City recognition for up and comers
Upper Hutt Young Achievers Leadership co-winners Michael Teague, 22, and Carlo Lim, 21, are a tight team going places.
They have been friends since they met in their early Upper Hutt College years.
Final year commerce students at Victoria University they are, in a variety of ways, working on improving the financial knowledge, understanding and decision making of their peers.
While at university they qualified and worked as volunteer budget advisers with the Family Finances Service Trust and today are co-trustees on the FFS board where they head its youth-focused services.
The pair are also developing a youth-outreach project in this area, a move made possible last year through Lim’s business plan receiving funding from the Cossie Club’s Youth Academic/ Entrepreneurship Scholarship Scheme.
‘‘The main goal is to try and educate young people on financial matters,’’ Lim said.
‘‘For them budgeting can be a big issue and they can face many daunting decisions and options when they are young and starting out.
‘‘A lot of these things were not taught at school and it’s something we are interested in.
‘‘We want to do it in a modern way, online with social media and make it very interactive.
‘‘We will look to take it into the [Upper Hutt] colleges as a starting point and go further.’’
Teague said receiving the lead- ership award was satisfying.
‘‘It was a good night and it was great to hear what the other nominees and winners are doing.
‘‘There was a big variety in each category,’’ he said.
THE WINNERS
Young Achievers category winners were:
Sport: Upper Hutt College’s Ethan Murtagh, 15, who has earned selection in the NewZealand Taekwon-Do team for World Championships in Ireland in October.
Leadership: Carlo Limand Michael Teague (see story).
Expressions ArtAward: Arts a Go Go Performing Arts School’s Riley Dick. Riley is a performer, actor and singer with extensive stage experience. He is also is amember of the rock band Transistor.
Resilience: Phoenix Aranui has overcome life challengeswith selfdetermination and resilience. Fluent in Te Reo, she has a beautiful singing voice and plays several musical instruments.
MayoralAward: Mary Fisher, the partially sighted paralympian swimmer who won gold at the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games and holds eight world records.