National Support Team
Debbie Kell
Volunteer Services Coordinator |
Pam Bashall
Administrator |
Leigh Bredenkamp
Kiwiparent Editor |
Peter Cowan
Advertising Manager |
Michelle Missen
Kiwiparent Advertising Assistant |
Viv Gurrey
Chief Executive Officer
Viv emigrated to New Zealand from the United Kingdom where she started her management career in the Information Technology industry. Since then her career has been shaped as a management and governance professional. She brings a wealth of expertise gleaned extensively over 30 years in the commercial, corporate, and social sectors.
Currently as Chief Executive of the largest parenting network and provider of support services for parents in New Zealand, she has a strong profile in the community sector. Viv is a member of the Institute of Directors and sits on several commercial Boards. She also holds positions in the non government (NGO) sector specifically relating to parenting, the community and families. In 2003 she was invited to join the Board of the Parenting Council of New Zealand shortly followed by an invitation to join the Family Services National Advisory Council as one of a ten 10 strong NGO caucus.
Prior to this Viv successfully led the New Zealand arm of the world’s largest enterprise technology organisation as their Managing Director. While achieving significant global results for the business, she also compiled the sponsorship team that put their brand on the spinnaker of Team NZ.
The first 25 years of her career saw Viv work internationally across the UK, Asia, the Pacific and Australia. During this time she held senior executive positions in the IT industry and spent several years in a variety of positions with the IBM Corporation. In particular her expertise in strategic business consulting has seen her influence the business planning process within several significant corporations across Asia and the Pacific.
While on contract in Papua New Guinea, she successfully led a technology company through restructure and at the same time developed an interest in the village life transitions for families. In a country with one of the highest maternal and infant mortality rates in the world she assisted with a health and hygiene education programme for women and their babies. This initiative was the impetus for her future involvement in the community sector.
Viv has been married for 20 years and she and her husband have two gorgeous school age children who they adore. Family is their priority.
Viv has effectively woven her role as a mother and a wife with a highly successful career as a senior executive in the corporate world and then transferred those skills to the non government sector. This rare blend of experience offers her insight into many facets of business and the diverse social issues that face New Zealand right now.
Viv holds a vision for New Zealand that has a successful economy at its foundation. She believes this solid base acts as an enabler for personal achievement offering the opportunity for individuals and families to exercise choices in their lives.
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Michelle Burton
Executive Assistant to Chief Executive Officer
I first became involved with Parents Centres when I attended childbirth education classes prior to the birth of my first child in 2001.
I joined the National Support Centre in March 2004 in the role of Executive Assistant to the Chief Executive Officer. As part of this role I have regular communication with our government agencies, strategic partners, members and centre volunteers.
I come from many years working in administrative roles in the Corporate Sector. This has assisted in our goal of providing professional services and support to those in contact with our organisation.
This is a very rewarding role and there have been many instances where this organisation has really made a difference for children and parents. I am proud to be part of the new generation of Parents Centres people making a positive difference for parents and children in New Zealand.
I am married to Tony and have two gorgeous girls - Aimee (6 years) and Emma (3 years).
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Joan Hay
Volunteer Services Manager
My name is Joan Hay and I have had a long and exciting background in Parents Centre. I have two adult sons and a lovely little grand-daughter. I have held a number of positions within the organization starting as a volunteer on committee through to National Co-President and now as an employee. Parents Centre first entered my world in the early 1980's and over a 25 year span I have participated in some exciting projects at both Centre and national level.
Working as Volunteer Services Manager is both challenging and very rewarding. Volunteers are at the very heart of Parents Centre and nothing gives me greater pleasure than working closely with them. To see volunteers empowered to achieve is what we strive for. Centre health and wellbeing is paramount to the success of Parents Centre.
To my role I bring a wide experience in volunteering and training. I enjoy managing volunteer projects as well as working closely with our national teams and linking closely with Centres. The passion I have for training and working with adults in the teaching and learning environment is very strong and I believe the benefits we offer through our training programmes are far-reaching.
I am very proud of the history of Parents Centre and admire the many women and men who have gone before to make the organization what it is today. I hope I can continue to give as much so I may continue to assist and support of all those who touch Parents Centre.
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Trudi Ashcroft
General Manager, Childbirth Education
My name is Trudi Ashcroft and my role with Parents Centre National Support Team is as General Manager Childbirth Education. I have a back ground in business management specialising in the not for profit and voluntary sectors. Additional skills I bring to this role include experience and qualifications in psychotherapy and counselling and a commitment to supporting informed choices for children, individuals and families.
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Vivienne Lowe
Finance and Administration Manager
I am employed as the Finance & Administration Manager and have been with Parents Centre since November 2006. I live in Upper Hutt with my husband Andrew and son David who was born in 2000. My role within the organisation is to provide quality financial and administrative support services to all the individual Parents Centres around the country as well as to manage the operational finance and administration requirements of the National Support Team.
I bring to Parents Centre more than twenty years experience in finance and administration roles within a variety of workplaces from medium to large as well as government and private sectors. I have been on the Board of Trustees at my son's primary school in the role of Treasurer since 2006 and have also served as Treasurer on the committee of my local quilting guild since early 2006.
I believe that you get out of this world what you put into it and feel that Parents Centres play an enormous role within communities all around New Zealand. Parents deserve the very best information and support available in what is possibly the most demanding role they will ever have. To be responsible for nurturing, shaping and forming your own contribution to the next generation is a very challenging and demanding task which oftentimes goes unremarked and unrewarded unless something goes wrong. Parents and their children these days are so bombarded with the technologies available to ‘make life easier' that it can be very easy to marginalise the huge value attached purely to the satisfaction of our basic needs for unconditional love, food and shelter.
I am very keen that Parents Centres should be thought of as the safety fence at the top of the cliff rather than the ambulance at the bottom and, having also worked within the Corrections environment for a short time, can attest to the overwhelming need for well informed parents who can apply conscious parenting strategies in helping their children grow up to be strong, secure and safe from the vagaries of their environment.
I believe absolutely in the work that Parents Centres does, I have the greatest admiration for those pioneers that have gone before us and look forward to a long and happy relationship with Parents Centres as we continue and expand on the work that was started in 1952.
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Debbie Kell
Volunteer Services Coordinator
Debbie lives in Ashburton with husband Craig and daughters Laura and Renée. Parents Centre has played a major part in Debbie's life since she attended a Baby & You class in 1996. She joined the Ashburton committee soon after and tried her hand at many roles over the years, ending up as President. Attending Parents Centre's personal and professional development training workshops over the years has been hugely beneficial to Debbie she says, as a parent and as a person, and have given her the skills and confidence to take on tasks and roles she wouldn't have thought herself capable of.
Being the Volunteer Services Co-ordinator is something that Debbie is really passionate about, and ensuring that the Centre volunteers are well supported and happy in their work is her first priority. She is proud to be part of the awesome national team for Parents Centres NZ Inc; an organisation she believes can do and is doing so much to make ours a better society.
Debbie is also closely involved with the Ashburton Learning Centre, an organisation that helps adults with literacy difficulties, and with her local Adult & Community Education Network. Parents Centre has really opened up Debbie's passion for adult education and given her the ability to get out there, be involved and make a difference.
Debbie describes herself as a “slightly pedantic people person”. She loves things to run efficiently with systems in place and people working well together. She enjoys a challenge and is not afraid of a bit of hard work.
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Pam Bashall
Administrator
Bio available shortly.
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Leigh Bredenkamp
Kiwiparent Editor
Bio available shortly.
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Peter Cowan
Kiwiparent Advertising Manager
Bio available shortly.
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Michelle Mission
Kiwiparent Advertising Assistant
Bio available shortly.
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