Citizens Foundation chief and Rotary headed to New Zealand

Chester — The Orange County Citizens Foundation and Rotary District 7210 have announced that Nancy Proyect has been chosen to participate in the District’s 2007 Group Study Exchange Program. Proyect, who serves as president of the Citizens Foundation, will travel to New Zealand in March with four other regional representatives. The Washingtonville-Blooming Grove Rotary is sponsoring Proyect. The Group Study Exchange program of The Rotary Foundation is a unique cultural and vocational exchange opportunity for business and professional men and women between the ages of 25 and 40. The program provides travel grants for teams to exchange visits between paired areas in different countries. For four weeks, team members will experience the host country’s institutions and ways of life, observe their own vocations as practiced abroad, develop personal and professional relationships and exchange ideas. Helen Gutfreund of Ulster County, George Duarte and Noreen Knips of Rockland County and Heather Malcom of Dutchess County also will participate in the program. The team will visit Rotary District 9940 - located in Wellington and surrounding areas - learning about the economics, government, civic life, agriculture, environment and culture of the southern portion of the northern island of New Zealand. At the same time, the team will serve as Hudson Valley ambassadors, sharing information about the region with Rotarians and others in New Zealand, according to Bob Broadhurst, a member of the Washingtonville-Blooming Grove Rotary and coordinator of the 2007 New Zealand Group Study Exchange Program. In turn, representatives from New Zealand will visit the Hudson Valley in April. Participants from that team include the manager of the New Zealand Police Museum, a prosecutor, a crop and food research scientist, and a sign language interpreter.