Rotary File - March 3, 2015

Announcements:  Thanks to all those involved in planning our Community Grants event last week, it was our best ever!

World in a minute – Jack Tank spoke about Grenada, which has just one Rotary club. Grenada is an island country consisting of Grenada itself and six smaller islands at the southern end of the Grenadines in the southeastern Caribbean Sea. Grenada is located northwest of Trinidad and Tobago, northeast of Venezuela, and southwest of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

Grenada is also known as the "Island of Spice" because of the production of nutmeg and mace crops of which it is one of the world's largest exporters. Its size is 344 square kilometres (133 sq mi), with an estimated population of 110,000. Its capital is St. George's. The national bird of Grenada is the critically endangered Grenada dove.

District conference is just six weeks away, and members are encouraged to sign up for at least one of the three major dining events.  We prefer you sign up manually (print out and mail in the registration form) instead of digitally due to the extra processing expense, but please do one or the other.  Friday’s lunch will feature Bob Bowlsby, Saturday’s lunch will showcases kids and Friday evening’s dinner will feature Aaron Thomas.  Please volunteer to help out if you can.

Here’s a link with more details:  http://www.clubrunner.ca/portal/Events/EVPEventDetails.aspx?accountid=50027&eid=045ba807-a303-47e5-860f-cecbd517f92c&tid=2

There will be a board meeting this Thursday at 6:45 at Waterfront Hy-Vee.

45 people from all over the district attended a grant management seminar last week.

Program: Our six Interactors (three from City High and three from West) were unable to attend due to the morning ice storm, but Nancy Pacha filled in with help from Casey Cook.

Interact gives students ages 12-18 the chance to make a real difference while having fun. Every Interact club carries out two service projects a year: one that helps their school or community and one that promotes international understanding.

Clubs meet at least twice a month and are sponsored by their local Rotary club.  Interact helps young people:

•connect with community leaders

•develop leadership skills

•make international connections

•discover more opportunities to connect with Rotary, including Rotaract, RYLA, and Youth Exchange

On March 29 at West High School will be the third annual Iowa MOST benefit fundraiser.  Casey said there is some remarkable talent on display there.  Iowan Frank Canady (son of lead surgeon John Canady) will be one of the speakers.

RYLA (Rotary Youth Leadership Awards) was also discussed in some depth.  Rotary clubs in Districts 5970 and 6000, throughout Iowa sponsor students to participate in this 6-day leadership conference.

RYLA is a life-changing leadership training program for young men and women where leadership skills and principles are learned, developed and enhanced in an atmosphere of trust and respect.  The purpose of RYLA is to encourage and assist current and potential youth leaders in methods of responsible and effective leadership.  Many past RYLArians from around the country have said, “It was the best week of my life!”

The RYLA Conference for 2015 will be held July 26-31, 2015 at Grinnell College.  Registration for 2015 Iowa RYLA begins December 1, 2014 and closes April 30, 2015.