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Jamie L. offered our invocation while John M. introduced as his guests Lori Ronning and John Steinbrenner, the latter the Principal at Lincoln School. Hal L. introduced our Student Athletes form M State, all from the men's basketball team, which had a 17-2 record at the time of our meeting and was ranked 10th in the nation. Yonis Muhammed was the first to speak, telling us he grew up in Shakopee and is in his second year at M State, planning to obtain a four-year degree in psychology or social work. Carter Clark is in his first year and is from Mahnomen. Kayden Knick is from Fergus and he too is in his first year, ultimately intending to pursue a business degree. Left to right: Kayden, Carter and Yonis. Brian T. encourages ticket sales for the upcoming magic show and Cody O. indicated we would need volunteers for the event starting at 1:00 p.m. and ending around 4:00 (the show is from 2:00 to 3:00). President Katie acknowledged long-time Rotary anniversaries for Steve A. and Hal L., both 41 years, and Deb M., 13 years. Our volunteers at the High School speech tournament the prior Saturday raised $1115.00 from concession sales for the speech team. Thanks to all who volunteered! Hal L. led off the bragging, contributing for not being able to make it to the speech tournament because of a last-minute plumbing problem at their home. Steve A. wished us a Happy Chinese New Year, recognizing the snake this year, and told us he was going to spend most of February in New York with his spouse. Zack S. told us that there will be a public performance of the middle school's musical production, starring his daughter as Ariel, this coming Thursday; he also apologized for forgetting to wear his Rotary gear to the speech tournament. Kathy A. told us she is off to Asia for a three-week sojourn. John M., who serves on the Salvation Army board, told us that last year Ricki served 17,000 meals. John then proceeded to introduce his oldest granddaughter as our speaker, Megan MacFarlane. Megan received her college degree from MSU, then taught for two years, followed up by two years at a foundation and now she is with an advertising and marketing firm called Tell Well. Megan received her Master's in Positive Coaching and Athletic Leadership from the University of Missouri and is deeply involved in volunteer efforts to prevent suicide amongst youth. The program she started is called M3, which stands for My Mind Matters. She is the executive director of it and because of her efforts was nominated by the Fargo-Moorhead YMCA as one of their women of the year candidates last year. John also remarked on her red hair, which he told us was a good trait in the McFarlane family. Megan started off by telling us that the only wrong answer in dealing with someone who may be struggling is to do nothing. She has been nannying three children and the conversations about what could be done to discourage suicide by youth began in 2019; the effort kicked off in 2020 after a hockey student/peer committed suicide. The effort is addressed to student athletes, recognizing kids like to be involved in sports and thinking they may be more receptive if they were addressed in that context. At the beginning, they worked with eight- to ten-year-olds, but the program has expanded to now reach high school students as well. Money has been raised through five golf tournaments to date. They talk to the kids about being mentally tough and 15 different components to that. The main goal is to help each student to be their best self, in and out of sports. So far, the organization has worked with over 2,300 students. The statistics Megan shared about suicide were startling. One suicide occurs in the U.S. every 11 minutes. For every suicide death, there are four hospitalizations for attempted suicide, eight emergency room visits and 275 people who seriously considered suicide. Forty percent of men have never spoken to anyone about their mental health, with men committing 80% of all suicides while only being 50% of the population. Medications are three times more effective when combined with talk therapy if someone is experiencing suicidal thoughts. We also learned that 50% of chronic illnesses begin before the age of 14, 75% by age 24. One in five adults live with a mental illness. In Minnesota, 31% of our population does not have access to adequate mental health resources. Strategies suggested to students include building each person's confidence (identifying what he/she does well and having them repeat it often), gratitude (listing three things one is grateful for on a daily basis) and resilience (identifying one's ideal mind set by learning from what he/she has already overcome and promoting positive growth). You could tell how important this is to Megan. As an unpaid volunteer she gave 107 locker room talks in 2024, taking 45 hours of her time, to say nothing of the hockey and golf tournaments and other efforts the group is making under her leadership and service. The most important message to everyone is that each of us matters. |
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