Change in Action Week - Innovative Impact Winner - POWA First Steps

First Steps Outdoors (POWA) run outdoor recreation activities. They observed that many women stood on the sidelines as they didn’t have the time, confidence, support or opportunity to give the activities a go. They decided to create a programme for women to give them a safe space with women-only activities, fostering a supportive environment and an opportunity to get involved in outdoor activities with other women to support them.

POWA is a free community of like-minded women who want to enjoy the outdoors and is for women run by women. They run a Facebook group that any woman can join where they launch their Women's Only events and also encourage others to share activities, articles of interest and link together to undertake their own outdoor adventures.​ As well as local women and girls they have had ladies joining from Whakatane, Taupo and Auckland.

Many of the women feedback that their daughters would love something similar for young women, and so they now run Girl POWA with a similar model.

Since starting POWA in May 2022 they have taken 355 women and girls on 14 adventures.