Mentors and mentees from across Yorkshire came together to celebrate at a Mosaic end of year event marking the completion of our programmes in the region for this academic year.

Shazia Saleem, Founder of ieat Foods with Mosaic Mentor Noor Ali, Regional Chairman Sarah Khan-Bashir and Regional Manager Nabila Ayub

Sarah Khan Bashir, Chairman of the Yorkshire Regional Leadership Group welcomed guests to the event which was held at Leeds Trinity University. She went on to thank mentors, staff from participating primary and secondary schools, funders and organisations in the region for their support throughout the year.

The assembled guests in turn paid tribute to Sarah’s leadership which was very recently recognised in Her Majesty’s Birthday Honours List, with the announcement that Sarah is to receive an MBE for her amazing work with Mosaic.

The founder of iEat Foods, Shazia Saleem was amongst the line-up of speakers and talked about her experiences of setting up her business and the hard work and research that motivated her. She also paid tribute to the mentors who gave up their time to inspire and support the students from secondary and primary schools in the region.

Students from the Apax-Enterprise Challenge winning team Trash4Cash from St Bede’s Catholic Grammar School also presented their winning pitch to those attending which also included their parents, many of which were hearing this for the first time. Shazia Saleem was Guest of Honour at the Grand Finals of the Enterprise Challenge earlier this year and was particularly pleased to reconnect with the St Bede’s students.

The event also provided an opportunity to acknowledge and recognise some of the outstanding contributions that mentors had made in the region such as Noel Stephenson winning the Mosaic Hero of the Month for January 2014 and saw Highly Commended Mentor Awards 2014 being presented by Nabila Aub, Mosaic Regional Manager, Sarah Khan Bashir MBE and Shazia Saleem to:

• Faith James (DLA Piper)
• Rachel Fell (DLA Piper)
• Emma Holdsworth (DLA Piper)
• Mubashir Mian (DLA Piper)
• Ajaz Ahmed (LCF Law)
• Ansar Ali (MHA)
• Noor Ali (Morrisons)
• Leanna Geary (Squire Sanders)
• Samina Akhtar (HMRC)
• Lee Hobson (HMRC)

Speaking of her award, Rachel Fell, Senior Professional Support Lawyer at DLA Piper commented:

“Thank you very much for my mentor award! It was a lovely surprise and very much appreciated.”

Noor Ali, Lead Ethnic Buyer at Morrisons added:

“Totally unexpected as I’m sure you saw from my face!”

Mosaic National Director, Jonathan Freeman said:

“Yorkshire has had a great deal to celebrate this year and my thanks go to everyone involved. We would like to offer our very warm appreciation to all of the mentors and organisations that have supported our programmes throughout the year. It is only fitting that Sarah Khan Bashir, our wonderful Mosaic Yorkshire Chairman, was recognised recently in Her Majesty’s Birthday Honours List with the award of an MBE.

“We would particularly like to thank Leeds Trinity University for hosting the Yorkshire celebration event and for their ongoing support for our work to inspire and raise the aspirations of young people in Yorkshire.”

Read more about the schools we support in Yorkshire and why not sign up as a mentor for one of our programmes starting in the Autumn.