The Rotary Club of Bath
The Morse Interact Club, with help from the BRCTC Culinary Arts students, held a Lunch For Leaders sandwich drive on February 10 to raise funds to send additional students to RYLA in June.
The Rotary Club of Bath has been serving the Bath community for nearly 100 years, providing financial and physical support to a variety of programs and causes whose aim is to make life better for people not only in the local community, but nationally and internationally as well. That includes supporting education. The Bath Rotary offers two scholarships for graduating Morse High School seniors who are continuing their education.
The Bath Rotary Trust also gives two scholarships to graduating seniors from the Bath Regional Career and Technical Center who are continuing their education. It was formed in 1973 to provide materials for construction of single-family modular dwellings built by students at the BRCTC under supervision of the school’s instructors. The sale of each modular home provides the seed money for the next construction project. The skills acquired enable the students to become proficient in construction, thus entering the workforce on a more competitive basis. The newest completed modular home is currently for sale and ready to be moved.
Other local organizations that the Bath Rotary recently supported are the Patten Free Library, the Chocolate Church, Success By 6, the Bath Area BackPack Program, the Bath Area Food Bank, the Red Elf book project, Main Street Bath, Friends of Seguin, Friends Forever, the United Way’s Diaper Project, SEARCH Greater Bath, Big Brothers/Big Sisters of Bath Brunswick, and the Bath Elementary PTA book drive, among others.
Internationally, the Bath Rotary has supported Rotary International’s efforts to eradicate polio as well as contribute to ShelterBox, which provides emergency shelter to victims of war and natural disasters. The Bath Rotary’s ShelterBox was recently deployed in Syria. One international project we are very proud to support is the CIO Orphanage in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Bath Rotarian Rich Cromwell travels to Cambodia every year to work at the orphanage. Most recently Rich secured land on which the orphanage built a permanent home. Adjacent land was purchased with plans to build a learning center. The learning center, which will house a lending library, will be open to local residents to use and will be the only library in that area of Cambodia.
To finance these projects the Bath Rotary holds an annual golf tournament in June, the 4-Way 5K Walk/Run on Columbus Weekend, and an Electronic Waste Collection event, also in October. Bath Rotarians also help the Salvation Army by manning the kettles during the holidays and hosting a Stuff-A-Bus food drive for the Bath Area Food Bank in early February.
