Community Champions | Progress Housing Group

Are you passionate about helping others? Do you help your neighbour or someone in your community? Are you giving up your free time to a good cause that helps individuals or groups? Then these awards are for you.

Volunteering is an opportunity to do something great, offering your time for a good cause or practice. It helps with your mental wellbeing, connects you with your community, and looks good on your CV. So, are you out there?

After the success of our Community Champions Awards in 2024, we want to recognise and celebrate the amazing work done by individuals, young people and groups across our communities over the last year. We are therefore, running our Community Champions Awards again in 2026.

Who can enter?

Anyone living in one of our communities can enter themselves or nominate a group or individual.

What are the categories?

• Community Volunteer of the Year Award

Awarded to a person (over age 25) who makes a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

• Community Group of the Year Award

Awarded to a group of people who make a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

• Young Volunteer of the Year Award

Awarded to someone aged 25 or under who makes a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

• Progress Housing Group Volunteer of the Year Award

Awarded to a tenant who makes a real contribution to their community/scheme by giving up their time voluntarily

• RWP Volunteer of the Year Award

Awarded to a tenant or support staff who makes a real contribution to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

Entries for each category will be judged by a panel of our involved customers. Each winner will receive a gift voucher.

Prizes

Groups

Individuals

Gold £200

Silver £100

Bronze £50

Gold £100

Silver £50

Bronze £25

When will judging take place?

Nominations can be made from 5 January 2026. The closing date is Sunday, 22 February 2026. The awards event will take place on Friday, 20 March 2026, starting at 6pm at The Mill, St Catherine’s Park, Lostock Lane, Lostock Hall, Preston, PR5 5XU.

Community Champions form

Your name: (If you are aged under 16 please only provide your first name) *

Your contact number: (If you are aged under 16 please provide a contact number for your parent/guardian instead) *

Your contact email: (If you are aged under 16 please provide a contact email for your parent/guardian instead) copy *

I confirm that I have permission from the person or group being nominated to provide the following information for the purposes of the Community Champions Award 2026 *

Does the person or group you are nominating live or volunteer within one of our communities?

yes

no

Name of the individual or group you are entering

Their contact number: (If they are aged under 16 please provide a contact number for their parent/guardian instead)

Their email address: (If they are aged under 16 please provide a contact number for their parent/guardian instead)

Age of the person you are nominating if they are under 25

category you are entering

Community Volunteer of the Year Award (over age 25) - Awarded to a person who makes a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

Community Group of the Year Award: Awarded to a group of people who make a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

Young Volunteer of the Year Award: Awarded to someone aged 25 or under who makes a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

Progress Housing Group Volunteer of the Year Award: Awarded to a tenant who makes a real contribution to their community/scheme by giving up their time voluntarily

Reside with Progress Volunteer Award: Awarded to a tenant or support staff who makes a real contribution to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

Why you think they deserve a Progress Community Champions 2026 Award: (Max. 250 Words)

Consent for storing submitted data

Yes, I give permission to store and process my data

Please do not provide any sensitive personal information about the person you are nominating unless you have received the nominee's permission to do so. Sensitive personal information includes information related to the nominee’s health, race, sexual orientation political/philosophical opinions, economic status, religion, cultural or social identity, or any information that might be sensitive.

By completing this form, you are acknowledging that if you are 16 years of age or under, you have permission from a parent or legal guardian to participate. If the person you are nominating is 16 years of age or under, you are acknowledging that you have permission from their parent or legal guardian to enter them.

Please ensure you have read the terms and conditions below before submitting your entry. For more information about how we will use your personal information, please see the Privacy Notice below.

Terms and conditions

Progress Housing Group Progress Community Champions 2026

You can nominate anyone who lives or volunteers their time in a community where Progress Housing Group owns and manages properties.
Nominations can be made either: (i) by post to Progress Housing Group, Progress Community Champions 2026, Sumner House, 21 King Street, Leyland, Lancashire, PR25 2LW or (ii) online at www.progressgroup.org.uk/community-champions
Please provide as much information as possible to ensure the nomination can be judged for one of the categories below. Please note that all nominations, whether online or post, must be received no later than midnight on Sunday, 22 February 2026. Any nominations received after this will not be accepted. Please be aware that sending personal data by email may not be secure, as email messages can be intercepted.
The Customer Voice Team will contact everyone making a nomination and everyone being nominated or his/her parent or guardian, where applicable, to verify the information provided and to make sure all relevant consents/permissions have been obtained.

We will also ask for a photograph of everyone entering the awards. The photograph will be used at the awards event and to promote the winners of the awards.

The categories and criteria to qualify for nomination, and on which the judging will take place, are:

Community Volunteer of the Year Award

Awarded to a person (over age 25) who makes a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

Community Group of the Year Award

Awarded to a group of people who make a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

Young Volunteer of the Year Award

Awarded to someone aged 25 or under who makes a real difference to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

Progress Housing Group Volunteer of the Year Award

Awarded to a tenant who makes a real contribution to their community/scheme by giving up their time voluntarily

RWP Volunteer of the Year Award

Awarded to a tenant or support staff who makes a real contribution to the community by giving up their time voluntarily

All nominations will be judged anonymously by a group of our involved tenants. The panel will award gold, silver and bronze awards to each category.
Progress Housing Group’s decision regarding the awards presented is final. No correspondence relating to the awards will be entered into.

The prizes will be in the form of a voucher to the value of:

Group prizes
Gold £200
Silver £100
Bronze £50

Individual prizes
Gold £100
Silver £50
Bronze £25

Everyone taking part in the Progress Community Champions Award 2026 must agree to take part in any post-award publicity if required.
Progress Housing Group reserves the right to: (i) vary these Terms, including but not limited to, opening and closing times of the awards nominations; (ii) disqualify any nomination that breaches the rules, is fraudulent in any way or brings Progress Housing Group into disrepute; (iii) move nominees into another category should they see fit and (iv) cancel the awards, at any stage, if in its opinion it is deemed necessary or if circumstances arise outside its control.
All nominees will be invited to an awards event, which is scheduled to take place on 20 March 2026.
Progress Housing Group, their sub-contractors, subsidiaries and/or agencies cannot accept any responsibility whatsoever for any technical failure, postal strike or delivery issue, loss of data via use of a third-party email platform or malfunction or any other problem which may result in any loss or data, any nomination being lost or not properly registered.
The promoter of the awards is Progress Housing Group, and these terms and conditions are subject to UK laws.

Privacy statement

Our Privacy Notice describes the categories of personal data we process and for what purposes. If you have any questions about how Progress Housing Group handles your personal information, or you wish to find out about your rights, please visit Progress Housing Group’s website, https://corporate.progressgroup.org.uk/privacy/. You will also be able to find out more information about how Progress Housing Group processes your information and how you can contact Progress Housing Group’s Data Protection Officer. If you raise a complaint with Progress Housing Group about the way it has handled your personal information, you are entitled to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority. In the UK, the supervisory authority is the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which can be contacted at https://ico.org.uk/concerns