President Sue Hansen pulled everyone in from their small group conversations and called the meeting to order. The invocation was provided by Hari Kern (provided at the end of this report). The patriotic song was God Bless America.
President Hansen called on Rotarians to introduce their guests. Gabrielle Lawrence introduced Robert Crowe from The Christman Company. Uma Umakanthan introduced Travis Stoliker from Slice by Saddleback and Win Oo, an entrepreneur and senior at Everett High School and Max Smedly who has been accepted to MSU Osteopathic Medicine. Jonathan Kolbasa introduced Rep. Sarah Anthony who was there in support of the Lansing School District mileage. Justin Sheehan introduced Gerald Bullock, an Everett grad and new production intern for a Lansing Promise podcast. Scott Watkins introduced Roman Stotland.
Pres. Hansen led the group in the reciting of the four-way test. Lesa Smith reported on the health of the club (good) and President Sue called for a moment of remembrance for Rotarian James L. Reutter who passed away on the evening of April 3, 2022. Jim was a Rotarian from February 21, 1964, with Louis Legg as his sponsor. Jim was the President of the club from 1977 to 1978.
President Sue invited Kellie Dean, Rep. Sarah Anthony and Gabrielle Lawrence to give a community announcement on the Lansing School District’s Bond Proposal.
Announcements included:
- Volunteer opportunity: Details are in the Rotogram about the Capital City Clean Sweep on Saturday, April 23, from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. Contact Jason Brunette for more details.
- Irv Nichol’s son will be presenting a film in the Capital City Film Festival.
- Heidi McNaughton reminded everyone to make their donation to the Paul Harris Appeal with a specific reminder to write checks to Rotary Foundation.
Special music featured Benjamin Clements with songs from the musical Show Boat.
Thanks to our Chair of the Month/Day, Scott Duimstra, who provided the introduction of Jim Curran, Founder of Great Lakes Reality Lab.
Mr. Curran spoke on "Web 3.0, the Metaverse and VR - the WILD World Web"
Highlights include:
● What is a Metaverse? Taking a physical experience and recreating it in a virtual world.
● How is the virtual world evolving? How do we access it? The future of the virtual world and the metaverse is endless-- how do we bring this tech to Michigan?
● Young people and recent grads are choosing to stay local because the living expenses are so much lower than in California’s Silicon Valley.
● Research shows that retention happens in “doing,” and the virtual approach is a smarter way to give content to students in order to retain information.
● The applications of this technology are endless. Some examples are: teaching, virtual art experiences, immersive art, historical and science experiences, technical training
● Using VR minimizes the cost of potential destruction--like experimenting with chemicals and blowing up a chem lab.
● VR also has opportunities to help mental fatigue or minimize trauma to essential workers by offering a calm escape.
● Digital Workforce Development – Access to what job experiences young people might be interested in; messages and videos from prospective employers; a more streamlined approach to connecting hiring managers with interested potential employees.
● Presented the Michigan Joint Training Innovation Center, a place for kids to experience technical skilled trades. It is the first of its kind in North America and looks to grow the available curriculum.
● “Digital Gold Rush and you don’t have to go West to find it”
President Hansen shared that in lieu of a speaker’s gift, we will make a donation in the speakers’ honor to a local organization through our Lansing Rotary Foundation which has, over the history of our club, given in excess of $2,000,000 to local organizations and projects.
NEXT WEEK: We will not meet next week due to the Good Friday Holiday. Our next meeting will be Friday, April 22, 2023, at the Lansing Center and we will hear from Michele Strasz, Executive Director of the Capital Area College Access Network. The invocation that Kern read in honor of Curran:
Let us be still as we humbly turn toward the Spirit of Life and the Spirit of Love.
Today, we express our gratitude for our many blessings: for good health; for the freedom to gather together here; for the fact that for most of us, our needs are being more than well-met. Also, we are grateful for those in our community who are dedicated to educating our citizens and who continue to look for new and creative ways for people to learn.
But even as we count our blessings, we are reminded that so many in our world are suffering. Great numbers of people are fleeing their homes and their countries of origin and are experiencing horrific turmoil, destruction, and loss. For them, the possibility of learning new things is likely the farthest thing from their minds right now, and prosperity for the future must seem more remote than ever. May we find ways to reach out with compassion and may peace come in those areas much sooner than later.
Being part of a service organization like our Lansing Rotary is also a blessing - where we can come together, form new associations and friendships, expand those we already have, be exposed to new ideas, share our life experiences, and have opportunities to contribute to the well being of others in our community and in the wider world. How fortunate we are!
And now, as a new and warmer season is beginning, we can turn to nature to teach us yet another powerful lesson in that those seeds, which have been dark and closed and buried, are surrendering to a process where they are cracking open in the dark, giving themselves over to a growth process they cannot see, and finally, breaking ground to bud and bloom into a life of light that we call spring.
Blessed be and may it be so.
Amen
Meghan Martin's email is: meghan@lansingarts.org