as well as helping other people it has helped me improve myself. I have never mentored someone and not learnt something, which to me is priceless.” Nichole was recognised for her role supporting jobseekers as a CIPD Steps Ahead Mentor which provides jobseekers with one-to-one mentoring sessions to help them improve their employability skills, boost their confidence and find work. Over 2,500 volunteer mentors are signed up to the programme and to date over 5,700 jobseekers have accessed Steps Ahead with 60 per cent going on to find employment.

National Mentoring Programme of the Year was awarded to Mentivity. Leon Wright Mentivity’s co-founder says, “We have worked tirelessly to improve holistic outcomes for our youth and wider community since 2016 without funding from the UK Government. This award helps to solidify our reputation as the most progressive and innovative mentoring organisation in the U.K. giving us a greater platform to reach those that need our help and spread our services across England.

Official Hashtag is #TheNMAWards   @TheNMAwards.

Images available upon request.