09 Jul Maroochy River a Trailblazer in Women’s Golf
While Australian Minjee Lee’s third major victory on the Women’s PGA Tour is making waves throughout the world, at Maroochy River Golf Club the women members are blazing a trail of their own.
They’ve also become trailblazers with the full support of the club’s male-dominated Board.
It started in May 2024, when the Board agreed to back Golf Australia’s Women and Girls’ Engagement Plan and the club became the first Sunshine Coast signatory to the R&A’s Women in Golf Charter.
As part of its commitment to the charter, the club developed an Action Plan that outlined initiatives to encourage female participation in golf at all levels and provide a pathway to Board representation by women. The Board also reviewed membership categories to enable more women members without limiting other memberships.
A Women in Golf Committee was established, led by Women’s Captain, Julie Turner, and has held regular monthly meetings, developing initiatives to increase engagement with new members, plan a range of fun social and golf-related activities and strengthen communications.
Another milestone came in March 2025, when Merryn York, who was awarded a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in the 2025 King’s Birthday Honours, was elected as Vice President of the Board. Amongst Merryn’s duties is ensuring the club’s Action Plan for the R&A Women in Golf Charter is meeting its targets.
Maroochy River Golf Club also has three women golf coaches – Di Pavich, who was the first person on the Sunshine Coast to start golf clinics especially for women and girls 16 years ago; Katelyn Must who joined the club as a teaching professional in November 2024; and Jessica Cook, Assistant Professional.
Both Katelyn and Jessica represented Australia in the Women’s PGA Cup in Oregon in October 2024, Katelyn as Captain. Jessica has had a stellar year, winning the North Queensland PGA Professinoals Championship in May this year.
All three women are committed to increasing the female participation rate in golf, offering classes for women and girls of all ages and abilities. Di, who attends the monthly Women in Golf Committee meetings, says they have exciting plans for a range of activities for both new and existing members, including information sessions, rules nights, complimentary lessons, Chip & Sip Clinics and putting competitions.
Julie Turner says the initiatives to encourage more female participation in golf is starting to pay off. “Women currently make up approximately 20% of the Club’s total membership, an increase ofrom 18% last year following reinstating a 5 Day membership for mostly women.
“The club also has a policy of replacing a woman if a female member leaves. This means our female membership can never go down. We are committed to increasing the percentage of women members even more than this and will continually look at ways to achieve it through the Action Plan and Women in Golf Committee.”
Did you know?
- Golf Australia’s strategy to draw more women and girls to golf started in February 2018. It was called Vision 2025.
- A record 3.8 million adult Australians played golf in some form in 2023-24, according to the latest Golf Australia Participation Report. See The report
- Women’s and girls’ participation continued its steady climb, with a 3.2% rise in membership, supported by initiatives like the R&A Women in Golf Charter and the Australian Golf Foundation’s Junior Girls Scholarship program, the latter seeing a 22.7% growth.
- Get into Golf entry level program for adult beginners saw a 21.2% increase, with 86.8% being women and girls.
- While participation in golf is increasing, women and girls are under-represented at just 18.1% of total participation.
- QLD is lagging behind Victoria, WA and NSW with 17.7%.
- The report revealed that 53% of people who used off-course only facilities were female and the average age was 36.