By Melanie Petrucci, Senior Community Reporter, Community Advocate

On a recent Saturday morning, nearly two dozen young members of the Northborough Rotary’s Interact Club gathered at the Northborough Police Headquarters to pack lunches that were to be delivered to a Worcester shelter later that day.

Interact clubs are youth-based Rotary International sponsored organizations affiliated with local Rotary clubs that bring together young people ages 12-18, who are committed to service above self while having fun and learning valuable leadership skills.

We are rapidly approaching the end of the year for our Rotary Foundation Annual Fund contributions.

 

I know that many of you intend to make a gift and have a consistent history of contributing annually, but perhaps you just haven’t gotten around to it yet! The end of this Rotary year is right around the corner, and I urge you to consider making a gift to The Rotary Foundation’s Annual Fund.

District 7910 is pleased to announce that O'Mara Taylor of Wayland is the recipient of the $35,00 2019 David & Eleanor Morley Endowed Global Grant Scholarship.  Sponsored by the Rotary Club of Framingham, O'Mara is a graduate of Vassar College. She plans to spend the 2019-2020 academic year in graduate studies at the Saïd Business School of Oxford University. Her Rotary Area of Focus is Maternal & Child Health. 

The answer to the question of how early Rotarians consumed Rotary is pretty easy. It was through our traditional clubs centered around a meal and back then it was typically lunch or dinner. The advent of breakfast clubs was a bold experiment to widen our appeal to those who could not fit into what then was our typical model of delivery, how we were consumed. 

My own early exposure to Rotary was through my Dad’s Rotary Club. It was a large lunch club. Consum-er patterns were different then. I remember listening to baseball games on the radio with my Dad. Now, while many still attend games or watch on TV, a large segment of sports enthusiasts of all types consume sports via social media, on highlights shows, or streaming over the internet. Back then TV was three major networks and some UHF channels, now it’s hundreds of channels and numerous ways to view offerings from TV’s to computers to handheld devices.

In 2011, Kiran Singh Sirah turned 35 — “halfway through our life’s journey,” he says, citing Dante’s Divine Comedy. The UK native had been living in Edinburgh and Glasgow for a decade, working on a variety of cultural endeavors. “I felt I had done everything I needed to do and learn in Scotland. It was time to take my experiences and move them to the next level.” 

That’s when Sirah heard about the Rotary Peace Fellowship. Since the program began in 2002, more than 1,200 peace fellows have received fully funded scholarships to study at one of six peace centers at universities around the world. With help from Rotarians in Scotland, Sirah eventually landed one of those scholarships and headed to North Carolina, where he earned a master’s degree in folklore studies and a graduate certificate in international peace and conflict resolution. 

or the past few years, Rotary International has been promoting Reconnect Week as a time to remind Rotary clubs of the value of reaching out and “reconnecting” with alumni of Rotary programs like Interact, Rotaract, scholarships, Rotary Peace Fellowships, youth exchange and other regional programs. But celebrating alumni and making them feel welcome to your club is something you can and should do year-round. Alumni of Rotary make great leaders and innovators and may possess the skills you need for your next service project.

So in that spirit, we collected five events that impressed us during this year’s Reconnect Week in October to encourage you to think of ways you can reconnect with alumni in the new year.

1. District 7020 Alumni Association – Video Conference

District Alumni Chair William Inniss of Cayman Islands has made it a tradition with his district’s alumni association to hold an annual video conference for Reconnect Week. Since his district is made of many islands, travel between them is more difficult for in-person meetings, so this is simply the best way to keep up. During the meeting, members of the alumni association discuss their past experiences and decide how best to partner with local Rotary clubs.

2. Northern Illinois Rotary Alumni Association – Networking Event

Members of the Northern Illinois Rotary Alumni Association, Rotaract Club of Chicago, and Rotarians in the greater Chicago region came together for an evening of networking at One Rotary Center in

• Achieve a net gain of 1 member
• Maintain or improve your club’s retention of current and new members:
  • Improve your club’s retention rate by 1 percentage point or  
  • If your club’s retention rate was 90 percent or more in 2017-18, maintain it
• Achieve a net gain in female members
• Have at least 60 percent of club members report their birth dates through My Rotary
•  

• Engaging New members quickly to increase satisfaction and reduce retention issues;
• Organizing meetings that are informative and fun, to re-engage established members;
• Breaking the common 80/20 ratio “Amount of Work Done” / “% of Total Membership”;
• Building a pipeline of more informed members and potential Club leaders.  

Child trafficking happens here in the U.S. and in virtually every other country. The Rotary Club of Northborough together with the Northborough Junior Woman's club are partnering to present a fair Trade luncheon and a screening of the award winning film "Not My Life."Many people are familiar with UNICEF’s work providing children with things like emergency aid, clean water and medical care, but UNICEF also has a strong record protecting children from violence, exploitation and abuse. The End Trafficking project

At a Repair Café, everything centers on making repairs.  Knowledgeable volunteers help repair items such as clean and mendable clothing, knitted and crocheted items, lamps, small appliances, computers and other electronics, bikes, outdoor power equipment, toys, and jewelry.  They also can sharpen knives, scissors, and garden tools.  Visitors pay only for needed parts, and when possible are encouraged to bring parts with them to save time.

To start, you can livestream Rotary International’s World Polio Day event, which is marking the occasion from the College of Physicians in Philadelphia, starting at 6:30 PM.  The event will highlight the steps being taken to reach Rotary’s goal of polio eradication. We’ll also celebrate 30 years of achievements by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI)

Closer to home, you can host your own viewing of the event, sponsor your own fundraiser, or participate in the events that neighboring clubs are running.  For example, the Brookline club has sponsored a video running on a screen outside in Coolidge Corner and asked pedestrians for donations. The Nashoba Valley club works with the schools in its regional school district to get donations from the students in exchange for a purple pinkie. To our north, the Gloucester club runs an annual polar plunge into the Atlantic Ocean in the middle of winter, raising thousands of dollars. Other clubs have sponsored races, “mic-athons,” and speaking events.

Highlights from the June and “July” 2018 Rotary International Board of Directors Meetings

The 2017–18 RI Board of directors held its fifth and final meeting on 21 June 2018 in Toronto, ON, Canada. The 2018–19 RI Board held its first meeting on 29 June 2018 in Toronto, ON, Canada. At these meetings the Board reviewed reports from six committees and recorded 39 decisions.

June 2018 Board Meeting Highlights

By Michael Walstrom, president of the Rotary Club of Downtown Boca Raton, Florida  

Rotary, like any business, has customers. For us, those customers are our members and we must provide value to assure satisfied customers. The key to attracting and retaining young professional “customers” is presenting a Value Proposition that is attractive.

From the Young Professional (YP) Membership Development project, a 10 question survey designed by District 6930, we learned that young professionals are looking for networking and mentorship, but have concerns about time, money, and family commitments. Fortunately, Rotary has considerable value to offer in all of those areas.

• lead the activities that day
• prioritize projects during the year
• define the co-host role for the May 4 multi-district event

Pre-Conference September 18-20, 2018  |   Conference September 20-22, 2018
Hotel Bonaventure in Montreal

The 2018 Montreal Zone Conference is a unique event, and we want to invite you to be a part of it.  Whether you’re an incoming District Governor, District leader, Past District Governor, or a Rotarian with an interest in becoming more engaged in Rotary….the Montreal Conference is for you!  The theme “People Coming Together” fits our goal of providing you with an extraordinary and unforgettable event.  This is why we're inviting everyone to be a part of the excitement!

Sturbridge Rotary Builds New Playground at the YMCA

 The Sturbridge Rotary Club recently helped build a new outdoor playground at the Tri-Community YMCA Child Development Center, 115 Marcy Street in Southbridge.  The new outdoor playground, built with the help of the Sturbridge Rotary Club, will be enjoyed by more than 150 kids a day.

“This playground will help the Y provide safe and healthy spaces for our children to learn foundational skills, develop healthy, trusting relationships and build self-esteem," Glenn Juchno, Executive Director of the Tri-Community YMCA. “We are fortunate to have great partners like the Sturbridge Rotary Club who understand the impact of youth development in our community.”

A princess, 3 prime ministers, and a former first lady join 25,000 in Toronto to celebrate Rotary’s good work and plan more of it

Why and how to host a Rotary Service Day