Rotary Rag April 12, 2017

President Damon called the meeting called to order at 7:15am and started us off with

THIS DAY IN HISTORY: April 12^th…

1945 – US President Franklin D. Roosevelt dies while in office; Vice-president Harry Truman is sworn in as the 33^rd President.

1961 – The Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human to travel into outer space and perform the first manned orbital flight.

1955 – The Polio vaccine, developed by Dr. Jonas Salk, is declared safe and effective.

Donation of My Rotary Personal English Dictionary
LAGOS Nigeria
Approximately 500 students and their families will benefit from having this standard reference tool.  Receiving the dictionaries from Rotarians is very beneficial to the students, their siblings, families, and the community.  Besides the improvement in their academic performance, the young people meet successful adults (Rotarians) in their community who care enough about them to purchase these dictionaries and come to their school to present them personally.

GUESTS: Student Rotarian Sam brought a friend: Mariah (“Mo”) Nichols, and Guest Speaker – Meghan Rigali – Educator at Twin Valley Middle/High School in Dover, VT
Also, a few “Junior Rotarians” – Young, talented offspring of our dear members.

ABSENT MEMBERS:
(Missed grabbing this info, so sorry)

TODAY’S GREETER: Ali
Next Week… Lisa

SCRIBE:
Today: Ali* – Standing in for Booie (who made it worth her while!!)
*This scribe enjoyed the first hour of note taking with a highly generous loan from Evelyn who let her borrow her fancy Hogwarts wand/pen… (Despite having to take notes, I felt very lucky indeed!)
Next Week’s Scribe (4/19) – Bob;  4/26 – Amelia; 5/3 – Sadie; and on 5/10 - Lisa

GUEST SPEAKER:
Today: Jerry (in absentia)
Next Week (4/19): Diane; 4/26 – Ross; and 5/3 – Tristam

 

Switching the format of the meeting to accommodate the Guest Speaker, we let her go first while we munched on breakfast, as she would need to leave immediately following her presentation in order to get to work/school on time…

 

TODAY’S GUEST SPEAKER: Meghan Rigali – Twin Valley Middle School Instructor

Meghan told us much about a wonderful trip she recently took in Ethiopia…

Five educators went along, 2 Exec Directors of Non-profit organizations, and 3 dancers/writers/musicians/and teachers… all collaborating and sharing cultural knowledge about the way we educate our youth.

“One Love Theater” is the group they joined up with in Ethiopia… their efforts on creating consciousness around gender equality, aids, self defense, etc… through performance, dance, theater, music, and art. Free for audiences in market-places and schools throughout Ethiopia, One Love performances serve as a dynamic vehicle to educate Ethiopians of all ages and walks of life about the threat of HIV and harmful traditional practices.  One Love workshops educate Ethiopian youth and empower them to find their own voice through making art.  Over the last 15 years, One Love has performed for hundreds of thousands of Ethiopians.  They celebrate youth-lead initiatives where students teach other students…

The idea behind this type of learning is that – if you teach today’s youth (tomorrow’s leaders) all they need to know about equality and bettering human-kind… they will grow up skilled and versed in all important matters in order to better lead their own generation when their time comes.

The first things Meghan noticed about Ethiopia when she arrived were that the things that we Americans think of as “normal” are resources easily taken for granted… Once there, it’s clear that the few resources the Ethiopians live on are eye-opening. 

Exhibition coming… with a date to be determined.  Now they are enjoying a guest who came back with them from Ethiopia, who is now collaborating with Meghan and the high school kids.  The project they are excited about is a T-Shirt screen printing activity, whereby each student will have their own T-memento from the beautiful and educational cultural exchange they were able to experience.

 

National Honor’s Society – raised money to help end hunger.  Classes began to compete to see who could raise the most money.  More money was raised than they had hoped.  It was very exciting. 

Also got a few sports highlights, but this scribe was experiencing operating difficulties with note taking at this particular time.
 

None to sing to, as the Birthday Girl Amelia was absent… If you see her, wish her well!!

Sadie – Scholarship Committee is meeting briefly after today’s meeting.
Also, if you wore any blue today (either accidentally or on purpose), please allow a group photo to be taken in honor of Wear Blue Day… To raise awareness/support for Child Abuse prevention.

Damon – 28^th and 29^th – District Conference.  Tristam expressed some interest in attending.

Sandy Shriver – TRIVIA NIGHT(S)
     ~ April 17^th – Battle of the Boards
     ~ May 8^th – Battle of the Schools – For this one, we need help reaching out to schools – info blast them with the information and get as much participation as possible (Jon Secrest, Kevin, and Deborah offered to help with this.  Any more interest, or if anyone knows school contacts worth contacting, see Sandy S.) 

Will –  The ducks are laying, so duck eggs-a-plenty are available… take some if you’d like – Will has to streak so can’t stay but will leave these delicious yolky wonders for any interested takers.

Tristam – Coffee, both ground and whole beans deliciously roasted in Honduras, $12/lb provides a $7 donation to a Honduras student’s education scholarship.

Dan - Touch-a-Truck (Brattleboro Memorial Hospital fundraiser) is where we have flipped burgers in the past to help raise money – all proceeds going back to the hospital… This year it will be MAY 13^th - Dan needs some help soliciting for food donations.  At this time he has not heard back from C&S yet, nor has he been able to contact another contact he was given.  Dan could use a hand… please contact him with available time to help him follow up with these tasks.

CARDS: Drum Roll… xxxxxxxxxxx … 10 of Clubs… No one has it, so … We ALL LOSE, LOSERS!! (No Srgt at Arms present, so we all chanted in unison the familiar phrase… with great gusto.)

 

Ali – with $10 – Provided by the uber generous Booie in exchange for my typing the newsletter this week… (Thanks Booie, for that AND my breakfast!!)… $1 for everyone who got here before I did today… As I was the greeter, but failed to make it before 10 members who beat me to it!  (Terminally late as I always am, I should know better than to volunteer for this job…)

Jon – Been 12 years since he’d last sailed, but he is freshly tanned and just back from a recent vacation – a great time in Puerto Rico with a few old sail buddies.  Jon played ‘captain’ as they took their craft to a beautiful undeveloped island off the mainland, where there were turtles in the water and it was just beautiful.  Jon regaled us of tales of shoring off the ship’s mooring pin (that which anchors the craft) which then sent them floating, and bobbing … slowly drifting out to sea.  Luckily they enjoyed cell phone service the entire time.

Nick – $5 for this past weekend starting on Friday when we got hit with that snow storm – Spent time in Boston with his son, “Kinder-moon”? (Just having hit Kindergarten age) – Jack got 100% of his daddy’s attention at the Science Museum and also a Celtics game, where the Celtics won by 1 exciting point!

Sadie – Evelyn got to see her big (20 yr old) step sister in Boston too (Thanks, Nick, for reminding her to brag for their Boston trip)… They went to a great show Sadie highly recommends… “The Improv Boston Family Show” in Central Square.  “PG” improvisation; having never seen it despite living in Boston for 15 years, Sadie highly recommends this family-friendly and entertaining show.

Ali – One more brag… for my baby girl who got accepted to, and has decided on Skidmore College for her new life’s adventure.  Mom is busting buttons, so proud!!

 

Damon ended the meeting at 8:26 with the 4-way Test of the things we think, say or do…

And the meeting adjourned.

 

Respectfully Submitted, with the usual disclaimers attached.