Club President John Starnes called the meeting to order at 12:27 welcoming all Rotarians and guests to Rotary.

 

Guy DeWitt and Eric Easton were our greeters and Guy introduced guests:

Guy introduced our visiting Rotarians, Helen Bishop, and Bill and Nancy Sniffin;

Susan Griffith introduced the Interact members, A.J. Beadle, Raquel Baca, Christyonna Martinez, John Durleerley, and David Kienzle ;

John Jorgensen introduced Greg Dixson from Hilltop National Bank;

Tara Short introduced Joe Dedic;

Don Harris introduced Stephen Finzo;

Bill DeGraeve introduced Dale Bohren from the Casper Start Tribune;

Martha Rakestraw introduced family members of the SOM, Grandmother Marylou Sandefer, and Father Travis Bagwell;

Rick Reimann introduced Jim White;

Dennis Lower introduced Dr. Michael Skaff;

 

President Starnes advised that Brenda Peters has resigned as our pianist after many years of doing an excellent job for us, thank you Brenda for all of your years of service. If anyone who has the talent to play and would like to volunteer, please contact a member of the board.

Dennis Lower treated us to a good chuckle and then he told us a joke, after which Gary Pehrson had us all Rise and sing “Cowboy Joe” in recognition of UW winning a game this past weekend. 

 

Susan Griffith let us know that Ronna Boril lost her father this past week and the funeral will be pending this week.

President Starnes then asked who traveled the farthest for Thanksgiving or had a family member travel into Casper from the longest. Eric Easton topped the people coming in with his sister traveling here from England, then Denise Prugh shared that she drove eight hours and took out a Coyote with her car on the way.

 

Dave Simonson nominated Bill Schilling and Doug McLaughlin for stepping up last week and pledging a donation to the International project, spurring on many others to donate. He then nominated many others who donated, Steve Loftin, Chaz Farnum, Bill Mortimer, Red Nickerson, Dick Jay then read off the names of those who brought a check today; Kevin Hawley, Dick Shamley, Don Mealer, Gene and Deb Theriault, Dave McNaughlty, Tim Monroe, Erin Essary. If anyone wants to donate please send checks to the Casper Rotary Foundation and mark it for the International Schoolroom Project.

 

President John then presented Brenda Peters with a four way test coin for her service to the club.

 

We had a great young man speak to us today from Roosevelt High School, Lane Bagwell, we wish him the best for the future.

 

Jim Ruble told us that before the Christmas Party on the 21^st he has arranged for us to volunteer at the Food Bank of the Rockies to pack food and we need about forty volunteers to help with that, he then introduced our speaker today, the President of our Casper Rotaract club Amanda Sutton. As part of the Presidential Citation for Rotary International this year they want to increase the use of the online tools and so the goal is to have at least 50% of our club members signed up for Rotary.org. So Amanda is here today to talk a little about Rotary.org and how to get signed up. To start she let us know a little about Rotaract and how we can help them by mentoring and involving them so that we can encourage them to become Rotarians in the future. They have just changed their by-laws to include associate members ages 18-21 so that they can start getting Casper College students involved at an earlier point to help grow their club. She asked that all of us let young professionals that we know about Rotaract also. She also asked that we attend their club events and meetings sometimes to give them support and to promote Rotary. They also want to support the community so please invite them to our events and service projects so they can be included. They will be partnering with the Reveille club to deliver groceries to the assisted living centers to help those shut-ins that need help getting some of the fresh produce and things they need. They are also working on a World Café networking event to do networking and conversation with their members and our members so we can give them career advice and mentoring, this will be in Mid-February at the pump house.

She also asked that if anyone is willing to host an eighth grader for them to do a career study please let her know so that she can connect students to Rotarians. She let us know about all of the resources that are available in Rotary.org and how we can see what other clubs ae doing and so that all of the Rotary clubs can be recognized for what they do. She encouraged all of us to register and showed us how easy it is to do so. She also brought a link for the video showing how to do it and also a paper copy of the step by step instructions. Simply go to Rotary.org and click on register then fill in your information, the more information you can put in the easier it is for the site to find you in the Rotary records. Many members then pulled out their smart phones and got registered. If anyone needs help getting this done please feel free to ask another Rotarian or give Amanda a call. We need at least 50% of our club to get signed up so please do so. Amanda said that on January 18^th she will be here with a couple of laptops to help anyone who has not been able to get signed up yet.

 

President John Starnes adjourned the meeting at 1:3 with the ring of the bell, reminding us that next week we are meeting at the Petroleum Club again. The following week we will be at Casper College for one week and then we will be back at the Parkway for our Christmas meeting on December 21^st.