Celebrating Champions: Anhaar Kareem Honoured at the Western Sydney Women Awards
Image: nominees for the 2023 ‘Western Sydney Young Woman of the Year’ award at the Finalist Cocktail Networking Event. From left to right: Olivia Widjaja, Anhaar Kareem, Emily Smith and Taylah Murray.
Young and Resilient is thrilled to share that our Wellbeing Health & Youth (WH&Y) Commissioner Anhaar Kareem was recently celebrated as a finalist for Western Sydney Young Woman of the Year 2023.
At 16 years old, Anhaar is a superstar contributor to the Young and Resilient Research Centre, spokesperson and national Steering Group member for the Make it 16 campaign, and one of 15 young people nationally selected (from a pool of 1,250 applicants) for the Youth Steering Committee that advises Minister for Youth, the Hon Dr Anne Aly MP.
As a WH&Y Commissioner, Anhaar co-authored the article ‘Teens should have a say in whether they get a COVID vaccine’, co-authored an article on the WH&Y Commission 2021 Report findings, and represented WH&Y at the Youth Health Forum. She also featured on our Research Week youth panel alongside fellow Commissioner and health equity advocate Grace McGowan and spoke about ‘Storytelling for impact: Measuring and evaluating with young people’.
“The Wellbeing Health and Youth Commission and being a commissioner has really helped me to gain the skills and connections in order to have a deeper understanding of the diverse issues facing young people in Australia and of how I can do my part to raise awareness about them,” says Anhaar.
“I am really appreciative of the WH&Y commission’s work in highlighting the importance of youth consultation and equity in the health system.”
The award Anhaar is nominated for recognises excellence for a woman aged 15-25 years old in her area of expertise, whether this be sport, career, business or in the community. We are delighted to share that Anhaar’s success is the latest in a series of achievements amongst the young people who inform our work. In 2022, Y&R’s Betty Nyguyen, a driving force in the creation of the WH&Y Commission, received the same honour and was later named the 2022 winner.
The Western Sydney Women Awards are organised by Western Sydney Women and celebrate women at all stages in their life, business & career across the Inner West, Greater West, North West, and South West of Sydney.
We congratulate the winner Olivia Widjaja, an Aerospace Engineering Student at UNSW and Space Operations Analyst at EOS Space Systems, as well as the other finalists Emily Smith and Taylah Murray.
We’d also like to acknowledge how lucky we are to interact with so many inspired and inspiring young people. Here is a list of awards achieved by our WH&Y Commissioners:
- Inaugural Rising Star in Youth Health (National award) - Grace McGowan (2023)
- Western Sydney Young Woman of the Year (Regional award) – Anhaar Kareem (2023 finalist), Betty Nguyen (2022 winner), Jean Lewis (2022 finalist) and Rose Lewis (2019 winner)
- NSW Young Volunteer of the Year (State award) – Rose Lewis (2022) and Harpreet Kaur (2020)
- Excellence in University Engagement and Sustainability (Western Sydney University award) – John Lewis (2022) and Rose Lewis (2020)
- Western Sydney Outstanding Youth Leader (Regional award) – Anhaar Kareem (2022) and Jahin Tanvir (2019)
- Warrior for Change at the Wollondilly Women in Excellence Awards (Regional award) – Mali Dillon (2021)
- Young Citizen of the Year (Regional award) – Jahin Tanvir in Canberra (2021), Mali Dillon in Wollondilly Shire (2020) and Rose Lewis in Blacktown City (2020)
- 7 NEWS NSW and ACT Leadership award (Interstate award) – Harpreet Kaur (2020)
