News and Events
From the Manager's Desk 
June 2009
Like a whirlwind, Heart Kids Week is over and thanks goes out to all the wonderful volunteers, Heart Children Branches and members of the public who made it such a fantastic success.
Heart Children NZ Ambassador, and All Black captain, Mils Muliaina showed his support by stripping off for the Hamilton Branch! He jumped into an icy pool for five minutes in what looks to be our best year ever for the Heart Stopper Challenge. He made front page of the Waikato Times with son Max and local heart child Caleb Appleton. The Heart Stopper Challenge made front page stories in The Dominion Post and The Press, along with numerous newspapers around the country.
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Heart Jam had school kids jumping for joy for a gold coin donation in the Bay of Plenty. They were aiming for the biggest kid’s aerobic class in their region at 10am on 26th May. Heart Jam was brought to us by Brett Fairweather – the talented creator of Jump Jam – which is already popular with school children. Thanks too, to the Heart Children Bay of Plenty Branch who ensured a huge turn out on the day. Kiwi kids rock!
The sun was smiling throughout most of the country for the heart children volunteers who took to the streets with collection buckets on Friday 29th May. The day proved that New Zealanders are a truly generous bunch so thank you to all those who stopped to donate. In fact, there are so many people we wanted to thank that we’re creating a whole page of thank yous. Watch this space.
And finally, another piece of wonderful news was hearing that Dr Kirsten Finucane was honoured with an ONZM in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list on June 1st for services to medicine, in particular paediatric heart surgery. For anyone whose life has been changed by Kirsten will be truly delighted, as we are, that her many years of dedication and skill have been rewarded in such a public way. Congratulations Dr Finucane!
At our Annual General Meeting on 17th May, our Annual Accounts were presented. If you would like to view the Annual Report 2008, you can download it here.
Best wishes,)
Sarah Bell
Acting CEO, Heart Children New Zealand
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