The Atlanta Host Organization Committee is offering some good old-fashioned Southern hospitality at the Rotary International Convention from 10 to 14 June. It has planned a wide range of activities featuring everything from good food and music to inspiring tours of local landmarks. If it’s your first convention, these events are chances to meet fellow Rotarians from around the world, and if you’re an experienced convention goer, you can catch up with old friends.
Hall of Fame baseball player Hank Aaron will host Rotarians for a “Strike Out Polio” night at the new SunTrust Park, where you’ll...
When Teguest Yilma helped found the Rotary Club of Addis Ababa Entoto in 2002, she thought polio had already been eradicated from most of the world. But while Ethiopia had been free of the disease, Yilma was shocked to learn that new cases had started cropping up in surrounding countries such as Somalia.
“I was thinking, it’s not possible, we can’t be free if the countries around us are not free,” she says. Yilma, the managing editor of Capital, Ethiopia’s largest English weekly newspaper, has brought a journalist’s skills to the fight against polio. She became vice chair of the Ethiopia...
Battling breast cancer in 2000, Kathryn Smith found comfort pursuing her lifelong interest in Franklin D. Roosevelt. The more she read, the more intrigued she became with the 32nd U.S. president’s private secretary, Marguerite Alice “Missy” LeHand. “I thought, what a fascinating life she had because she was by his side through the polio crisis, establishing the polio rehabilitation center in Warm Springs and then after his return to politics,” she says. Smith, a past president of the Rotary Club of Greater Anderson, S.C., and a longtime newspaper journalist, turned that curiosity into a book...
One of United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s earliest memories is of fleeing with his family into the mountains during the Korean War, his village burning behind him. His father and grandfather had to forage for food in the woods; his mother gave birth to his siblings away from anything remotely resembling a health facility. “I have known hunger,” he says. “I have known war, and I have known what it means to be forced to flee conflict.”
The soldiers who came to their rescue were flying the blue flag of the United Nations. The UN provided them with food and their schools with books....
Like a lot of us, I spent much of my childhood riding bikes, but fell out of the habit for a while. Forty years. Then my wife and I moved to New York, where cyclists risk their necks in a daily Thunderdome of cabs, police cars, firetrucks, double-decker buses, messengers on motorbikes, and delivery trucks backing around corners at 20 miles an hour. Not for me! At least not until my 50th birthday, when my metabolic furnace flamed out. Calories started going directly from beer bottle to beer belly. It was time to start exercising. Either that or give up Samuel Adams, and I couldn’t do that to...
Our regular noon meeting at the German Club will convene at the Edmonton Valley Zoo. Details are as follows:
Date: Tuesday, February 14th (in lieu of our regular meeting at the German Club)
Place: Otter Room, EdVenture Lodge, located in the entry plaza of the Edmonton Valley Zoo
Schedule: 11:30 -11:30 am Setup
11:30 – 12:30 Lunch and Club Meeting
12:30-12:45 Presentation Presentation by Stephanie Perilli, Director, Fund Development, can be entitled Nature’s Wild Backyard.
On the tour we will see the animals and learn the scale of the zoo’s next phase of revitalization.
12:45-2:00 pm Tour of the Zoo
Cost: $20.00 per person
Invite a guest or two!
Click on the link in "Upcoming Events" to register and pay online.
You may confirm your attendance at the club meeting of Jan. 31st or Feb. 7th, or by email to dianadan@telusplanet.net. Payment may be made on line or at the door. Please advise in advance of any dietary restrictions.
Deadline for registration is Friday, February 10th.
Members are reminded about the District Volunteer Security Policy, DOWNLOAD HERE.
This policy was generated from the requirement of our insurance company providing liability coverage in case of issues arising from members and non-Rotarians working with youth and other vulnerable members of our society.
The policy provides that all involved Rotarians and non-Rotarians complete a vulnerable persons police check. Click on title 'Police Check' to read more about the relaxed submission procedure.
Contact Hans Granholm, 780-466-5566 for more information.
We heard from Elizabeth Bonkink (pictured), a Communications Advisor with the Edmonton Community Foundation (ECF) and a Rotarian, on some highlights of their Vital Signs report, which they publish on a yearly basis. She explained that every year they collect basic statistics on Edmonton, and in addition they choose a topic of interest for a more in depth report.
The in-depth topic chosen for this past year was immigrants and refugees. She said that Canada accepts two classes of refugees, government sponsored and privately sponsored. She noted that we are the only country that accepts privately sponsored refugees, and said that this class of refugees actually integrate more quickly into Canadian society, as they already have a safety net to help them along. She mentioned that Canada is in a zero population growth position, and needs the boost that immigrants and refugees bring to our country in terms of numbers, youth and entrepreneurship. She said that seventy one percent of immigrants are economic immigrants, twenty one percent are family re-unification immigrants and seven percent are refugees. The remaining one percent are immigrants accepted on compassionate or humanitarian grounds. A large number of these immigrants, sixty one percent, are highly educated, more than the Canadian born number of fifty four percent. They also have a higher home ownership rate within five years of immigration, at thirty nine percent, as compared to the overall Canadian average of thirty seven percent. Edmonton, in particular, has been a popular city to settle for them, with an increase of one hundred seventy eight percent in immigrants settling here over the last few years, due to our vibrant economy. This has slowed down somewhat in the last year. This also has meant that our school systems are dealing with much larger numbers of non-english speaking children. They have seen an increase of almost one hundred percent in English language learners over the last five years.
Edmonton also becomes home for many secondary migrants, who come here after settling initially elsewhere in Canada. Edmonton receives about ten thousand new immigrants a year. The majority of recent immigrants in Edmonton come from the Philippines, India, China, Pakistan and the US. Edmonton is also home to more than three thousand temporary foreign workers. Many of these immigrants send money home to support family, with thirty one billion dollars sent overseas from Canada in 2014 alone, and many live in poverty here in Canada, so that they can send money home. Most of these immigrants find it hard to find jobs in their field of expertise at first, and need help to have their credentials assessed by Canadian standards. The ECF helps in many ways to support the integration of immigrants into our local community. They support the Multicultural Family Resource Center, the Mennonite Center for Newcomers, the Cultural Connection Institute, the Council for Advancement of African Canadians and many others. They also offer grants to help them get their credentials up to Canadian standards.
She also offered some highlights of the general Vital Signs report for Edmonton. Our population is continuing to grow, with almost one point four million people in greater Edmonton now. Edmonton has an equal number of single person households to those with two or more people. We also have more cats and dogs than children under the age of eighteen! We have seen record school enrollment growth with about eighteen percent increases in both local school systems. Housing vacancy rates are going up and costs are coming down, although forty percent of Edmonton renters still pay more than thirty percent of their income for rent and there are over four thousand families waiting for affordable accommodation. Our food security is in a delicate balance here in Alberta, as nearly all of our food is brought in from outside the province. In case of disaster, we would only have a three-day supply of food in the city. We really do need to support more of our local food producers. The living wage in Edmonton is now $16.69 for a family of four with both parents working full time. Sixty percent of people making less that the living wage are women. Four hundred volunteers a day showed up to help with donation collection and distribution for the Ft McMurray Fire evacuees, and we assisted nearly eighty thousand people.
Our charitable giving is the second highest in Canada. Eighty percent of Edmontonians donated money to a charity or non-profit organization within the last year.
Edmonton has over ninety festivals each year, and we have about six hundred and fifty groups that host various events throughout the year. Crime severity has decreased almost forty percent from what it was ten years ago. Sixty percent of Edmontonians believe it is important to be involved in their community.
In all, it as a very enlightening talk, showing both our strengths and weaknesses. This report can give all of us some issues to think about, and work on for the future.
One of our newer members, Ron Brown and his bride, Judy Harcourt-Brown spends a few months in Mexico every year. They visit Rotary clubs regularly and participate in local club projects and events.
Judy is a director of Project Amigo Canada, and it is no coincidence that one of their favourite projects is 'Project Amigo' in Colima.
Ron just sent me a Blog covering the period January 11 - 19.
YESS is starting to plan for our 2017 Gala for Youth, taking place on April 28, 2017. This is our largest yearly fundraiser and we are asking for your help! Are you or someone you know willing to donate an item to our gala’s silent auction?
Donor individuals or companies will receive recognition in our event program and signage at the event, on the auction table, and on our event website.
Here some examples of items we are looking for that tend to do well at our auction: Experiences – tickets to an event, trips – skiing, fishing, etc., golf packages or lessons, helicopter, airplane or hot air balloon ride, photo portrait session, kid’s party , art party or lessons Romance - dance lessons, flowers for a year, dinners, dream date night Lifestyle – gym membership or fitness training, haircuts or spa package and related items, pet grooming, massages, housekeeping, shopping spree Outdoor Items – bbq, decking or backyard reno, outdoor machines like snowblower or lawnmower, tools, birdhouse, gardening set, kid’s playground set New Items – purses or luggage , set of his and hers sunglasses, kitchen machines, themed gift baskets, camping or outdoor items, musical instrument, luxury bedding set, home gym, golf clubs, telescope, autographed sports memorabilia Art – artisan pottery, sculpture, painting/print (preferrably framed), woven blanket or shawl
If you have an item you are interested in donating or know of a company we should contact, please call or email Michelle Iorio, michelle.iorio@yess.org, 780-468-7186 ext 223.
INQUIRY FOR INTEREST FOR A TRIP TO GREECE IN SEPTEMBER 2017
After the 2016 successful Tour of Greece there has been an interest in a repeat. If you or acquaintances of yours are interested in participating in an 8 to 10 days bus tour of Greece please send an e-mail to Dimitri Papanicolas at dpapanicolas@outlook.com in order to receive more information. The number of participants should not exceed 20, on first come first saved basis. We will also connect with a few Rotary Clubs during the trip and see if we can organize a visit. The tour is open to non-Rotarian too.
The tour will take place in the mainland visiting archeological sites, religious sites, overall site seeing (see map) and of course some local food, wine, ouzo and shopping. Island and cruise tours can be organized separately before or after the tour.
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