Rotary Youth Leadership Award
Empowering young leaders through growth, learning, and service.
The Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA) are Rotary International programmes run in New Zealand at the district level. They aim to grow emerging leaders by providing an intensive leadership development programme. Participants take part in a range of experiences including seminars and group activities designed to develop both self-leadership and leadership of others.
Rotary Youth Leadership Award’s Aims
From the official RYLA website RYLA aims to:
- Demonstrate Rotary’s respect and concern for youth
- Provide an effective training experience for selected youth and potential leaders
- Encourage leadership of youth by youth
- Recognize publicly young people who are rendering service to their communities
Development of future leaders is more important than ever: As part of Rotary’s emphasis on helping children this year, Rotarians will want to grab an opportunity to help shape the lives of future generations by taking an active role in the development of their leaders. RYLA offers that opportunity.
The age range for the RYLA program is 14 – 30. However, most organizers choose to focus either on the 14 – 18 or the 19 – 30 age groups as their needs are so different. Furthermore, most organizers narrow the range to a couple of years e.g. juniors and seniors in high school in the USA – the range really depends on the program that the organizers are planning.
Since it became an official Rotary program in 1971, RYLA has assisted thousands of young people to develop leadership skills at camps, seminars, and workshops. Warwick Bateman, a Rotary International 1998-99 RYLA committee member who has participated in 17 RYLA courses in District 9680 in Australia, considers the program more relevant than ever.
Youth Committee Applicants
Taradale Rotary have been involved since the programme’s inception in 1971
The RYLA programme is run by the Club’s Youth committee who regularly seek suitable applicants for the one week course held in Cambridge, N.Z.
- 1971 Wendy Lee and Murray Wiig attended the one week course at Dilworth. They were supported by the Club and after the event, talked to members on their experiences which were often hilarious and very worthwhile.
- 1972 Dianne Brown addressed Club after her week at RYLA at Dilworth.
- 1974 Marg Symons and Diane Littleford (now Diane Howell)
- 1976 Michael Kepka
- 1977 David Reed
- 1978 Lynne Prebensen
- 1979 Selena Brown
- 1980 Pamela Dine
- 1981 Dianne Beckett
- 1983 Glenda Neilson and Jenny Mayo
- 1985 Germain Meews and Jim Wilson
- 1987 Graeme Single and Mary Dysart
- 1989 Grant Burney
- 1993 Suzie Aikman
- 1994 Andrew McKinnon
- 1996 Hayden Winter and Amanda Sim
- 1997 Larina Iraia
- 2004 Rachel Maher
- 2005 Amanda Klausen, Andrew Rotchester and Jess Jones
- 2008 Rachel Horton, Danee Collins and Elyse Clarke
- 2010 Cornellia (Nelly) Vermunt and Alister Nunn (Student, EIT Hawkes Bay)
- 2011 Samara Brownlie and Kendall Latimer (Mitre 10 Mega)
Right, Diane Littleford (now Howell) with friends at RYLA 1974
