National Council of Women of NSW

NEWSLETTER

2018-19 Issue No 1

* 2018-19 Executive Members

* Christmas Celebrations at final meeting of the year

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* Foundation Day Luncheon Report * Outreach

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* Dame Marie Bashir Peace Awards recipients

* Group photo Awardees/HCs

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* DMBPA Recipients continued 5

* Individual Members’ Rep. — An introduction & M/T dates

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* Celebrate Being an Australian Luncheon notice

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* Report from Julie Morris, NSW Coordinator of Standing C’tees.

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ENCLOSED : Booking Form: Celebrate Being an Australian Australia Day Luncheon, Thurs-day 24 January 2019

* Dates for Your Diary

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INSIDE THIS ISSUE

A MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT Annie Kiefer

Well another couple of months have come and gone and it is now nearing Christmas. The festive season is almost upon us with many shops here in Sydney already knee deep in Christmas deco-rations and mince pies!

Firstly, I would like to thank you all for allowing me to continue being your President for another year, and I congratulate those who have taken on other Executive positions. Our next meeting (and I know you already have it in your diaries) will be held this month on the last Thursday after-noon/early evening on the 29th. Please come along for some festive good cheer, an interesting Guest Speaker and a lovely chat with your fellow Council members.

I have recently been travelling extensively across NSW and have noticed that some of the coun-tryside is extremely green. I could’ve been forgiven for thinking the drought is over, but not so. It is called, by the farmers, a “Green Drought”, where the surface has half an inch of green grass, but when you dig down, it is as dry as a bone. The further out you travel, the drier it is.

Sadly, we have had some terrible disasters over the last few months culminating with the news of the recent plane crash off the coast of Indonesia and our thoughts and prayers are with the victims of all of these tragedies.

The last couple of months have been busy. Our Foundation Day Luncheon was held at the Castle-reagh Boutique Hotel. Our Awardee on this day was the very worthy Sonia Casanova who has the most amazing set of credentials. Sonia was nominated by Doreen Todd, a member of Soropti-mist International.

We held our Dame Marie Bashir Peace Awards, attended by the very gracious Dame Marie Bashir. This year a new format was tried & it was very, very successful. Our hostess, Caroline Blanden, conducted an individual interview session with each of our Awardees and this proved to be most successful. These young high school women are amazing in all they do. It’s always grati-fying to see them accompanied by members of their proud families.

In July I represented NCWNSW and attended the NSW Nurses and Midwives Association Confer-ence at Rosehill (I am a member of their Aged Care Roundtable). A couple of the subjects dis-cussed included nurse bullying in aged care, registered nurses in nursing homes 24/7, funding for dental care in aged care as well as the further release of more documents in the “10 Questions” series.

In September myself and several members of the NCWNSW attended a forum on Child Protection and Family Law. The special guest was Mr Lee Evans, Liberal Member for Heathcote. It was an informal and friendly forum wherein the members and guests heard brief outlines of some cases where the State and Federal Child Protection systems failed to protect children. We have all been asked to personally submit a letter to our local MP.

On the 11th September the NCWNSW were invited by the War Widows Guild & Legacy to lay a wreath at the War Memorial in Canberra. It was a service commemorating not only those lost in the Twin Towers tragedy, but women who have served, now serve & will serve in the Australian military. The service at 5pm was very moving with women from the Royal Navy carrying out the ceremony at the tomb of the unknown soldier. Afterwards I was privileged to meet with Scott Mor-rison, Bill Shorten, Brendan Nelson & Tanya Plibersek when I spoke on the work of the NCWNSW.

Our Members and Friends Morning Tea is now held at the Piccadilly Arcade Food Court. It would be lovely to see you all there for this friendly get-together on the third Monday of the month at 10.15 am.

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WELCOME TO THE NEW EXECUTIVE 2018-2019

President Annie Kiefer Vice Presidents Vacant Hon Secretary Marlene Arditto Hon Treasurer Nola Barkl AM Individual Members’ Representative Judith Townsend State Coordinator of Standing Committees Julie Morris

DELEGATES REPRESENTING AFFILIATED ORGANISATIONS

Australian Church Women NSW State Unit Inc.—Tricia Graham Australian Federation of Graduate Women - NSW Inc. — Dr Jane Baker Catholic Women’s League Australia NSW Inc. — Sally Fennell Girl Guides NSW & ACT — Margaret Wood National Council of Jewish Women Aust. NSW Division— Maxine Bachmayer Quota International Sydney Inc. — Judith Townsend Soroptimist International - Region NSW — Dr Anne Sheehan Sydney High School Old Girls Union Inc. — Alison McDonald Women Lawyers Association of NSW Inc. — Janet Coombs AM

CHRISTMAS CELEBRATIONS

Our last meeting of the year

will be held on

THURSDAY, 29 NOVEMBER at 4.30 pm

Please join us to celebrate the Festive Season

NCW NSW delegates are welcome to invite their Presidents to join us on

this occasion Level 1, SMSA 280 Pitt Street, Sydney

E info@ncwnsw.org.au T 9269 0433 F 9269 0466 W www.ncwnsw.org.au Facebook www.facebook.com/NCWomenNewSouthWales/

Our Triennial Conference was held in Canberra in mid-October. This was my first attendance at an “NCWA Conference” - and what an amazing gathering of very clever, very articulate and very smart women it was. Our NSW Resolutions were passed unanimously and the highlight of the whole event was the Gala Dinner where two of our very own, Doreen Todd and Michelle Pedersen, were awarded the Inaugural NCWA Woman of the Year and NCWA Senior Service Award respectively by Lady Cosgrove, NCWA Patron and wife of the Governor-General, Sir Peter Cosgrove. Our thanks go to their nominators Nola Barkl and Judith Townsend. What worthy recipients our two NSW members are.

We now have a new President of NCWA, Robyn Nolan from Western Australia and we wish her well in her role. I would urge you all to attend the next NCWA Conference. From a ‘newbie’ perspective I found it very important and enlightening to see how our Council works, why things are done the way they are and to meet and mingle with fellow members from all over Australia. And, of course, the camara-derie is exciting.

I wish to thank all who have attended to the office during the past year. To our Executive for always making the right decisions!! To our members who faithfully attend our General Meetings and to you all for renewing your Memberships. Please consider swelling our num-bers by the giving of a gift membership for family members, friends or even strangers! It would be very much appreciated.

I would also like to acknowledge the great service that Michael Mannington, Volunteer Photographer Extraordinaire, does for our Coun-cil. Thank you, Michael. You are much appreciated.

And last, but by no means least it is a very happy, safe, cheerful and peaceful Christmas that I wish for you all. And as 2019 nears, I

hope that this particular year will be the biggest and best yet for yourselves and for NCWNSW.

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NCW NSW 122nd

Foundation Day Luncheon

Held on Thursday 9 August, 2018, the venue was again Cello’s Restaurant at the Castlereagh Boutique Hotel. The Restaurant is contained within a sumptuous dining hall decorated in a wonderful baroque style. We had ~40 attendees from a number of affiliated organisations and it was lovely to meet new women and learn of their interests.

Our Guest Speaker was Janet Schorer the NSW Children’s Guardian. Janet has a background as a regis-tered nurse with her career focusing mainly on the health and welfare of children. Her decision to work in the public sector gave her an ideal background to take up her current position.

Her role is to oversee the safety of the children of NSW who are the most vulnerable. This amounts to ~25,000 children and covers children not with a parent due to disability, homelessness, violence. It also co-vers the working conditions of children in entertainment, circuses, scouts or other groups. Janet explained that child safety can mean many things. They might need emotional support, freedom from abuse, freedom from bullying, adequate food and shelter.

The Department has over 200 staff and every one must have a current working with children check. This is monitored daily to ensure no staff member behaves inappropri-ately. Janet must act as Guardian, CEO, team leader and support counsellor because what staff see and read is pretty awful. The Guardian is appointed for five years and so needs to get on with the job.

Janet then went on to speak about the necessity of values, the role of champions/mentors and the use of influence. Her first question is ‘Why does it matter?’ and then ‘I want to repay the investment made in me’. This leads to the champions who encouraged her to take on issues and challenges, who helped when doubt crept in, who gave her confidence and is followed by the use of influence through developed networks and mentors, interconnected systems, and small conversations that can snowball.

It is a career that gets Janet out of bed every morning to continue making a difference.

A very worthy recipient of the NCW NSW Recognition Award 2018 was Sonia Casa-nova, nominated by Soroptimist International – Region of NSW.

Sonya’s profile and amazing range of fabulous good works were related to the admir-ing attendees. At a young age her achievements are impressive and with young women like Sonya working to improve the status of women the baton is in good hands.

Report from Judith Townsend

OUTREACH … TO Syrian New Arrivals

Michelle Pedersen will be organising a Community Day in February 2019 through the contact she

has been developing over the past year with SydWest Multicultural Services. Watch for details to be

emailed to members . If you are interested and are not on email, please write to us with your contact

details so that we can send you information.

TO a Delegation from Japan

Arrangements have been taking place through the Australia Japan Healthcare Network for a

visit from Japan of a group of women who are working for gender equality in Japan. It is now con-

firmed that 12 women, will meet with us on Friday, 30 November at 2.30 pm on Level 1, SMSA, 280

Pitt Street, Sydney (where we hold our General Meetings). They will be interested to learn about our

roles and activities as well as gender related issues in Australia. If you would like to attend, please

phone the office at 9269 0433 or email info@ncwnsw.org.au

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DAME MARIE BASHIR PEACE AWARDS 2018 Parliament House, Sydney

Tuesday 2 October 2018, at 2.30pm

For the 9th Annual Presentation of these awards, Professor the Hon-ourable Dame Marie Bashir AD CVO presented 6 Awards ($250) and 5 Highly Commended Certificates to an impressive group of young wom-en, each of whom showed a passion for harmony and social justice. Before receiving Certificates, each recipient was drawn into a conver-sation about her achievements by Carolyn Blanden, Awards Commit-tee member, as she was seated with Professor Dame Marie and the student’s principal or school representative. Highlights of recipients’ achievements are as follows:

AWARDEES Angelina ARORA Year 11 Sydney Girls High School

Through STEM, created a plastic from waste that decomposed 1.5 million times faster than conventional plastics. Won BHP Billiton and CSIRO award and support to attend International Science Engineering Fair in USA. Angeline came fourth out of nearly two thousand students from 81 countries.

Invited on TV and radio and promoted social justice issues, plus encouraging people in instigating social change Partnered with Aminata Maternal Foundation to address exploitation of refugees, led Spread the Warmth and Share the Dignity

campaigns to collect hundreds of hot size toiletries and unwanted clothing, raised awareness through petitions and school-based groups to raise funds.

Mehak BOKHARI Year 11 Burwood Girls High School

Created Sisters in Society (SIS) & ran workshops in Auburn for students with refugee background, to help them understand Aus-tralian culture while retaining their own cultural background. This program was expanded when many H.S. boys were inter-ested. This became Brothers & Sisters in Society (BASIS). It has been a great success.

Multicultural Youth Affairs Network Ambassador (MYAN) to represent the voice of multicultural background youth. Attended 2018 MYAN Ambassadors Camp to begin planning a 2019 summit to discuss issues and empower migrants to take action and seek change while embracing their own culture.

Part of Student Representative Council to organise the ‘Islamophobia’ themed forum inspired by ABC TV “You Can’t Ask That”. A second one is currently being organised.

Eleanor DRURY Year 12 Ulladulla High School

Initiated positive self-image campaign “Everyone’s Perfect” addressing body and mind issues to reset internal voices and create positivity. Has now gone global through Facebook and Instagram with over 12,000 followers.

Won Award for her contributions to “Anti Bullying” and “Upstander” campaigns across NSW schools for years 7-12 help students understand why they bully. This involves self-perception as negative and then treating others negatively. Changing self-image to positive and kind is the aim.

She has coordinated workshops at school, community, national and international levels to promote student wellbeing, seminar for country Rugby League Referees to provide skills around mental health, leadership and wellbeing.

Caroline HO Year 12 Strathfield Girls High School

Founder and participant in Amity (formerly Kind Club) that aims to spread kindness and love to bring the school community to-gether. The Club has lessened negative comments and covert bullying and empowers young women to see kindness as an important value.

Launched ‘Give Something for Nothing’ campaign inviting friends to offer sympathy, food and coffee to the homeless community. Initiative now relaunched in school and community raising funds and blankets.

Also volunteer or participant at Exodus, UNSW Museum of Human Diseases, Brain Games, RYPEN camp, and awards from Zonta Sydney.

Madison UELAND Year 12 Monte Sant’ Angelo Mercy College

Passion began in primary school discovering the “deplorable conditions of mentally ill patients in the Philippines”. Initiated Mis-sion for Mattresses fund raising campaign and supplied 182 beds for patients.

Visited a College in the Mountains of Timor Leste. Had just been name a school scholarship winner and donated the $20,000 to fund university education for several girls. This launched the ‘Colegio Tertiary Education Scholarship Fund’. First two recipi-ents are now studying medicine in Dili. They want to make an impact and bring peace and prosperity to their communities.

Initiated and introduced 2018 College theme “Journey to Justice” with initiative like “Change for Timor” where students donate small change. Funds raised buy “Food for Thought” that provides meals for Timorese students.

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Nicola WEISS Year 11 Moriah College In 2016 she was selected to participate in the school’s Future Problem Solving Team which focused on eliminating stigma

around teen mental health, and encouraging those suffering from depression or anxiety to seek professional help. In the international finals in the USA her team came second, with a special mention of their approach as a model project.

Back home she wanted to start a similar dialogue throughout her school. She had the idea for a Teen Mental Health App. The App called “Blue Sky” was designed to use Diversional Therapy. She entered this idea in the Scholars for Entrepreneurship. She was a finalist in this competition.

Attendance at the Generation Next Talks she heard from experts about the relationship with sleep and mental health. Students complain about how exhausted they are and she thought about a sleep space at school to encourage students who need it to have some down time. Negotiations are ongoing.

HIGHLY COMMENDED Tasnia AHMAD Year 11 Riverside Girls High School

Within her school she is Chair of the Amnesty International society with 40 students, the largest in NSW. Her aim here is to de-velop advocacy skills with a focus on goal setting, pitching, fundraising, event management, etc.

In her community she is Youth Councillor and Deputy Chair of Ryde Youth Council and has developed a Youth Ambassador program to foster youth engagement.

Youth of Sydney is a photo journal series that aims to deconstruct the misrepresentation of today’s youth and to share their real and raw stories in all their complexity and diversity.

Emmanuelle BOURIS Year 12 Queenwood School

An experience in Cambodia made her realise that suffering and the need for rehabilitation exists in our Indigenous communities, and particularly for children.

She began volunteering at Life for Koori Kids which supports families and especially children realising their potential. It was in this way she understood how skewed the European understanding of Indigenous people is. So she devoted her weeks to learning and helping this community.

At school she wanted to encourage younger students to engage with organisations and people. She established a Social Jus-tice Club with 50 participants from 12-18. They are involved in such groups as Rough Edges and The Big Issue.

Rola ELAYAN Year 12 Wyndham College

Rola uses her academic initiatives, leadership skills, public speaking to promote harmonious relationships and change percep-tions of the role and abilities of women in her local and cultural communities.

She also writes poetry and was asked to write in memory of lives lost in if during Cyclone Winston. This cross-cultural involve-ment was a source of pride and encouragement.

She is also a founding member of the Sydney Palestinian Society formed to foster good relations between the Palestinian peo-ple in Sydney and other local cultural communities. She has been able to promote various events and panels to dispel myths regarding Palestinian women and to give them an equitable voice.

Hannah JOHNSTON Year 11 Kirrawee High School

This is my Mind is a campaign she started which focused on students using the power of self-belief and gratitude to overcome adolescent anxiety and personal barriers.

She attended the National Young Leaders Conference and developed skills she has applied to Wear It Purple Week, White Rib-bon Day, Harmony Day and NAIDOC Week, including International Day of Disability.

On two trips to Cambodia she volunteered with children in a learning centre and helped build a house for a family in need. She raised funds to support the cost of building materials and worked as a labourer to help build the house.

Molly SPONG Year 12 Matraville Sports High School

Having a personal intellectual disability, she is Support Captain to represent students in the school with intellectual disability and actively advocates for equal rights for children with disabilities.

She is also a strong advocate against bullying and has made and starred in two anti-bullying short films. She was the per-son being bullied and was able to clearly show the effect bullying has on victims. Both were entered in the Focus on Ability Film Festival and were well placed.

Back Row (l to r) Molly Spong, Eleanor Drury, Emmanuelle Bouris, Nicola Weiss, Mehak Bokhari, Tania Ahmad. Front Row (l to r) Rola Elayan, Hannah Johnston, Caroline Ho, Professor the Hon Dame Marie Bashir, Angelina Arora, Madison Ueland.

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DON’T FORGET

THERE IS A DAYTIME OPPORTUNITY

FOR YOU TO MEET AND TALK

TO NCW FRIENDS AT THE

MEMBERS & FRIENDS OF NCW

MORNING TEA

10.15 - 11.30 am Piccadilly Food Court (area on left after exiting from escalator) NEXT DATES: Wednesday 21 November 2018 Wednesday 20 February 2019 Come along for warm friendship and to hear the latest news of NCW NSW. Judith Townsend Individual Members’ Representative

Strangers’ Dining Room

Parliament House Macquarie Street

Sydney Thursday 24 January 2019 12.00 noon for 12.30pm

Early Bird Bookings by 8 Dec 2018 $110 pp

Later Bookings by 7 Jan 2019 $120 pp

.

SEPARATE BOOKING FORM ENCLOSED

also available at www.ncwnsw.org.au

INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS REPRESENTATIVE - INTRODUCTION My name is Judith Townsend and at our recent AGM I was elected as your In-dividual Members Representative. I was originally elected to the Executive as an Affiliated Organisation Delegate. I now hold dual membership and so have these two roles. I’m also guest Editor of the E-News and regularly volunteer in the office. My interests in the status and advancement of women are wide ranging, but particularly involve health and wellbeing, financial security, and personal safety. My IMR aims for the 2018-2019 year are to:

Be your voice on the NCW Executive Committee and in general Council meetings, Advocate for your interests and concerns, Keep you informed via occasional IMR news sheets and items in the E-News and Newsletters, Seek your views on matters raised in Council and urge your action in our campaigns.

So I would love to hear from you. Below are a few short questions you might like to think about and perhaps share your views with me.

What do you want from NCW NSW and from your IM representative? What are your 2-3 main interests relating to women and/or children? Why do you belong to NCW NSW or, equally importantly, why have some of you not renewed

your membership for 2018-19? NCW NSW is concerned to retain and grow its membership. The key to a vibrant organisation is firstly to keep its current members satisfied and engaged and then to attract new members to a liv-ing, exciting organisation. We would love to retain your memberships for at least one more year to see if we can offer you the stimulus, information, action and enjoyment you surely look for in an or-ganisation. To this end attached is a membership renewal form for you to complete and forward. If you have concerns, would like to share ideas or views or want some information you can always contact the office on info@ncwnsw.org.au and either myself or another committee member will re-spond. However if you would like to contact me personally I am always ready to chat with you. My MOB: 0435 526 316 and Email: henryst@bigpond.net.au I am excited and encouraged, and looking forward to a great year for Individual Members.

Best wishes, Judith

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NSW COORDINATOR OF STANDING COMMITTEES Julie Morris At the recent National Council of Women of Australia Triennial Conference, some changes were approved to the structure of its standing committees. Basically a merger of a couple of the coordinator roles and also the inclusion of an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islands adviser position. At this point in time we can’t see any rea-son as to why we wouldn’t reflect these changes into the NCW NSW structure. A full outline of the structure and those filling positions will be advised in early 2019. If you have an interest in a particular area – and feel you could make a contribution – please send an email to me: cec@velocitynet.com.au I want to thank all those people who have been filling adviser positions over this last year and hope you have enjoyed hearing and read-ing their interesting information. You will see a bit more activity from us on the NCW NSW Facebook page. If you are not on FB we will try to repeat the more important articles in the Newsletter – but space is at a premi-um, so not always possible. Music – Helene Galettis: RIP Richard Gill AO – this Perspective and Celebration of his life highlighted his role as a music educator and a catalyst for ‘making things happen’. Australia is all the poorer for his passing. Women at Work – Karen Binstead: Chart (below left) How can we do better? Does it mean that the females always need to ‘catch up’ to the males? Is there another way?

Economics - One of the things we learnt at the NCWA Triennial Conference was about encouraging all women who are still in the accumulation phase of their superannuation journey to CONSOLI-DATE all the accounts – so they aren’t losing fees from low bal-ance accounts. Education - Teach your younger colleagues, friends and family members not to be afraid of ‘numbers’ – this is the essence also of the STEM (or STEAM, if you include Arts) campaign. Arts sub-jects don’t always mean ‘no numbers’ – everything from planning sets to ‘composition’ of a painting is about the numeracy (too much of this, not enough of that) – not always expressed as num-bers – but still has a number base. We had a dynamic presentation at the NCWA conference from Sarah Moran, CEO and co-founder of Girl Geek Academy and she also directed us towards a site to help start you on the jour-ney. Not ‘tech savvy’ - try the pre-reader unplugged ones first – you will need a printer to do the print out, your local library can assist. Hopefully we aren’t 30 years too late to make and shape the internet!

Rural and Urban Women – at the time or writing the whole state of NSW is drought declared and we are thinking, and many of us are living with its ramifications. Our affiliate organisation CWA of NSW has really been a leading ‘light’ for our country women. It has put on two extra staff to han-dle the extra workload and streamlined the process of providing funds to families, in conjunction with the Red Cross, they have processed over 1,922 applications and distributed over $3.1million to deserving families. These funds are not used to feed animals or fund capital works.

Recently launched, the Australian Femicide Map is a visual reminder that our women and children in Australia still don’t exist in complete safety in our homes, on our streets and in their wider communities.

Sydney was one of the cities that Plan International recently covered in its research project “Unsafe in the City” .

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DATES FOR YOUR 2018-2019 DIARY 2018

Wednesday 21 November Members & Friends of NCW Morning Tea, 10.15-11.30 am Venue: Piccadilly Food Court (area on left after exiting from escalator) Wednesday 21 November Executive Meeting, LG Level, SMSA, 280 Pitt Street 12-2 pm Final Executive Meeting for 2018. Thursday 29 November Council Meeting, Level 1, SMSA, 280 Pitt Street 4.30 pm Guest Speaker: Robyn Nolan, President NCWA elected at Triennial Conference in Canberra , AGM 19 October JOIN US FOR CHRISTMAS REFRESHMENTS for final meeting of the year

2019

Thursday 24 January “Celebrate Being an Australian” Australia Day Luncheon Strangers’ Dining Room, Parliament House, Macquarie Street, Sydney. 12 for 12.30 pm (Notice on page 6 and separate Booking Form enclosed/attached.) Wednesday 20 February Members & Friends of NCW Morning Tea, 10.15-11.30 am Venue: Piccadilly Food Court (area on left after exiting from escalator) Wednesday 20 February Executive Meeting, LG Level, SMSA, 280 Pit Street 12-2 pm Thursday 28 February Council Meeting, Level 1, SMSA, 280 Pitt Street 4.30 pm Wednesday 20 March Members & Friends of NCW Morning Tea, 10.15-11.30 am Venue: Piccadilly Food Court (area on left after exiting from escalator) Wednesday 20 March Executive Meeting, LG Level, SMSA, 280 Pit Street 12-2 pm Thursday 28 March Council Meeting, Level 1, SMSA 280 Pitt Street 4.30 pm Wednesday 17 April Members & Friends of NCW Morning Tea, 10.15-11.30 am Venue: Piccadilly Food Court (area on left after exiting from escalator) Wednesday 17 April Executive Meeting, LG Level, SMSA, 280 Pit Street 12-2 pm EASTER DATES — Friday 19 April — Monday 22 April Thursday 25 April Anzac Day Thursday 2 May Deferred date of Council Meeting due to coinciding with Anzac Day Level 1, SMSA 280 Pitt Street 4.30 pm

NCW NSW

LG Level Letterbox 3 280 Pitt St SYDNEY 2000

T 9269 0433 F 9269 0466 E info@ncwnsw.org.au W www.ncwnsw.org.au