For this month’s volunteer story, we asked one of our Young Commissioners who you may recognise from our homepage, to share a bit more of her story and how anyone can volunteer and make a difference, even if feeling a little nervous at the start.

Marking one year of our Volunteer Story of the Month feature, we talk to Peter Struik “serial volunteer” extraordinaire, Chair of Sutton Soup, and active volunteer with EcoLocal, amongst many others!

For May, a month bringing awareness to mental health, especially with the 2024 theme being Movement: Moving more for our mental health, we had a quick chat with Sara Lee from Cre8 Football.

This month we hear from two women about the effect befriending has had on their lives, in the lead up to International Women’s Day this month.

Our Volunteer story of the Month for January is with a "Back to School" themed. It is also International Day of Education on Wednesday 24th January. Duncan from REUK, Refugee Education UK shares his story.

This month we are celebrating Befriending Week from 1-7th November. Fresh from her Serpentine Swim fundraising for us, Jo Bolton shares her story of being a befriender as part of Sutton Befrienders, along with her other volunteering and fundraising support.

Sutton Vision shares their story, just ahead of Befriending Week, of Adrian who volunteers as a telephone befriender for them.

Every month we are sharing inspirational volunteer stories, with September being the start of a new term and school year we thought it would be good to hear from one of the younger voices of the volunteering world.

We want to celebrate the volunteers that make our borough great, you, the individuals who give up your time to help others and make a real difference.

Our MAPS Mentoring project supports many Care Leavers with one-to-one mentoring. To mark National Care Leavers Week 2022, we wanted to share the story of Dillon, a 21-year-old Care Leaver, and his experience of mentoring.

Bernard moved to Sutton from Hong Kong in August 2021

"You meet so many different people every time you turn up for a shift, whether you're working with them or helping them and every day is another great experience." Read about the experiences of one our Nonsuch Vaccine Site volunteers

We could not be more proud of Pete Jemson, winner of the "Oustanding Volunteer" award at the 2020 Sutton Community Awards, and now nominated by Sutton Council for BBC Radio London's "Make a Difference Hero" awards

Read Edina's story about her volunteering journey into full time employment

For Refugee Week 2019, our Community Engagement Coordinator, Marta Rocco, reflects on her own volunteering experiences supporting refugees

Throughout Volunteers' Week we're sharing 'thank you' messages to volunteers from organisations in Sutton. The Royal Marsden Cancer Charity would like to thank Valerie Allsopp.

Throughout Volunteers' Week we're sharing 'thank you' messages to volunteers from organisations in Sutton. The Royal Marsden Cancer Charity would like to thank Denise Clarke.

Throughout Volunteers' Week we're sharing 'thank you' messages to volunteers from organisations in Sutton. Age UK Sutton would like to thank Rob Campion.

Throughout Volunteers' Week we're sharing 'thank you' messages to volunteers from organisations in Sutton. Home-Start Sutton would like to thank Sue Elson

Throughout Volunteers' Week we're sharing 'thank you' messages to volunteers from organisations in Sutton. Age UK Sutton would like to thank Sue

Throughout Volunteers' Week we're sharing 'thank you messages to volunteers from organisations in Sutton, starting with a thank you to one of our own volunteers

Throughout Volunteers' Week we're sharing 'thank you' messages to volunteers from organisations in Sutton. St Raphael's Hospice would like to thank Jenny Watkins

Afraid of leaving the house and struggled to cope with the demands of school life, he turned to MAPS for support

A brief summary of some of the findings from our recent research pilot looking into the effects of volunteering on health and wellbeing

Pat, our Volunteering Development Manager, relates the story of Patrick, one of the participants in our prescribed volunteering project, who said that volunteering is the connection between his old world and his new world.

We asked Judith Smith, Pastor of Horizon Church Sutton to write a guest blog about the positive experiences her church has had hosting Employer-Supported Volunteer teams at her church building, from which several community projects are run. She shares about the impact of ESV, some of the challenges and her top tips for any organisation thinking of hosting an ESV team.

Priya volunteers at the Refugee and Migrant Network in Sutton, where she teaches English as a Second language to adults