The meeting was chaired by President Bob Baker. There were 18 members present along with the 3 guest speakers. Bob handled the “thought for the day” by referring to a quote given at a 1956 Rotary Convention about the importance of Rotarians using their minds, hearts and spirit in performing their duties as Rotarians.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
- Amy announced that the next “Thirsty Thursday” in the WCH garden will be August 3rd from 5 to 8 PM with the Replay Band performing.There will be a cash bar and “pizza truck” available to add to the fun.
- Bill Leske announced that our Rotary Club will have a tent at the July 26th“Market and Music” event at Clarkson Park in Northfield from 5:30 to 8:30 PM at which we have a chance to display Rotary materials and to greet the many guests of all ages that are showing up at these Market and Music events every Thursday night during the summer — volunteers should contact Bill to participate.
HAPPY BUCKS: Barb and Patti reported on their role in recently hosting a Rotarian from the United Kingdom. Barb mentioned that her visitor from the UK had been here all week. He is Director of a Volunteer Center in England.
Barb and Patti hosted a newly-formed group of volunteers at Little Honeycomb last Wednesday. The purpose of this group will be to do service projects in our communities, in the name of our Club. The intent is to raise awareness of Rotary in our Centennial year and to enhance our motto of Service Above Self. This is not initially intended to be a Satellite Club, but may evolve into one.
DIG N GRIN: Bill Leske handled this part of the program by giving us dates on which special world events occurred.
BIRTHDAYS AND ANNIVERSARIES: Amy’s birthday was July 10 and Mary Lou Bilder-
Gold’s was July 14; Julie Tye celebrated 7 years and Patti 16 years as Rotarians.
GUEST SPEAKERS: We are privileged to have three outstanding members from the Gleview Sunrise Rotary Club speak to us today. Their home club meets weekly at 7:00am to do good things for Rotary.
MARCIA CEBULA started by explaining some of the projects undertaken by the Sunrise Club such as attending a Rotary International Convention on “peace and mental illness”. Other topics covered there were eradicating diseases in addition to polio, providing needy communities with low cost medicine, clean drinking water, quality medical care and education to the children. Marcia also reported on the service trip that 10 members of the Glenview “Sunrise” group took last February to Uganda with some other Rotary Clubs participating. Their main project was to help repair and construct a local school attended by preschool to 7th graders and to buy needed school supplies and sports/recreational equipment since the local government there only pays the salaries of the teachers but does not pay for any other expenses of operation. Marcia also summarizied what Rotary is doing in Uganda to improve the health of expectant mothers and newborns.
DEE SANTUCCI then explained her experience on this Uganda trip which included a safari in a
National Park where they were introduced to gorillas of all ages and sizes, but all were very
friendly as long as they had green trees/bushes to consume! She also attended several days on
their school project as well as attending a local Rotary meeting (where the attendees seemed to
be more serious than their American counterparts!)
CECILIA HAGIST (a Northfield resident and local school teacher who grew up in Mexico City and whose grandfather was a longtime Rotarian there) then talked about the importance of engaging our “youth” in Rotarian activities and how much her 16 year old daughter, Anna, benefited so much by going on the Uganda trip described above. She also mentioned that the Interact program at New Trier High School was discontinued when the assigned New Trier teacher/advisor retired and has not been replaced. She suggested that our Club may want to review and take action to reinstate this program at New Trier. She then explained what she and her daughter, Anna, are doing to try to establish an Interact program at the Skokie Jr. High School in Northfield. Through the efforts of the Hagist family and the Sunrise Glenview Club there may be many of the 40-50 students in the7th and 8th grades at this Junior High School who would be interested in this extracurricular school activity if there is a teacher who is willing to serve as the advisor, which Cecilia is working on. Rotary requires a minimum of 5 members to start the Interact program.
After a short Q and A period, the meeting ended around 1:30 with the recitation of the Rotary 4-Way Test.