Westminster Award 2026 - Stage 2

As always we have a large number of high quality nominations representing some of the very best Cadet Vocational College learners in the country. As part of the next stage, to determine who will be invited to the exclusive selection event in Somerset, we need to know more about you: what motivates you, what inspires you, how you’ve used your experiences, and to explore some of your ideas, skills and opinions.

Please read the following carefully!

Section 1:

For this you need to complete a personal SWOT assessment, looking at Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. Please fill in some brief details for each heading in the form below (WA Stage 2 Form): They can be bullet points or short sentences, but the key thing is to be concise and clear about each entry. To help you:

Strengths: The things you are good at, skills and abilities that make you the person you are. Imagine all the positive things your friends or family would say about you. You might include being a good team player, problem solver or have good planning skills. Equally, you might be compassionate, a good listener, have a good sense of humour or be inquisitive.

Weaknesses: Though traditionally this section is used to look at weakness, it might be better to think of it as ‘things you could do better or improve’. For example, if you always find yourself running late, then improving your planning and time keeping would be an improvement.

Opportunities: In this box consider all the things that may provide you with opportunities to achieve your aspirations and ambitions. For example, contacts, experience or achievements. What are the things that will help you reach your goals?

Threats: We all face challenges or issues that we need to overcome to achieve our goals; some are under our control, others are not. In this section, consider the things that might prevent you from achieving your aims. As a simple example it might be the cost of going to university or moving away from home for work.

Section 2:

The Westminster Award is all about taking on new challenges, helping those in need and generally striving to be a good citizen. Use the form below to tell us about a time where you have achieved something positive, like pitching in to help your local community, supporting a friend or family member in need, or raising money for a worthy cause. Please tie your response into Cadet Vocational College’s values (for example going the extra mile, being caring and supportive) where you can.

Think carefully about your submission and be honest in what you say as it may form part of the discussion at the selection stage when you may be asked to elaborate on certain elements. None of the information is shared other than with the Westminster Award selection panel at Cadet Vocational College. You are welcome to answer the questions in any way you would like to and use any type of media in your response: video, audio, presentations, written formats are all accepted. We love creativity but quality responses matter more.

Please email your submission to westminster@cvcollege.org

The deadline for submissions is midnight Sunday 25 January 2026.

Important: if you are successful in making it through to the next stage of the award, you will need to be available to attend our Selection event in Somerset on Tuesday 07 April to Sunday 12 April 2026. We will also be running evening Zoom sessions throughout March for the ILM Level 3 in Leadership and Management qualification – dates will be confirmed shortly.

Remember, to be eligible for consideration for selection you MUST have completed Unit 1 of your BTEC Level 2 qualification in Teamwork and Personal Development in the Community.