Kosciuszko Heritage has been awarded a Medal of Recognition.
The honour was given by the Polish Community Council of Australia and was presented by its Vice-President, Leszek Wikarjusz, on the first day of Dream Lights, this year’s Kosciuszko Festival.
In its citation justifying the award, the Polish Community Council of Australia acknowledged Kosciuszko Heritage for its “dissemination of knowledge about Poland and its outstanding sons, Thaddeus Kosciuszko and Paul Edmund Strzelecki, promoting their humanitarian ideals, and for many other initiatives that reinforce the arguments for maintaining the Polish name of Mt Kosciuszko”.
Ernestyna Skurjat-Kozek, the President of Kosciuszko Heritage and the director of Dream Lights, accepted the award on behalf of the organisation.
“This is obviously a medal for all of the members, associates and supporters of Kosciuszko Heritage, who contributed to this great success,” Ernestyna said, adding that the organisation does not intend to rest on its laurels. “We are planing further activities. We are aware of the great intellectual potential that we have and we do not want to ‘short-change ourselves’.”
“Thus, formally thanking the Council for appreciating our work, we are getting to work! First, some mundane activities: the dismantling phase of the festival – financial accounting, documentation, media, bureaucracy, the production of documentaries and a book containing the history of past festivals – and then a new stage, new ideas, new forms, new activities!”
The medal presented by the Polish Community Council of Australia 
The medal presented to Kosciuszko Heritage, for ‘promoting the humanitarian ideas of T. Kosciuszko and P. E. Strzelecki’ 
A diploma acknowledging the conferral of the medal 
From left: Dariusz Paczynski, a committee member of Kosciuszko Heritage; Ernestyna Skurjat-Kozek, the president of Kosciuszko Heritage; and Leszek Wikarjusz, the vice-president of the Polish Community Council of Australia. 
Ernestyna Skurjat-Kozek, the president of Kosciuszko Heritage, accepting the medal at the Dream Lights festival, under the Strzelecki Statue, in Jindabyne.