The 2015 SLaM Young Leaders Scholarship
In support of young leaders, this year SLaM is offering two scholarships to enable two young people (under 35) to attend the 2015 Conference and to present a session in the Programmed Strand from a young person’s point of view. The intention of this scholarship is to build an inter-generational bridge between the depth of knowledge and lifetime experience that currently exists within the SLaM community and the thriving emergence of the young leaders in the field.
These two young leaders will walk alongside the conference facilitator team, closely working with the keynote listener and strand facilitators while delving into their own leadership inquiry and offering a direct young person’s response to the conference journey.
The two young leaders will be selected by our highly regarded panel members through a process of submission and interview.
Young leaders and people in the broad SLaM community are invited to:
- nominate a young person for these scholarships; or
- self-nominate for the scholarship.
Our panellists
Our panellists who will select the two young leaders are:
- Melanie Tasker
- Sue Sharpe
- Kerry Cochrane
Melanie Tasker
Melanie Tasker is a doula, offering support to women, partners and babies through pregnancy, the intimate and sacred moment of birth, and early parenting. She is currently studying Social Ecology to keep her brain agile while caring for her own three young children (sometimes with compassion and other times with frustration). Melanie also works as a team leader with ‘Days for Girls’; a global, grassroots volunteer network that creates and distributes sustainable feminine hygiene kits to girls in need, providing greater dignity, safety and access to education. In her life before children, she trained as an architect and worked in sustainability at local council. Melanie appreciates her ongoing opportunities to study Tao and be part of an active local cooking circle.
“I am filled with anticipation about the unique, inspiring and uncapped thinking, work and leadership of young people. Being a part of this panel allows me to swim in ideas, dreams and questions; questions that abound in complexity and are powered by collaboration and diversity of experience. I want to feed on these ideas, to learn, and heeding Jan Owen’s (CEO of the Foundation for Young Australians) advice, to find myself a youth mentor! I eagerly await your nominations.”
Sue Sharpe
Sue has held a number of leadership roles through her life. As she has explored her own inner life and those of many leaders across the globe she found her concept of what qualities a leader in this time and place need in order to build and nurture community. Sue owned and operated Phoenix Rising Books (1999 – 2015), Australia’s leading retailer for all holistic (mind, body and soul) books, DVDs, audio books and music. In this role Sue has had the privilege and pleasure of meeting and learning from thousands of individuals across all walks of life.
Prior to this role she worked as East Asia project director for Unilever alongside some exceptional leaders and gained insights into the many ways of implementing vision and values across many cultures. Her volunteer role as a Lifeline call centre operator expanded her compassion for the struggles that we humans encounter in our lives.
“I support myself and others to convert interests into passions and into lifetime skills.”
Kerry Cochrane
Kerry was the foundation President of the Spirituality, Leadership & Management (SLaM) Network, a position in which he served from 2000-2005. During this time he set up the Journal of SLaM and convened two international SLaM conferences as well as helping members in the ACT, Qld, Vic and WA to establish their own conferences. Kerry is the foundation President of the Ecological Agriculture Australia Association. He was Course Coordinator of the Bachelor of Ecological Agriculture at Charles Sturt University for 10 years, retiring recently, although he still teaches Human Ecology in that course.
Prior to work in academia, Kerry was employed with the ABC for six years as a rural reporter based at 2CR Orange. Kerry grew up on a dairy farm at Candelo, NSW, and now lives in Orange, NSW. He is married to Helen and has three grown-up children. His passion, outside the family, is one of promoting an ecological approach to life as a key strategy in mitigating against climate change.
Nominations
To nominate a young person, please discuss the nomination with them, ensuring that they are available for the conference period. The young person is also asked to submit a statement about work they are doing that is pertinent to our aims of bringing values of the spirit into the business world and organisational life.
Your nomination should address the following criteria.
Nomination: File name = Young Leader Nomination [person’s name]
a) Young person’s name
b) Institute/organisation with whom they are currently studying/working
c) Name of person and institution/organisation who are nominating this young person
Maximum of 300 words:
d) What inspires you about this young person’s approach to mindfulness in the practices of spirituality in leadership and management?
e) How would receipt of this scholarship benefit this young leader and the SLaM community?
The young person’s statement should address the question: What work are you doing that is pertinent to the SLaM aims of bringing values of the spirit into the business world and organisational life? (maximum of 300 words)
Nomination: File name = Young Leader [person’s name]
a) Young person’s name
b) Institute/organisation with whom they are currently studying/working
The 2015 SLaM Young Leaders Scholarship will cover the cost of the conference fees for the two young leaders selected. It does not cover travel costs.
Thank you for nominating a young leader, and thank you to the young leader for your interest.
Please send the completed nomination and statement to inquiries@slam.org.au with the subject line “Young Leader’s Nomination”.