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The Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service is the highest award given to local volunteer groups across the UK to recognise outstanding work done in their own communities. It was created in 2002 to celebrate the anniversary of The Queen’s coronation.

The Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service is the MBE for volunteer groups. Any group doing volunteer work that provides a social, economic or environmental service to the local community can be nominated for the award. Each group is assessed on the benefit it brings to the local community and its standing within that community.

Find out more and nominate a group here

Anyone aware of the group, including people who benefit from the group’s activities, may make a nomination. Simply complete the online form. You are not allowed to nominate your own group if you are a volunteer or paid staff member as nominations must be independent and supported. Nominations from staff members/volunteers will therefore be deemed ineligible.

Submit your nomination by midnight on 16 September 2016 to make sure your nominated group is considered for the 2017 awards. The awards are published on 2 June on the anniversary of Her Majesty’s coronation. We’ll let you and the Award recipients know beforehand, but you must not tell anyone outside the group until 2 June.

Previous Oxfordshire winners include volunteering charity Student Hubs and Assisted Reading for Children in Oxfordshire, both of whom have been supported with grant funding from OCF.

Speaking at a previous awards ceremony, Lord Lieutenant and OCF President Tim Stevenson said: “The Queen’s Award was intended as a way of recognising the huge contribution the voluntary sector makes to the lives of our community. It is a constant source of astonishment to me how much time and energy and commitment hundreds of people around Oxfordshire give to the ‘common wheel’ every week, often every day of their lives. The job that somebody like Bob Price has as leader of the City Council would be impossible were it not for the contribution that the voluntary sector makes to almost everything that goes on in the county, but particularly for disadvantaged members of the community.” Watch his speech here.

Find out more about the groups we support