Dame Ruth Aitken, of Paeroa, DNZM, for services to netball
Dame Ruth Aitken is an internationally acclaimed netball coach who was appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2011, having coached the Silver Ferns from 2002 to 2011. Dame Ruth coached the Silver Ferns to win the 2003 World Netball Championship and the 2006 and 2010 Commonwealth Games. The team also won silver at the 2002 Commonwealth Games and the 2007 and 2011 World Netball Championships. She is the most capped Silver Ferns coach with 112 Tests. She was Netball New Zealand Coaching Director from 2011 to 2013, leading initiatives to encourage increased participation at all levels of coaching. From 2013 she moved to Singapore and coached the national team to win the Asian Championships and South East Asian Games. She returned to New Zealand in 2016, taking up the role of Performance Manager of Netball Waikato Bay of Plenty Zone through to the end of 2019. She was a member of the International Netball Federation Coaching Advisory Panel from 2011 to 2014. She has been a member of the Sports Tribunal of New Zealand since 2017. In 2021, as well as receiving a Service Award from World Netball, Dame Ruth was made a Life Member of Netball New Zealand, in recognition of her service to netball, promoting the game and inspiring a generation of young netballers.