You better Belize it !!!!

Posted by Bill Lawrie on May 14, 2019

Guests: Peter Tam Haney Club President and Ron Warneboldt Rotary Club of Coquitlam

Meghan was acting as President and did an admirable job keeping everything on track. Yea Meghan!!

Rotaract fundraiser May 17 @ Vancouver Golf Course. $60.00

May 18^th we will be doing an early street cleaning on Heritage Mountain [and it will be a lot warmer than the photo above] PLUS it will be the day Rotary World Help loads their 400^th container. Since shipping their first almost 22 years ago to the Ukraine containers have been shipped to more than 60 countries and this 400^th container will be going to the Ukraine as a perfect bookend.

Friday September 20^th will be Coquitlam Club’s “Find the Perfect Pint”

Speakers—Glen and Al S. gave the Club an update on our Belize International Project:

You Better BELIZE it !!!!

Why Belize: We have had a relationship with Cisco who is President of 1 of the 8 Rotary Clubs in Belize. He also is contracted to run the prison (with help from the non-profit Kolbe Foundation) as well as his own business. He also works with other Clubs—Edmonton, and Britain. Belize population is appr. 350,000 with 1 prison (appr. 1200 inmates) mixed men and women plus some adolescents. Cisco has focused on skills training with the aim of job placements as the inmates are released. They have government financing but subsidize with programs from other Rotary Clubs—RACHEL, loaded with how to programs and basic training. They’ve set a goal for literacy levels and they are achieving SPE success (Student Placement Exam) which is their High School graduation equivalent.

Global grants are a great way to parlay our Club International contributions into 3-5 times the amount with matching grants. The community Al and Glen visited (St. Martens) is a poor neighbourhood. There are 800 students in 1 school K-8th grade. Parents at home lack literacy so can give little support to their kids. St. Marten’s Goals are improved educational achievements (currently measured at grade 4 levels, improved literacy, improved/increased use of the Library/learning centre, and better family support for education.

They need a RACHEL server, chrome books, implementation support, monitors/projectors. Etc. Our Club can help financially with RACHEL content acquisition and development. Also implementation support in class rooms, facilitation training of program staff etc.

Our next International committee meeting is going to be Tuesday June 4^th 7:00pm at Moody Ales. If you have a passion for any project, in any part of the world, bring your ideas and passion to the meeting. We currently have ongoing projects in Ecuador (Ian’s passion) Kenya (Cleone’s passion), South Africa upcoming (Isy’s passion) and Belize (Linda and George plus Al S and Glen’s passion).