Volunteering at North East Museums
Discover rewarding volunteering opportunities at North East Museums. Gain valuable experience and make a difference in the community. Explore volunteering roles and student work placements - apply today.
Volunteer with us
At North East Museums, we couldn't deliver our Mission without the skills and generosity of volunteers. You are essential to the success of the organisation.
As well as creating new opportunities and pathways for personal development, volunteering can help you to develop new skills and interests, generate new social connections, increase your confidence and improve your health and wellbeing.
We want all our volunteers to have an enjoyable and rewarding time and to feel part of the team that delivers a world class museum service to the communities of the North East and beyond.
On this page you can:
- Apply to become a North East Museums volunteer
- Find out about heritage railway volunteering opportunities
- Find out about work experience opportunities
- Find out about other programmes for young people.
Contact us
If your have any enquiries relating to volunteering or work exprience, please contact volunteering@northeastmuseums.org.uk.
Apply here
Start your volunteering application on our Better Impact page.
Heritage railway volunteers
Volunteers are needed to help maintain and operate our heritage railway, the North Tyneside Steam Railway, based at Stephenson Steam Railway in North Shields, which runs passenger trains on selected days during the year.
We are always looking for interested people who can spare some time. There are a wide range of volunteering opportunities available, covering virtually every aspect of the Railway’s activities. Whilst some roles require a significant time commitment and training, others do not. If you want to get your hands dirty, there are plenty of opportunities, but if manual work is not for you, there is also a wide range of choices.
Volunteering presents you with the opportunity to meet new people from all walks of life, gain worthwhile skills and results in a real sense of achievement. Working groups are usually held on Wednesdays and Saturdays from 9.30am - 2pm with train operations and running days on Sundays, Bank Holidays and Thursdays during school holidays from Easter to November.
Tasks include:
- Railway operational staff including guards, operations controllers, ticket inspectors, footplate crew
- Steam and engineering maintenance, track maintenance
- Painting and gardening
- Site tidying.
Personal qualities required/preferred: Volunteers are constantly under the public gaze, so personal appearance is important. As well as having significant safety responsibilities, you must also have good communications and personal skills, both for dealing with colleagues and the general public.
Training of volunteers: Training is available for all of these jobs; some training may take hours, for others years are required.
Find out more about opportunities
Start your volunteering application on our Better Impact page.
If your have any enquiries relating to heritage railway volunteering, please contact volunteering@northeastmuseums.org.uk.
For other enquiries relating to railway operations, please call David Grindley, Engineering and Railway Operations Manager, for an informal chat on (0191) 277 7135 or email: david.grindley@northeastmuseums.org.uk.
Work experience
At North East Museums, we are able to offer a number of places on a one-week work experience for students in Key Stages 4 and 5. This is a great opportunity to get a taste of what it's like to work in a museum or gallery, with the chance to spend some time with staff and work on a project, covering a variety of departments and venues.
Places are limited and date specific. We are unable to offer work experience places outside of these dates.
For the 2024/2025 Academic year, we will be offering work experience as follows:
Monday 3 - Friday 7 March 2025 (post-16 only)
Applications close for this week on Friday 20 December 2024, and places will be confirmed by Friday 17 January 2025.
Monday 30 June - Friday 4 July 2025 (Key Stage 4/ages 14+ and post-16)
Applications close for this week on Friday 7 March 2025, and places will be confirmed by Monday 21 March 2025.
Monday 7 – Friday 11 July 2025 (Key stage 4/ages 14+ and post-16)
Applications close for this week on Friday 7 March 2025, and places will be confirmed by Monday 21 March 2025.
We regularly receive more applications than we can accommodate so please make sure you apply before the deadline. When we are deciding who to offer the places to we will consider the answers you have given on the form and offer the spaces to those who we feel will benefit most from the experience.
If you are unsuccessful but over 16 you can also consider applying for volunteering opportunities with us.
For more information, please email: volunteering@northeastmuseums.org.uk
We are unable to offer work experience places outside of these dates.
