National Young Leaders Day

By Simon Clarke | Posted: Thursday June 14, 2018

A group of us; Taylor Baker, Tom Wilson, Maggie Murdoch, Emma Fahey, Annabelle Batchelor, Meg Allison, Mac Forde, Ruby Goodchild, Tayla Twemlow, Hope Stapley, Cameron Naaroa, Sophie Lloyd, Eva Reynolds, Tommy Jephson, and Emelia Spurway got to attend this great event.

NYLD (national young leaders day) was held at the town hall. There were so many children from schools across dunedin. Some were even from outside of dunedin! I personally think that everyone enjoyed the day, and bonus, we got to miss out on school. We learned all about ‘Me Whakaro Rangatira’ (thinking like a leader) from a group of amazing speakers. They taught us concepts like not giving up, valuing your differences, working hard, making sacrifices, taking on responsibilities, supporting each other, and being supported to help achieve our goals.

The guest speakers included Amanda Wilson, Robbie Fruean, Jono Naylor, Riley Hathaway, James Beck, Te Waka Mcleod, Vince Harder, Christian Gallen and Liz Alexander. All the talks were really inspiring. We had so many cool people. A singer, dancer, politician and even a rugby player! I was so excited when I got told I was going to the NYLD!

It was so much fun. My favorite speaker was Amanda Wilson, she talked about how it's good to be different. She grew up with not much money but she loved horse riding. But she didn't have all the right gear. Lots of people were mean and bullied her, she really wanted to be popular, but when she grew up at the age around 20 she learned that it’s good to be different in your own way!

I also really enjoyed Riley Hathaway.

She was 17 years old, and she grew up disliking the ocean, until one day when she had to do a school project on the ocean. Riley didn’t like the ocean because she was absolutely terrified of crabs, sharks, and even seaweed. She thought that turtles were sort of cute so she did her project about turtles! Luckily her dad knew someone that new lots about turtles so he talked to her about them. She learned that lots of sea animals were eating plastic. She said that if we carry on like this in 2020 there was going to be more plastic in the sea than fish. She started to to get interested in the ocean so she decided to find out more. She overcome her fears in the end by swimming with around about 12 sharks.

Another speaker we heard from was Robbie Frauen. He played internationally in the under 19’s World Cup Rugby team with the other New Zealanders. They won! Robbie Frauen went through a lot of hard times in his life. He had heart problems and was told he could not play rugby again.

We heard from lots of other speaker and in the end we even got to hear from a singer that sings the song Sugar Coated!

A big thank you to the Bendigo Valley Foundation for paying the entry fee to this great event.

We had lots of fun and learnt a lot.

We enjoyed it heaps!!!!

By Ruby Goodchild and Hope Stapley