Don't you ever let a soul in the world tell you that you can't be exactly who you are.
― Lady Gaga
Maren Strachan - Deputy Director, YWCA Australia
Born in Minnesota, USA, Maren grew up endlessly wishing for warmer weather. After receiving her BA in Speech, Theater and Communications from St. Olaf College in Minnesota she became a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Central African Republic, working as a health volunteer. It doesn’t get much hotter than Africa! Upon returning home Maren started working in the not-for-profit sector in Minneapolis where she found her passion for working with young people, schools, families and the arts. After receiving an MA in Occupational Therapy from St. Catherine’s University she and her husband moved to New Zealand and later moved to Australia. Maren started working for the YWCA in Sydney as the Leadership Coordinator, and happily moved to Brisbane in 2007 to share her passions for working with young people, schools, families and the arts with the Brisbane community. Maren was a mentor in the Y Bloom program in Term 2, 2012.
Catherine Raff – Youth Health Nurse
Catherine works in high schools supporting students and delivering health programs and is also a very busy mum. Outside of work, she loves spending time with her family, friends, partner and kids watching movies, swimming, dancing, taking walks or reading a great book.
An experienced traveller, Catherine also enjoys giving back to her community, meeting new people and values new experiences to enhance her day to day work – a key reason for getting involved in Y Bloom. She really believes in preventative health programs and the way in which programs like Y Bloom encourage girls to have confidence in themselves to become more connected in their community and world, a really important factor in health and wellbeing.
Read more about Catherine here.
Caterina Sestili - Co-Director of Direct Care Australia
As the Founding Director and current Co-Director of Direct Care Australia (DCA), Caterina is responsible for the overall management and development of the operations of DCA. Caterina has held a senior executive role with DCA for the past 15 years delivering primary and community health care projects in aged care, disability, mental health, child and youth health.
Originally from Adelaide, South Australia, in 2010 Caterina expanded DCA into Queensland and her current focus is on delivering a highly responsive nursing and personal support workforce to Queensland Hospitals, Nursing Homes and the Community.
Caterina's qualifications include a BA (Hons) Politics, a Graduate Certificate in Health Services Management, a Masters in Human Services Management & Policy, Advanced Diploma of Quality Auditing (ISO 9001 Quality & Safety), Certificate IV in Fitness, and a Certificate IV in Workplace Training and Assessment.
Read more about Caterina here.
― Lady Gaga
Maren Strachan - Deputy Director, YWCA Australia
Kim Hughes - Head of Client and Mandate Services at QIC
Kim, a Y Bloom mentor in Term 2, 2012, is the Head of Client and Mandate Services at QIC. She manages a team of terrific people to help their clients (Qld Treasury, Super funds etc) understand what’s going on with their investments and to create investment solutions for them. Kim is usually found juggling the activities and personal needs of her 9 kids - 2 fantastic biological kids (12 and 14), 5 amazing step kids (7, 11, 14, 17, & 20) a daughter-in-law (16) and a gorgeous granddaughter (16 months)! She spends a lot of time listening and helping them get through life’s little challenges with smiles on their faces! She is also currently the Manager of her daughter’s soccer team, on the organising committee for her son’s 8 week school trip to Germany, building a house in Mackay, and coordinating her house renovations. But more importantly, she's the reigning champion in her evening round robin table tennis championships – although not for long as these seem to have taken on quite a competitive spirit!
Linda Bywater - Director, The Growth Objective
Linda is a Strategy/Marketing/Business Development Executive, working with large multi-national corporations. In other words, Linda helps big businesses figure out what activities they should pursue to best generate better, faster or cheaper products for customers and big profits for the business owners - while also figuring out how they can do this in the most sustainable way to improve the environments and communities in which they operate.
Linda has worked all around the world (for over 13 years in fact!) and considers her travels amongst the greatest adventures of her life. She says that it has helped her to realise how many different and wonderful approaches and attitudes (cultures) to life there are and how lucky we are to have Australia as our ‘home’.
Phoebe Tucker - Project Officer, Skills Queensland
As a Project Officer at Skills Queensland, Phoebe works with colleagues to manage projects and programs which build the skills of Queenslanders, ensuring programs are on track to achieve objectives while also providing communications and marketing support.
Phoebe loves working with people and got involved in Y Bloom to become more connected with her community and to meet other like minded women who believe in developing the leadership capacity and confidence of young women, something which Phoebe, as a relatively young woman herself, sees a lot of value in.
Outside of work, Phoebe plays re-bound volleyball with friends, loves reading and getting up to the Whitsundays as much as possible to spend time with her family.
Catherine Raff – Youth Health Nurse
An experienced traveller, Catherine also enjoys giving back to her community, meeting new people and values new experiences to enhance her day to day work – a key reason for getting involved in Y Bloom. She really believes in preventative health programs and the way in which programs like Y Bloom encourage girls to have confidence in themselves to become more connected in their community and world, a really important factor in health and wellbeing.
Read more about Catherine here.
Caterina Sestili - Co-Director of Direct Care Australia
Originally from Adelaide, South Australia, in 2010 Caterina expanded DCA into Queensland and her current focus is on delivering a highly responsive nursing and personal support workforce to Queensland Hospitals, Nursing Homes and the Community.
Caterina's qualifications include a BA (Hons) Politics, a Graduate Certificate in Health Services Management, a Masters in Human Services Management & Policy, Advanced Diploma of Quality Auditing (ISO 9001 Quality & Safety), Certificate IV in Fitness, and a Certificate IV in Workplace Training and Assessment.
Read more about Caterina here.
