National Maritime Museum Cornwall's volunteer education team has recently been recognised for all their skills, hard-work and dedication by being awarded the title of South West regional winner of the Marsh Award for Museum Learning.

The awards, developed by the British Museum and the Marsh Christian Trust, are the first of their kind and recognise best practice and the innovative ways in which volunteers work in museums and galleries, engaging the public with collections.

The ‘Volunteers for Museum Learning' award forms part of a programme of 29 awards in the fields of science, ecology, conservation, heritage, literature and volunteering. Each one of these awards recognises individuals and organisations who devote their lives to improving the world today and the world in the future. The Marsh awards programme is managed in association with key partners including the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, English Heritage, Barnardos, the Refugee Council and the British Museum.

The Maritime Museum's team of 16 volunteers were awarded the accolade as a consequence of their exceptional pro-active level of responsibility and involvement in the planning, delivery and evaluation and improvement of learning provision for schools, families and informal education groups.

There were over 90 applications in total, some from groups of volunteers and some from individuals.

Stuart Slade, Education Manager at National Maritime Museum Cornwall says: "Our volunteers are integral to the growth of the Museum. They have helped make the Museum come alive with young groups and grown our school visits exponentially over the last few years. Our feedback forms overwhelmingly credit the professionalism of our volunteer support and we are all over the moon with this recent recognition."

A team of education volunteers attended the awards event in London.