Prestigious Saltire Summit Award for Ronan

Regular readers of Am Pàipear will be familiar with 18 year old Ronan MacPhee from Benbecula, who makes a regular appearance in these pages.

Ronan is in the news again this month, as his exceptional contribution to the community has been recognised with a prestigious Saltire Summit Award for Outstanding Volunteering.

Alasdair Allan MSP, who was on hand to present Ronan with his Award last month, commented: “I was delighted to present Ronan with the Saltire Summit Award in recognition of his incredible volunteering efforts during my recent visit to Uist. Volunteers are vital to the success of so many of our islands’ charities and organisations, and volunteering is an excellent way to contribute to the local community. Ronan should be immensely proud of his achievements so far.”

Ronan has now contributed more than 800 hours of voluntary service, adding his value in different ways across Uist, with placements at Tagsa Uibhist Community Gardens, Caraidean Uibhist, Uist and Barra Foodbank, Youth Climate Action Group, Western Isles and Uist Local Energy Plan and many more. Ronan isn’t hanging up his gloves though, and plans to hit the 1000 hours goal by the end of July.

Ronan was delighted with his award, and keen to shine a light on the value volunteering can bring: “I highly recommend volunteering because you gain so much from it and make lots of awesome friends. One of the biggest things is my confidence has grown hugely.” Vicki Manchester, Development Worker for the Volunteer Centre said: “The Summit Award is the absolute pinnacle of the Saltire scheme, which celebrates, recognises and rewards the commitment, contribution and achievements of young volunteers in Scotland, aged between 12 and 25. You can gain your first award with only 10 hours of volunteering, and any hours of volunteering done for Duke of Edinburgh Awards can be counted for Saltire Awards and vice versa. I recommend that all young people log on to the Saltire Awards website and start their own Saltire journey.”