Local girls keep aiming for the stars

By Isabella Guzman Gonzalez

ANOTHER edition of Zonta’s Encouragement Awards is supporting local girls with big aspirations to start their careers.

The winners of the 2023 Encouragement Awards, Elizabeth McGill from Cairns State High School and Tara Blake from St Monica’s College, will use the funds to achieve their academic dreams and advocate for women with their achievements.

Elizabeth McGill dreams of becoming a psychologist or a social worker to support other women in achieving their goals and helping to break the stigmas that women have to be docile and play a secondary role in society. Through Zonta’s Encouragement Award, she aims to attend Griffith University in Brisbane.

After a childhood of battling health complications, Tara Blake was inspired to become a lawyer specialising in medical law. Tara is deeply invested in the rights to bodily autonomy and safe access to abortions and wholeheartedly believes that she can make a difference for women through medical law.

The Zonta Club of Cairns is a leading organisation of professionals aiming to empower women through service and advocacy, purposing $5,000 yearly to girls who are about to start their careers through the Encouragement Awards and the Vocational Awards.

Zonta Cairns Advocacy Chair Mary Potter has interviewed the applicants for the Encouragement and Vocational Awards for five years. She said she is proud to see the quality of Cairns’ young women.

“Every year, we get so impressed by all these girls who are fighting the odds,” Ms Potter said.

“Girls who, from Year 11 and 12, have gone on to assisting the community wherever they could, while they’re trying to study, while they haven’t got the money and are still driven to go out and do what they can for women.”

Zonta Cairns congratulated the winners of the Encouragement

Awards and thanked the sponsors Mary-Anne Stokes from Drilling Around and Yolonde Entsch, who sponsored the Vocational Awards, which is yet to be announced.

Ms Potter encouraged young women from the community to apply for the Awards in Term 4.

“You can now apply through our website, but please do so by Term 4,” she said.

“It is also essential that you have a placement to apply for the Awards.”

Zonta Cairns is currently looking for organisations to sponsor the awards for the 2023/24 period through a donation of $2,000 for the Encouragement Awards or $1,000 for the Vocational Awards.

For more information and applications (only on Term 4), visit https://zontadistrict22.org/district-22-clubs/zonta-club-of-cairnsinc/ or click here http://bit.ly/3Y7SiFA in our online edition.