 | The Rotary Club of |
High Gear
Volume 78 | Issue 29 / Feb 15, 2023
We were blessed today with an unseasonably balmy day for this time of the year. Our in-person meeting at Goodwin U was attended by 14. Two of us joined remotely. The two guests today were DG Randy Chapell and Assistant Area Governor Randi Saboski.
Our Tenor-in-Chief, Dan Larson, led us into the Rotary Song. We followed President Alex for the Pledge and the 4-Way Test. Marc gave the invocation about the inclusive culture of Rotary and philosophy of service above self.
President Alex asked our two guests to lead us to the buffet line which consisted of salad, and a selection of grinders and pizza. We also had two boxes of meringues at the table, and later Guy served us cupcakes.
CARING MOMENTS
- Today was Dan Larson’s grandson Gavin’s 6th Birthday.
- Dan Firestone’s grandchild from his middle son was accepted into the PreMed program at the University of Indiana.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
- A $20 donation in honor of Doug Willett came in.
- Another donation came in from a former member for the Cultural Arts program.
- The startup meeting of the Scholarship Committee is scheduled on February 21 at 5:00 pm. Zoom invitations have been sent out.
- Marc will take over as Assistant Governor in July when Randi Saboski’s term ends.
- April 1 – PETS/District Training Assembly
- April 22 – Multi District Conference
- May 20 – Rotary Day of Service; all clubs are encouraged to participate.
- June 11 – District Installation Brunch
- For more information on district events visit https://rotarydistrict7890.org/
Our Tenor-in-Chief led us into the Welcome Song for our guests. Alex introduced our guest speaker DG Randy Chapell. Randy served as the club president in 2019, Assistant Governor for 2019-21 before accepting the position as DG. He worked for 44 years in the aviation industry and served in the US Navy for six years.
Randy spoke about the revolutionary as well as the evolutionary nature of Rotary. Among the revolutionary milestones were changing the constitution to admit women into the Rotary in 1989 after the US Supreme Court ruling, and the election of the first woman president in 2022, just to name a few.
He then talked about the need for evolutionary strategies moving forward. Approximately 1.2 million new members joined Rotary worldwide in the last ten years, but just as many left during the same period. In order to attract new members and to retain them should be the goal of every club. One example he cited is to have new members respond to a few questions about their reasons for joining Rotary. Make the membership aware of the reasons and have the entire membership work towards achieving those goals.
He also emphasized the need to publicize Rotary by participating in service projects. One of his initiatives is the establishment of Pollination Gardens to fight the decline in the birds and bees population. This could also be used as a club service project. RI has tutorials and experts on this subject.
Until next week, your scribe for the month, Anwar Hossain