By Mikayla van Loon
Two of Lilydale Rotary’s finest have been presented with the highest honour, recognising their service to the community.
Ann Wheeler and Jenny Selway were awarded the Paul Harris Fellow (PHF) on Tuesday 12 September, making it the fifth for Ms Wheeler and the second for Ms Selway.
Having both been kept in the dark, the recognition came as a shock to both women.
“It was quite a surprise actually, I didn’t expect this at all,” Ms Wheeler said.
“It’s an honour to be picked as the person they want to give it to. So it was lovely. It made all the hard work worthwhile,” Ms Selway said.
The Paul Harris Fellow is named after Rotary’s founder and is awarded to those who “make an exceptional contribution to further the aims of Rotary”.
“If I’ve done my figures correctly, two thirds of the members of our Club are PHF recipients,” Lilydale Rotary president Arun Marappan said.
For Ms Wheeler, who has been involved in Rotary for 30 years and a member for 20 years, she said despite the recognition being lovely “that’s not why you do it”.
“It’s a really great organisation and the people are lovely and the projects are really good,” she said.
“It’s just a nice thing to do and if you didn’t enjoy it, you wouldn’t do it. It is certainly part of my life.”
Mr Marappan said Ms Wheeler has worked “tirelessly” over her 30 years of involvement, first with her late husband Ian and now on her own, to help better the lives of others, as well as Rotary within the district.
“We could safely say that Annie is the ultimate ‘quiet achiever’ and loved by all,” he said.
“She became the Rotary Club of Lilydale president on three occasions. As assistant governor, Annie worked closely with many clubs and is well known and highly respected in our district.”
Ms Wheeler’s focus has changed throughout the years but presently she works closely on projects involving young people like the primary speech contest and Lilydale Heights College’s Interact program.
“A few years ago, outside of the Lilydale Rotary, I became an assistant governor and I was in charge of six clubs, from Healesville through to Emerald,” she said.
“It was at one of their meetings, they invited me along to their primary school speech contest, and I thought ‘why are we doing this?’ So I actually introduced it to the club in 2019 when I was president.
“They’re all so terrific and then when you think that some of them are only 10 or 11, it’s just amazing. It gives them a lot of confidence.”
Ms Selway’s PHF came from her willingness to step in as president after the sudden death of president-elect Jenny Hill in 2022 and work to rebuild the club after the pandemic years.
“After Covid a lot of the organisations had fallen apart with face to face meetings and projects,” she said.
“So it was a big effort to get everything back on track and get projects running and collaboration with the community and improve our documentation processes and introduce ourselves back to the community.”
While Ms Selway has been very active in other projects, Mr Marappan said it was the behind the scenes work that has really stood out more recently.
“We owe her a debt for the increased transparency and compliance in our Club’s management,” he said.
“Jenny has been clear sighted, able to align district expectations with our goals and consistent in implementing procedures that have streamlined our club administration.”
Initially working with Rotary using her nursing training in Timor Leste at the Bairo Pite Clinic, Ms Selway and another nurse from Eastern Health worked to educate mothers in nutrition to improve the health of their babies and young children.
“We had few resources available to us and we decided we wanted to spend the resources and money we had available hiring a health worker to look after the children in the clinic, because they were left to their own devices,” she said.
“Jenny went on to host the Malnutrition Health Care Worker, Lidia dos Santos, when she gained an RMIT scholarship to improve her English skills,” Mr Marappan said.
It was for this work Ms Selway received her first PHF in 2014 and has since gone on to host a second woman, Nuncia Xavier, who came to improve her English language skills.
Mr Marappan thanked these two women for their ongoing support, dedication and commitment to serving the community.
“The symbolism in this recognition is to say thank you for making a difference in your club and community and in the lives of less fortunate people in the world,” he said.
