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RYLA District 9800

RYLA District 9800 blog space is an online space dedicated to celebrating our RYLA alumni
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October 10th, 2022

10/10/2022

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The 3rd Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA) Oceania Leaders Forum took place in Sydney on the 27th and 28th August. RYLA District 9800 was represented by the district chairperson Jessica Wheeler-Thomas, program co-director Molly O'Donohue and incoming co-director Jaiden Brandy. In total there were 30 representatives from 13 Districts across Australia and New Zealand.

The forum started in 2018 as a way for RYLA program leaders to connect and share experiences and resources and has proved to be an invaluable network for the RYLA district 9800 team. Previous forums have led to the establishment of the Rotary Oceania RYLA alumni association, which is open to all RYLA alumni from across the region; the creation of an extension RYLA program for graduates of District RYLA programs (RYLA Oceania Elevate), which ran in January 2020 and will return in 2023, as well as infrastructure to share knowledge and resources across RYLA districts.

Topics covered at the 2022 forum included: 'What does RYLA look like in today's world?'; 'What does Rotary look like in today's world?'; marketing, communication and recruitment; alumni engagement and participation in events such as the Rotary International conference in Melbourne. The district 9800 team came away energised for our upcoming program and inspired to develop our program further.

Opportunities for alumni

Upcoming events for RYLA alumni include RYLA O-Day on the 15th of October in Bendigo (tickets here https://rylaoceania.org/ryla-o-day/) and the RYLA elevate program in 2023 (see https://rylaoceania.org/elevate/).
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Nhung Vo

17/11/2019

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Nhung Vo Attended RYLA 9800 as a participant in 2015 Now works as a project coordinator for a builder in the construction industry and is the host of Everyday People Podcast with Nhung Vo.​
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Why did you do RYLA?
I did RYLA because I had no plans the week that it was running, the programme was fully funded for, and there was a huge theme around community and diversity, which are topics I have always been passionate about. I also enjoy meeting new people, going camping away from the city life and self-development. And you know what? RYLA exceeded my expectations! It was challenging, eye-opening, resourceful and planted seeds for passion projects to come alive years later.
 
What did RYLA mean to you?
RYLA to me is all about rubbing shoulders and having exposure to different people, ideas and opinions to expand what your mind used to believe and to expand the possibilities that you once thought were limited. RYLA delves into tough topics and encourages participants to speak up, share their thoughts, debate and discuss. At the same time, RYLA challenges participants to keep an open mind, to listen, to want to learn more and to understand better. Some of these controversial but need to be talked about topics include racism, the world of binaries and insecurities. Get ready to be mind blown and enlightened by people from different walks of life!
 
How has RYLA helped you on the path you walk today?
Soon after RYLA, I kept in contact with a few girls, a comedian, naturopathy enthusiast, marketing specialist and creative hippie. I made the effort to reach out and continue to connect with these girls because I love and appreciated what they were all about. We also all have the same top values, which is a thirst to see and embrace change and self-development. To be honest if I didn’t attend RYLA I would have never met such diverse women who shape who I am today. Where do you think I’d bump into a comedian? I never went to or knew of free comedy shows in Melbourne and have never been to the International Comedy Festival before. Where do you think I would’ve bumped into the other girls? Again, I would not have bumped into them in my engineering or construction world. These girls also came from different suburbs, some suburbs where I have never stepped foot into. Basically our differences opened up and expanded my world and my perspective. This led me to overall become a less judgemental person when meeting new people and who now appreciates diversity at a new level. And I just had to share that very special learning with my direct community. My first project was hosting the International Women’s Day Intimate Dinner with Speakers for 30 women in diverse industries. The 3rd dinner I hosted this year was sponsored by my work INTREC and was curated for women in construction and had guests who were architects, subcontractors, engineers, and project managers in one room. And guess who were behind me and the project from day dot, who collaborated with me and who helped drive the momentum that made these events successful? These RYLA girls of course! Without them and without my vision brought upon by RYLA, this project would have been stuck in a black hole somewhere. With the same foundations I’ve also started a podcast this year called Everyday People Podcast with Nhung Vo where I interview and chat with diverse guests about their story, learnings and life tools. Again I want to showcase that sharing our differences makes each other more colourful. And at the same time I want to showcase that we are also all the same and go through the same highs and lows of life. Maybe you’d like to join me on this journey ignited by RYLA and tune it? It is available on iTunes and Spotify.


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Conchita R. Khan

18/10/2019

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Conchita R. Khan
Attended RYLA 9800 as a participant in 2018
Master of Engineering student in University of Melbourne


Why did you do RYLA?
I was told about it by a friend who is a former participant. It was during the holidays; I didn’t have any plans. Also, I’m an international student, I’d never been camping in Melbourne before, and I enjoy meeting new people, so I thought, ‘Why not?!’ I did not know anything about Rotary clubs or RYLA and I honestly wasn’t expecting much from the program. But I was wrong – the program turned out to be much more than just a social event. I’m glad my friend got me involved.


What did RYLA mean to you?
My biggest takeaway from RYLA was empathy and compassion for others. In our day-to-day lives, it is difficult, and often inappropriate, to talk about certain issues like mental health or discrimination, but RYLA was a good platform for me to do that with other people in the same age group as myself. Listening to people describe their lives and their struggles with issues that I don’t normally face gave me a deeper appreciation for them. At the same time, it was liberating for me to be allowed to share my story and my perspective on things. These conversations I will hold dear forever, because you don’t get many chances to have them.


How has RYLA helped you on the path you are on today?
RYLA helped me mature into a better person. I’m much more considerate about other people’s struggles and not as quick to distance myself from those who have different opinions. I believe I’ve learned to respectfully disagree and work with people I don’t see eye to eye with. This helps me not only in my personal life, but professional life as well.
 
I also had the fortune to meet the Governor of Rotary, Bronwyn Stephens, who then sponsored me to attend the Social Impact Forum and, a few months after that, the International Women’s Day Breakfast at the Crown. Moreover, a few months after RYLA ended, I was invited for dinner by my Rotary club to talk about my RYLA experience, where I met some amazing Rotarians. I’m looking forward to becoming involved with the Rotary club in some small capacity in the future.


And last, but not least, I made some great friends at RYLA – friends I still catch up with every now and then. We have this unspoken understanding that we’re always there to lend each other a hand or an ear. It’s a support system that lasts a long time.






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Daniel Paproth RYLA participant 2011

13/10/2019

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​Daniel has volunteered as part of the RYLA team for 7 years since he attended RYLA as a participant in 2011. With many talents and skills in his belt Daniel has sort out past RYLArians to hear what the program was like for them as participants and active members of their communities. This has led to a series of interviews we will be posting here. 
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This smiling face you see to the left is Daniel helping out the Management team on our RYLA Rotary Dinner Night. His trade mark up-beat attitude made him such a wonderful member of the RYLA team. 


As part of the first in a series of interviews with former RYLA participants, Daniel Paproth interviews Daniel Paproth. : ) 
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Why did you do RYLA?
To be completely honest – I was working for a man by the name of Rob Fava, a member of the Rotary Club of Werribee, who owns cardboard box manufacturing company BoxesToGo. It was my first job, so when he asked if I would be interested in attending RYLA, of course I said yes. Little did I know that it would be the most transformative week of my life – it is the best thing I have ever done. It set me on the path I am on today and I haven’t looked back since. I am so thankful Rob and his wife Lyn planted the seed!
 
What did RYLA mean to you?
I am still discovering the answer to that question even today, though it’s been eight years since I did the program as a participant. I don’t know where I would be without it, and I don’t like to think about it. RYLA represented the first time in my life where I was in an environment where I could truly be myself. As I’d spent the best part of 21 years not being myself for fear of judgement from peers, I actually had to learn who I was. RYLA was a week where I knew no one; that gave me the freedom to explore myself and find out who I really was.
 
The program has given me so much over eight years. It has given me a wealth of personal development, trained me in crucial leadership skills, given me greater empathy, awareness, self-awareness, developed in me resilience and also given me an understanding of true community. It has also given me some of the very best friends in the world, many of whom I’m still in contact with on a regular basis. It has even allowed me to watch my partner and my sister in later years participate in the program, which gave me immense pride.
 
How has RYLA helped you on the path you are on today?
It’s a bit serendipitous, really. In my participant year in 2011 I met Jamin Heppell. We formed a great bond. He later went on to found The Man Cave, an emotional intelligence and preventative mental health organisation for boys and men. We kept in touch as the years went on, sometimes close, other times not. In 2017 we invited Jamin back to RYLA to deliver a speech and Q&A on his life experience, which introduced me to The Man Cave. In 2018, Jamin and his co-founder Hunter Johnson invited me to join the organisation as a trainee facilitator and I haven’t looked back.
 
So for me, RYLA is the single most important thing that has ever happened to me. It has led me to live out my passion, helping boys and men explore more of their humanity – just like I did in 2011 on RYLA – working for an amazing organisation. It’s given me many amazing friendships. (And, had I not moved out to live with RYLA friends David Kinnersley and Claire Bryan in Brunswick, I would probably never have met the love of my life Emily, because she would have been outside of the 50km maximum radius on Tinder.) To think I nearly didn’t get on the bus that Sunday morning back in 2011… I shudder at the thought.
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    One of the pillars of District 9800's RYLA program is Community. This blog will be an avenue for our RYLArians to contribute to the online RYLA community and share what they are doing to make change in their lives and the lives of others. 
    We are incredibly proud of our participants, so yes this is a space where we will be bragging about the amazing people we are lucky to call part of our RYLA family.  
    If you would like to contribute to this space please contact us 

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  • Home
  • About
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  • For Rotarians
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    • 2018
  • For Alumni
  • RYLA Digital Program 2021