Annual Report (Canada, 2002)
Yuka Nakamura, SWY12, headed the selection committee organization in coordination with SWAP, the Canadian organization responsible for liaising between the Canadian government and the Alumni Association.
This yearfs delegation was headed by David Simpson, an ex-py from the 3rd Program. SWY 15 had approximately 600 people apply, with funds being raised by charging an application fee to each person applying. These funds were used to help prepare the new delegation for departure, as well as some being designated towards the Port of Call in Vancouver to pay for a First Nations Ceremony at the University of British Columbia.
Canada developed its first constitution in early 2002, with major changes to the structure of the alumni itself. We created new positions to increase involvement and delegate more responsibility to members other than the key person. The elected members are as follows;
Key Person Blair Meadows
Assistant Key Person Louis Beauregard
Treasurer Reiko Tagami
Communications
Zane
Hamm
Website David Brodie
Batch 11 Rep John Burgener
Batch 13 Rep Angela Dawson
Although there are batch representatives for each program, only those Batch Representatives willing to take an active role in the alumni were elected as executive members.
During 2002, the Key Persons (Carol Lee SWY11, Blair Meadows SWY12) have been coordinating conferences in February for Alumni Activities (John Burgener, SWY11), March for possible Port of Call activities (Craig Takeuchi, SWY11), REN 2002 (Angela Dawson SWY13, Anna Stassis SWY13, Manon Provost SWY 7&9, and David Brodie SWY11), and the Tokyo Conference in December (Blair Meadows). In addition, the Canadian Alumni was involved in the selection of SWY 15, the Port of Call and the International Reunion in Vancouver.
Louis Beauregard, as Asst Key Person has taken on the marketing and sponsorship role for the alumni. He had recorded and tracked all sponsorship in order to keep a record of SWY Canadafs past involvement with organizations and donors. He worked with the new delegation to aid them in their sponsorship drive.
Zane Hamm, as communications director, has worked at getting in contact with inactive ex-pyfs. These alumni are unlikely to access e-mail regularly and were contacted by phone. In addition, Zane has created a reference center of activities and programs that are aimed towards intercultural communication and understanding. These files are accessible for Alumni or non-Alumni activities. Zane was also chosen as an Advisor for the 15th Program!
David Brodie, as web-site director was responsible for establishing the alumnifs web site. This yearsf selection used the web site as the focus point, with all applications being downloaded from the site. Although work has made it impossible to continue as our web-site director, David was able to use his personal experience in Mass Media / Communications as a representative at the Renaissance Conference 2002.
Reiko Tagami is the Treasurer and more recently, the web-site owner. In addition, she took on the extensive work of registrations for the Reunion in Vancouver. The account has been transferred to Vancouver and in the New Year we expect to standardize accounting procedures for the Alumni.
Carol Lee, past Key Person and International Reunion Committee Chair has remained extremely active in Alumni affairs despite stepping down as Key Person. The majority of work for the International Reunion fell on the shoulders of Carol and Reiko.
Communication between the various parties for the Port of Call was not very good. The groups involved and their role is as follows;
Government of Canada, were not interested in spending any time or money on the program. They refused to waive the visa requirements for the program, but did waive the dockage fees for the Nippon Maru to use Canada Place in Vancouver.
Government of British Columbia, was involved in the later stages of the planning as their resources were dedicated to the Queens visit in late summer. Did not respond to inquiries made by the alumni, preferring to channel all communication with the alumni through the Japanese Consulate in Vancouver.
Japanese Consulate in Vancouver, active participation with the Government of B.C. and alumni, seeking feedback and making sure the program was organized.
SWY Canada Alumni Association. Most of our involvement was with the Japanese Consulate. We prepared a sample itinerary for the Government of Canada which was passed on to the Japanese Consulate and Government of B.C. as a starting point. Also provided feedback on the positive and negative aspects of each suggested activity. Alumni also contributed funds to pay for a First Nations ceremony at the University.
Visas were an issue for both the Cameroonian delegation and International Reunion participants.
International
Reunion, Vancouver B.C., November 24-28,
2002.
With the exception of the visas, the international reunion went really well. Certain countries were either denied visas or did not have enough time to process them. Suggestions for the next program is to have on host country alumni member dealing with visas and ensuring that those countries that take longer to obtain visas are pushed ahead of time. In addition to the newsletter, it is recommended that a hard copy (paper) letter be sent directly from the reunion committee to the key persons of all alumni countries to ensure pyfs have more time to prepare. Those countries that lack access to regular e-mail are also likely to be those participants that have a harder time to obtain visas.
Selection Issues – Conflict of Interest.
A committee will discuss what situations
are conflicts of interest, and
what is the procedure when this happens.
Decision Making – Finalize decision making style by
adding it into the constitution
Finances – We have approached each situation
case by case. The alumni need to develop a set policy
and agree what expenditures are acceptable. This policy should be adopted into our constitution.
Thank You Book. Dana Reiter has
proposed a book with letters from ex-pyfs
from around the world detailing how
the Program would be presented to the Cabinet
Office.
Documentary. There was an effort
by Anna Stassis to get a documentary done
on the ship by Canadian Television
during the port of call in Vancouver.
Although lack of time prevented this, we
hope it can be done at a future
point in time.
Mavie Memorial Project – Garth Sam has visited South Africa
and is developing a plan to put
this project into fruition. He
visited with Maviefs family in order to
determine the possibility of creating a
park in her name.
1. John Burgener, SWY 11. John has continued giving school presentations
to all grades
in Calgary with his youth group Peacewaves.
(www.peacewaves.net). The presentations focus on developing a
culture of peace, and engage students in
discussion while using photographs and
slides. John visited the United
Nations in New York in the spring of 2002
for the launch of the Global Schools
for Peace program, which teaches about children
affected by armed
conflict. Peacewaves is raising
awareness for this new program.
This summer John hosted 10 Danish youth as
a leader for CISV (Childrenfs
International Summer Village program). In
October John began working at an
elementary school through a YMCA program.
2.
Angela
Dawson, SWY 13. Angela is currently working as a sport program
officer for the Canadian
Government. This entails consulting with
national sport organizations to
improve their high performance programs,
making programs more adaptable to
athletes with a disability, and setting up
initiatives so that more people may
participate in sport. It also involves working
at major international sport
competitions, such as being the assistant
lead for the Sport Canada mission to
the Paralympic Games in Salt Lake City in
March 2002. On the volunteer
side, she has been elected as a member of
the Board of Directors of the Girl
Guides of North, South and Central America
and the Caribbean. My role is to be
a link between 8 associations in the region
and the World Board. I work with
each one in the areas of program, training,
management and structure, finance,
membership and relationship to society.
3.
Dunia Tozy, SWY 15.
The SWY15 experience for me was very enriching
and rewarding. Before
that experience I volunteered and worked
for many student
and non-governmental organizations one
of them is Medecins sans
Frontieres/Doctors without Borders (MSF).
I do still volunteer with MSF
locally, and I started working with the UBC
centre for Intercultural
Communication (CIC). This Centre is a one-stop
resource for enhancing
communication across cultures by giving classes
that teach about culture. It is
very useful for international people who
want to learn about Canada as well as
for Canadians who want to work overseas.
I believe that my SWY experience has
added more depth to my perception of culture
and it will always continue to
guide me through my intercultural education