Sadie Balkind Scholarship Awardee 2025/2026 - Andrina Butler
Andrina Butler is a social services professional and postgraduate organisational psychology student with over seven years’ experience working in rural Aotearoa. Andrina shares her story below.
I feel incredibly privileged to be this year’s recipient of the Sadie Balkind scholarship, and cannot thank the board enough.
A bit about me: I am a city girl turned rural lifestyler, raised in Nelson and settling in the West Coast. Small but mighty, the coast in my opinion really does live up to its name “west coast best coast”. In my spare time, you’ll find me fully invested in the netball world, playing, coaching, serving on subcommittees, and of course watching the ANZ and SSN leagues. I have also served on the Grey District Youth Trust since May 2024, an experience I’ve found both grounding and energising.
Over my 7+ years of employment in social services I have been fortunate to foster strong working connections, and more recently have realised the importance of having long-term registered practitioners in rural areas. This realisation led me to write my master’s thesis on how organisational psychology theories contribute to rural social worker retention, which further drew out the importance of community connection. My thesis is in a niche field in Aotearoa research and you can find it on the Massey theses library.
My research explored how organisational psychology theories contribute to rural social worker retention, a niche and first-of-its-kind area of research in Aotearoa. Through interviews and reflexive thematic analysis, three themes emerged: community embeddedness, work conditions, and the challenges and opportunities unique to rural practice. Overall, participants described more “pulls” than “pushes”, highlighting the strong sense of fit, reward, and purpose that rural social services can offer when the right supports are in place.
I am now currently undertaking UC’s Postgraduate Diploma in Organisational Psychology, which sees me as an NZPB intern psychologist volunteering for a rural social services provider. This pathway has been a long-term dream of mine, so it is a huge "pinch me" moment that I am now here doing it thanks to this wonderful scholarship.
“Strong community connection isn’t just a ‘nice to have’ in rural work — it’s central to retaining skilled practitioners and sustaining services long term.”
Receiving the Sadie Balkind Scholarship eases that financial pressure and allows me to focus fully on excelling in my studies and professional practice, rather than managing large personal debt. More importantly, it enables me to continue working toward a qualification that is critically needed in rural communities.
Looking ahead, once fully registered, I plan to base myself in Waitaha Canterbury while continuing to support and travel to surrounding rural towns. My goal is to combine lived experience, academic research, and professional practice to support rural workplaces, particularly within the wāhine-dominated social services sector and to contribute to the growing body of empirical research that helps shape inclusive, sustainable futures for rural Aotearoa.