British students to volunteer for C'wealth Games

New Delhi, March 9, 2010: Thirty students from the Sheffield Hallam University in Britain will volunteer for the Commonwealth Games here under an agreement signed Tuesday.

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed by Sheffield Hallam University Vice-Chancellor Philip Jones and Commonwealth Games Organising Committee (CGOC) chairman Suresh Kalmadi.

The students will be selected from Sheffield Hallam University's media and journalism courses and will be part of a pool of 30,000 volunteers for the October games. They will mainly deal with the media.

The organising committee is planning a state-of-the-art Press Centre and International Broadcasting Centre for more than 5,000 journalists, Kalmadi said.

CGOC's Jiji Thomson told IANS: "A batch of 30 students from Sheffield had volunteered in the Beijing Olympics and performed commendably. For the Commonwealth Games too, we have students from the university volunteering for us."

At Beijing, the Sheffield students were the only Europeans among 16,000 volunteers. Sheffield is working in partnership with the London Organising Committee for the 2012 Olympic Games too.

"The students, who will arrive in September, will also train our volunteers in handling the press," Thomson added. The Sheffield students are in the age group of 21-24.

Vice-Chancellor Jones said: "Sheffield Hallam was the UK's first designated 'City of Sport' and has a world-class reputation for its commitment to sports. We are delighted to be able to showcase our ability at such a significant sporting event as the Delhi Commonwealth Games."