Milton Keynes College honoured its learners and their achievements at the Students of the Year 2017 Awards, held at the Sculpture Gallery at Woburn Abbey.
The evening was a huge celebration for everyone connected with the College, highlighting the achievements and success stories from the current cohort of learners, while bringing together students and staff from across the spectrum and crowning one overall Student of the Year.
On the night, Thursday 25th May, a total of 26 awards were presented by representatives of each category's industry sponsor, demonstrating and developing the College's partnerships with commercial businesses and providers.
This year, the night's top prize went to Karen Mwamba, who received the Student of the Year award from sponsor Santander to a standing ovation from the packed audience. Karen also collected the prize for the Business, Retail and Logistics category earlier in the evening.
Karen is currently studying the Level 3 Extended Diploma in Business, having progressed through part-time English and Maths and Level 2 Business since first joining the College in October 2013.
Karen, and all of the evening's award winners, who can be found at mkcollege.ac.uk, demonstrate perfectly the College's values: inspiration, excellence, innovation, integrity and respect.
Speaking after the awards ceremony, MK College Principal and Chief Executive Dr Julie Mills was delighted for all the winning students. She said: "It's been an amazing evening in a wonderful setting.
"I found the evening inspiring, as I always do; I never tire of hearing about our students and every year we have more and more people wanting to sponsor the event, wanting to get to know our students, wanting to get to know the College, so I'm delighted, absolutely thrilled about how it's gone.
"It was a really tough year, the competition was really hard but Karen is just an exceptional student - she typifies the College's values, she's worked so hard, she takes every opportunity that the College gives her and she's going to have an amazing future and we're really proud to have been part of it."
Milton Keynes College will be taking over Middleton Hall at centre:mk from Thursday 15th to Sunday 18th June with Festival in the City. Visitors to the festival can expect a showcase of talent from across the College, including Performing Arts, Catering & Hospitality, Art & Design and much more. Visit festivalinthecity.co.uk to find out more.
You can listen to an interview with Andy Gardener from the Student of the Year Awards below.
