2016 Round the World Breakfast: A Wrap

24 May 2016

On Wednesday 27 April, we celebrated world YWCA Day with a record 170 corporate guests, members, colleagues and friends at our annual Round the World Breakfast event at QT Canberra. World YWCA Day is recognised every year across 120 countries. The Round the World Breakfast provides an opportunity for YWCAs to come together to honour the contributions of women leaders in their communities.

After welcoming guests, Executive Director, Frances Crimmins highlighted YWCA’s global strategic goals and spoke about the importance of empowering young women and girls to have educational and vocational opportunities in careers in science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics (STEAM). Frances then introduced the valuable work of the YWCA Clubhouse in Tuggeranong, providing  young people from underserved communities with such opportunities.

We were delighted to have Dr Sarah Pearson, CEO of the CBR Innovation Network as our keynote speaker. Dr Pearson further endorsed the importance of STEAM in her address, stressing the importance of providing young people with pathways into these areas. Dr Pearson also highlighted opportunities for women to create change and have an impact within the STEAM field, and shared her passion for physics, entrepreneurship and venture capitalism!

While we enjoyed a delicious breakfast courtesy of QT Canberra, Dr Pearson joined Dr Annette Berriman and Professor Elanor Huntington in a panel discussion on their respective careers in STEAM, and how to tackle the gender gap and increase female representation in STEAM fields.

The winners of the Great Ydeas Small Grants Program were announced by YWCA Canberra President Kate Chipperfield. Seven local girls and women have been supported to pursue a diverse range of exciting new projects. We wish to congratulate our winners once again, and thank Australian Catholic Superannuation, EY and NAB for their generous support in offering three unique grants to add to our program.

The event was a terrific way to celebrate World YWCA Day, with a record $5,000 raised for the YWCA Clubhouse. We wish to thank everybody for all the generous contributions we received on the day.

We would also like to extend our thanks to the individuals and businesses who donated fantastic prizes for our raffle and silent auction:

• Betty Ferguson –  YWCA Canberra life member, who donated a beautiful homemade quilt
• Simon Le, from Simon Le Coaching
• HotelHotel
• Canberra Segway Tours
• Poacher’s Pantry

And to our supportive corporate and community friends, who purchased tables:

• Griffin Legal
• JB Were
• NAB
• EY
• Westpac 
• Australian Catholic Super
• PwC
• Julia Burns Consulting
• Dimension Data
• Microsoft
• University of Canberra
• AARNet

Tags: Computer Clubhouse, fundraising, great ydeas, Round the World Breakfast