Pānui - Sharing Our Stories - January - March 2025

Governor’s message

Kia ora koutou katoa. Hello everyone.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I’ve really been enjoying the summer weather! It’s starting to get a little cooler overnight and we certainly know daylight saving will be ending soon. But it’s so lovely to be warm.
(No comments about Wellington’s wind now 😊)

I hope you’re having a great summer in your part of the world.

What I’ve been doing

Attending Zonta International calls and webinars. It’s hard keeping up with them all, but I get so much out of them it’s worth it. A number of these are open to all members, and you’ll be receiving information about them from ZI too. In particular the Zonta Says Now Think Tank calls which are every two months. The most recent one was hosted by our own Helen Bowie, who is the International Advocacy Chair. For newer members, there is a series of two webinars especially for you. They start on 20 March and then repeat throughout the year every few months. Login to the ZI website and check out the Events page. There are two-time options given for each of the new member webinars.

On the ZI website is the Events tab (below this) where all upcoming calls and webinars are listed.

Webinars

On 7 March I attended the Ashburton Club’s Zonta Ashburton Women’s Art Award (ZAWAA). An annual award in its 9^th year which they hold in conjunction with the Ashburton Art Gallery and Museum.

The award is designed to promote an emerging woman artist in the Canterbury region. As well as a cash prize the award includes an exhibition at the following year’s event. There were 101 entries for this year’s award and 25 in the young generation category. The largest number they’ve received yet.

For anyone close enough to visit the Ashburton Art Gallery, it’s worth the effort and the warm welcome.

District Board and Committee Chairs Update

Advocacy

Our advocacy chair, Tiffany McCrae, has made a number of submissions so far. This year submissions have been made in support of the (Employee Remuneration Disclosure) Amendment Bill and the Crimes Legislation (Stalking and Harassment) Amendment Bill.

Zonta Foundation for Women

Foundation Ambassador Margaret Currie is one of our presenters in the Area Meetings, which continue through to 5 April. Margaret provides an update on our giving to date in the biennium, explains the Service and Endowment funds and gives an overview of the 40^th Anniversary of the Foundation fundraising campaign. If your Area Meeting is still to occur, I encourage you to attend.

The campaign to celebrate the 40^th Anniversary runs from 17 March to 18 April. How amazing would it be if we reached the goal. Zonta Foundation 40th Anniversary

District Project Foster Hope

I had the pleasure of meeting June Matthews at the Wellington Club, International Women’s Day Breakfast on 6 March. June is the Foster Hope Coordinator for Wellington, Hawkes Bay and Gisborne. Her nearest Foster Hope colleague is based in Auckland.

Foster Hope are a small organisation doing big things. The help we give them makes a big difference to the lives of young girls living in care. Many thanks to those clubs who have already sent funds through funds raised for this project. Great work!

For those clubs who are yet to donate, we know that you’ll have fundraising plans across the biennium. Keep working to your plans and we look forward to receiving your donation when it arrives.

Thanks to all the wonderful clubs who have made their donations for the D16 project! We are in the position of making another donation of $8,650 to Foster Hope. This gives them the total of $16,000 for the year to purchase the Kaz Cooke books. We are in discussions with Foster Hope on other projects or items we can help them with the remaining project donations that were received for this year.

A reminder that Foster Hopes annual Winter Pyjama Drive is starting up in April. If this is a project that your club or you individually would like to help out with then please reach out to your local co-ordinator at Foster Hope.

Foster Hope believes that every child in care deserves to know that their community cares about them. They demonstrate this by providing backpacks of essential items, which is a symbol of our support and love for both the children and their caregivers. For many women being able to provide their children with the basic necessities of life is taken for granted. Zonta prides itself on working together to build a better world for both women and girls, this is why Zontian’s throughout D16 should be proud to be supporting and working with Foster Hope!

Together we can support the women who take on foster children, and the girls in foster care and hopefully build a better world for them all!

Please continue to send through any queries, questions, feedback or photos of any events or advocacy that you are doing for or with Foster Hope to the Ashburton club!

Christine Todd

District Project Chair

Zonta Club of Ashburton

Zonta NZ Awards

The last JMK Award awarding Olivia Murphy, her District 16 JMK scholarship/award will happen on 31 March. This is being hosted by the Christchurch-Canterbury club, who nominated Olivia and gave her a Club award for a young woman in business studies. Lt.Governor Sarah Barclay with District 16 Secretary and JMK Women in Business Scholarship Chair Sue Hope will be my delegates and attend virtually.

We wish Olivia all the best for her continuing studies and the future.

Ongoing awards are now called the Zonta Women in Business Leadership Award. You can use all the information from Zonta International site Zonta Women in Business Leadership Award to promote the award in your area.

Area Meeting report back

Area 2 meeting

We had our meeting on the 8th of February. Governor Jen and Lieutenant Governor Sarah got the meeting rolling getting us to think about why we became members of Zonta and what keeps us members and delving into our core values. Jen reminded us of the Zonta International and District 16 strategy and got us thinking about what this means at our district, area and club levels.

Guest speaker, Helen Bowie gave an extremely insightful talk on advocacy, really highlighting what advocacy means from a Zonta perspective. Helen’s wealth of knowledge on Zonta advocacy really shone through.

We had a fantastic update from Margaret Currie on how the Foundation funds are progressing and the Foundation initiatives.

I always like hearing about what has been happening at each club and what are considered the highlight activities for each club. These updates from each club were a great opportunity for clubs to reflect on their own activities but also draw inspiration from what other clubs are doing.

Thank you to all those that participated in the meeting, either as a speaker or attendee. It was great to have your support and interest in either sharing or learning about Zonta. I hope to see you all again at conference in October.

Dr Nicola Schreurs

Zonta District 16, Area 2 Director 2024-2026

International Women’s Day & Zonta Rose Day

I’ve had a wonderful International Women’s Day this year and I hope you have too. I attended three events. Whether your club hosted your own event, joined another club or organisation’s event, it’s all about marking the day and the opportunity to hear from remarkable women. Thanks to everyone for sharing their pictures and activities.