Award-winning projects and initiatives
The German Engagement Award is considered the most important prize for volunteers. Let us introduce you to some of the award winners.
Klaus Lüber,
03.05.2023 
Many initiatives and projects would be unthinkable without the engagement of voluntary helpers – such as the work of Hamburg-based association “Pinkstinks Germany”, Germany’s most influential educational organisation on the subject of sexism. With an online magazine, educational work in nurseries and schools, digital campaigns and advice for companies, the organisation has been fighting since 2012 for a more gender-equitable society. In Berlin, meanwhile, the “Über den Tellerrand” initiative has been creating spaces for encounters between refugees, for example at joint cooking events, since 2013. And established in 2019, the “Africademics” platform based in Nürtingen in Baden-Württemberg enables young people in and fromAfrica to find out about scholarships. The platform now attracts up to 40,000 followers per day.
Nearly 30 million people in Germany volunteer in their free time for the common good. To pay tribute to their work, prizes are awarded to particularly successful initiatives. There are currently around 650 such awards in Germany. The organisers then have the chance to nominate first-prize winners for the German Engagement Award, which since 2009 has linked the many individual competitions across Germany to create one ultimate “prize of prizes”.
Awards in five categories
The German Engagement Award was initiated and is run by the Bündnis für Gemeinnützigkeit, an alliance of major umbrella associations, independent organisations and experts from the non-profit sector. Winners are selected by a jury in five different categories. In 2022, Pinkstinks won the award in the category “Strengthening Democracy”, Über den Tellerrand came top in the category “Overcoming Boundaries” and Africademics took first place in the category “Creating Opportunities”.
