Opportunity for VSA Speakers:  Connecting Communities

VSA is New Zealand’s largest and most experienced volunteer agency working in international development. We have recruited more than 3000 New Zealanders over the past 54 years. We bring together New Zealanders and our Asia-Pacific neighbours to share their skills and experience, working to transform lives and create a fair future for all. 

For many years Volunteer Service Abroad (VSA) has offered speakers to community clubs like yours throughout New Zealand. Last year we were delighted to accept invitations from Rotary clubs in Wellington, Auckland, Christchurch, Nelson, Whakatane, Whangaparoa and Dunedin.

We know that there are many more Rotary groups throughout New Zealand and in 2017 we would like to reach out to more of them.

We currently have about 50 speakers who have returned within the last year (2016) from VSA assignments throughout the wider Pacific including Timor Leste. This list is constantly being updated as volunteers are returning from assignments every few months. We are not able to offer a speaker in every part of New Zealand unless there is a returned who lives there but we can do our best!

 

VSA returned volunteers speak about their experiences on assignment in the different countries they have travelled to. They accompany their talks with wonderful photos of the places they have worked. They talk about the challenges and joys of working alongside cultures usually very different from their own and their efforts to make a valuable and lasting contribution to those communities. They are all highly qualified in their different areas of expertise and all confident speakers.

 

We do everything we can to make sure there are no hiccups on the night by briefing our speakers well and organizing all details well in advance.  There is no cost to you for the speaker.  We would appreciate it very much if you could let the speaker conveners of the groups in your district know about our offer of speakers and encourage them to contact us if they are interested.