2/4/2007 - Nina's Galatti Award
AFS New Zealand is very excited and honoured to announce Nina Crawford – long-time, enthusiastic and high achieving volunteer (South Auckland and Counties Chapter) – has been awarded the prestigious Galatti Award for Outstanding Volunteer Service.
Nina’s long involvement in AFS began in 1980 when her daughter was selected for an AFS exchange. In 1980 she joined the South Auckland Counties Chapter and in 1983 hosted a Japanese girl. Since that time has been totally committed to the mission and ideals of AFS.
“Anything I have done in AFS, I have done because I believe it is a wonderful organisation and I have so enjoyed being part of it and the wonderful people in it, “ Nina said after she discovered she had won the award last Thursday, 30 November.
When AFS International President Tachi Cazal called her from her Waiuku home she thought he was enquiring about her health, but, “then he started saying ‘congratulations’ and told me I was a Galatti awardee! I was so surprised and absolutely thrilled. I have always known about the Galatti Award as the highest award in the AFS world and admired greatly fantastic NZ recipients like Edie Baker and Elizabeth Francis. At first I couldn’t believe that Tachi was talking about me!”
Edie had this to say when she found out Nina won the award:
“I was always so humble beside Nina who must be the great lady of AFS of all time. I realise these awards come as a surprise to the recipient but this one to our lovely Nina is no surprise at all,” says Galatti award winner Edie Baker.
Nina’s excellent organisational skills and awe-inspiring ability to remember names and faces of those who have passed through AFS, even after many years, have benefited AFS and helped to strengthen its profile in her local community and nationally. Nina is very diplomatic when dealing with problems and is great at conflict resolution. Her recruitment and support of volunteers has been a vital part of her service to the chapter and AFS NZ.
She is a ‘fundraiser extraordinaire’ (both within AFS and the other organisations she is involved in), as well as an amazing raffle seller. On one occasion, a local poultry farmer mentioned to Nina he had a large quantity of chicken manure, which could be sold as garden fertilizer. Never one to miss an opportunity, Nina organized all the local selected and hosted students out to the farm to bag chicken manure!
“Nina, in her promotional speeches to regional Local Government Bodies on behalf of AFS often includes the fact her “AFS widower” husband Reid once thought she was speaking to a group in the small NZ town of Otorohanga when instead she took up an emergency challenge to chaperone a student to Argentina!” remembers AFS National Director Brian Robb.
He adds: “It was a pleasure to submit Nina Crawford’s nomination and to hear that she was one of the four recipients chosen to receive the Galatti Award for 2006. I feel that she is most deserving of the honour due to the tremendous time and effort which she has devoted to AFS over more than 25 years. AFS NZ is indebted to the service of this gracious volunteer. She exemplifies everything an AFS volunteer should be and more!”
On a much sadder note, but one which ultimately created something positive, Nina and her husband Reid lost their daughter Clair in a car crash, just before she was due to be selected for an AFS exchange. Although at the time Nina was involved in her chapter, in 1986 she was asked to become selection coordinator by the South Auckland Chapter president.
“I was able to throw myself into the role of selection coordinator for the next three years and it proved a very healing time for me as I had contact with young people of a similar age to Clair and was part of the great AFS family. We later learned that Clair would definitely have been selected. Unfortunately she never got to have her AFS experience but I have been able to have an AFS experience that I could never have dreamt of and learning that I have been awarded the Galatti Award is absolutely “the icing on the cake”.”
Outside of her roles within AFS Nina’s wide range of contacts have brought many people into the AFS network. She has also been involved in other local volunteer activities where she has strongly promoted her AFS beliefs. Nina is well known in her area as being ‘the AFS lady’ and people now expect Nina to ask them to support some form of AFS promotion.
“I believe the mission of AFS is carried out at the grassroots level in small towns like Waiuku where I live and in chapters all over the world with committed people similar to the volunteers in my chapter, South Auckland/Counties,” says Nina.
The Galatti was awarded to four AFS volunteers from all over the world in 2006. Established in 1983, it is awarded local AFS volunteers whose commitment and exceptional dedication have advanced the mission and goals of AFS. It is usually awarded to two volunteers but give to four in 2006 due to the impending 60th celebrations of AFS.
The Galatti Award for Outstanding Volunteer Service is the most prestigious commendation granted by AFS. 49 volunteers around the world have been awarded since 1983.
Nina will be presented with the award at the World Congress in New York in 2007.
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