The Aurora Foundation Ltd

The Aurora Foundation Ltd was established in 2001 by the late Warren Horton to provide education, development and training opportunities in leadership for the library profession and associated information and cultural communities in Australia and New Zealand. The Foundation is incorporated as a not for profit company, and has tax exempt status.

The directors of the Aurora Foundation are Dagmar Schmidmaier (Chairman), Ian McCallum (Secretary), Sue Hutley (Alumni Rep.), Brenda McConchie and Mary Teague from Australia, and Helen Renwick and Mirla Edmundson from New Zealand.

The Foundation now has responsibility for the Aurora Library Leadership Institutes, the first four of which were held from 1995 to 2001, under the auspices of aima Training and Consultancy Services Ltd.

After the Foundation conducted the highly successful 5th Aurora Leadership Institute in March 2002, it was decided to move to an annual Institute cycle.

The Foundation is also developing other leadership programs. These plans were formulated at the Aurora Recall Meeting, for previous participants and mentors, which was held in Auckland NZ from 22-25 February, 2003.

The Foundation operates a closed electronic discussion list for the Aurora community of Institute participants and mentors, now numbering more than 330 in Australia and New Zealand.