December 2015 Speaker Summary

First, at the December 2 meeting, Fred Nevar and Jim Zeitz were recognized for attaining their Paul Harris +1 status.  Then, Betsy Magolin and Sally Comitigano spoke to us briefly about the new café opening at the WG high school.  The café is to be run by students from Metzenbaum and business students.  The café will be open all day except during lunch and will be a place for students to get coffee, tea and snacks.  All the work setting up the café has been done by donations.  They need $1000 to purchase a few items in order to finish the project, especially signage, and asked for our consideration.

 

The speaker was Suzi Kay.  Although she works for the United Way, she was here to talk about volunteer vacations.  She had volunteered at a dude ranch in Montana and found it to be a great experience.  Another example of a volunteer vacation is working for the US Forest Service.  Suzi encouraged everyone to consider a volunteer vacation but stressed that it should be done outside of the community where we live.  Then it would be a vacation!

 

WG student Katherine Kulp, accompanied by her mom Theresa, was present to receive the Student of the Month award at the December 9 meeting.  Some of her activities are secretary of Interact, Latin club and swim team captain.  Katherine also has helped raise $10,000 over the last six years for Rescue Village.

 

The speaker was Judy Zamlen-Spotts from the US Department of Veteran Affairs at the Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Center.  She is the Community Outreach Coordinator.  Judy is also a Marine veteran and a CASA volunteer.  There are 98,000 vets in NE Ohio and many are not enrolled in the VA for benefits, especially in Geauga County.  Now there are income guidelines to receive medical benefits but Purple Heart veterans are covered automatically.  Judy asked our help to identify veterans who have not registered.  Even if they cannot qualify for benefits, they may be able to help another veteran, because the dollars allocated are based on registered vets. 

 

There was not a speaker for the December 16 meeting.  It was a club meeting where items from the December 14 Board meeting were discussed.  Meetings on the last two Wednesdays of December were cancelled due to the holidays.