Dr Joan Bailey MBE, Course Co-ordinator and Senior Lecturer, BA (Hons) Youth and Community Work at the University of Bedfordshire, has over 40 years’ experience of working within the statutory and voluntary sector both as a social worker and youth community development worker.

Dr Bailey has worked in community safety tackling crime prevention for over 25 years as well as working with young offenders, developing a range of preventative work to divert them away from crime. She has been involved in youth justice work for the last 20 years, working with young people from Black and Minority ethnic communities. Her recent work has been around community cohesion, tackling far right attitudes and building cohesive communities.

Her nomination for the Outstanding Teacher award praised the way Dr Bailey ‘thrives to help all her students and puts in hours of personal time to working with them on an individual basis to help them achieve their goals.’

24 hours later and it's still so surreal that I won this award. Thankyou to all those people that nominated me and those that thought I deserved to be the winner. pic.twitter.com/G55Gs8BbnY

— Dr Joan Bailey MBE (@jdbailey19) November 30, 2019

On receiving her awards, Dr Bailey said: “It was lovely of my students to nominate me for the Outstanding Teacher award and I am thrilled to have won. I am, however, really honoured and humbled that the people of Luton nominated me to receive Luton’s Most Outstanding Citizen. I would like to say thank you to everyone connected to Love Luton for giving me this very prestigious award.”

The Luton’s Best Awards in partnership with Love Luton, celebrate the achievements of individuals and organisations who make Luton a better place. Nominated by the public, the winners are from all walks of life, of all ages, and from all over the town.