Greetings fellow Rotarians! We started things off with the first round of the District 7850 Speech Contest.  Three students from Essex High School delivered speeches about the application of Rotary’s principles in their daily lives.  Shristi Rai (who was the last year’s winner of the first round of this contest), Iris Hsiang and Fatima Khan all delivered very eloquent speeches about what the motto of “Service Above Self “means to them. The results were close, but Fatima Khan was declared the winner of this round. In addition to winning the Round 1 prize of $100.00, Fatima will move on to the second round where she will be competing against other students from the District. Thank you to all three of these well-spoken individuals for participating in this event! We concluded the meeting with a brief talk from Professor John Reuwer.  Professor Reuwer teaches conflict resolution at St. Michael’s College. He is also involved with a number of projects that focus on non-violent conflict resolution. He recently became involved with a program in South Sudan that is known as  Unarmed Civilian Protection. This program aims to provide unarmed escorts for civilians affected by the conflict that is occurring in that country. Professor Reuwer informed us that he is about to embark on a trip to South Sudan to witness first-hand how that initiative works.  He will be returning to our Club at a later date to describe his experiences and efforts in greater detail.

            You won’t want to miss this year’s annual Service Above Self Dinner that will be held at The Essex on the evening of February 13^th.  We will be recognizing several of our community’s first responders who have gone above and beyond the call of duty as well as this year’s recipient of the Service Above Self award, Dorothy Bergenadahl. This is a nice event that celebrates what our motto of “Service Above Self” is all about. You can sign up and pay for this event through the following link:   https://rotaryclubofessex.org/event/annual-service-above-self-dinner-1/ Please contact Dave Johnson at mdjkiln@gmail.com if you have any questions about the dinner.

            We are inching closer to the Rotary All-Star Hockey Classic which will take place on Saturday, March 23^rd at the Essex Skating Facility. The women’s game will start at 4:00pm and the men’s game will start shortly after the completion of the women’s contest.  Although this is just a one-day event, we do need as many Rotarians as possible to volunteer on game day. Please contact Jeff Cabanaw at Tarrisonus@comcast.net if you have any questions about this event.

            We are looking for volunteers to help staff the Heavenly Pantry Food Shelf on the following dates: Monday, February 11^th (5:15pm); Thursday, February 28^th (3:30pm); Monday, March 11^th (3:30pm); and Thursday, March 28^th (3:30pm). Please contact Sharon Dettenrieder at sharon.dettenrieder@gmail.com if you are able to fill any shifts.

 

Upcoming Meeting Schedule:  Wednesday, February 6, 2019 – Our speaker will be fellow Essex Rotarian, Tim Gendron.  Tim will be sharing information about the Vermont Suicide Prevention Coalition.

 

For the complete list of upcoming speakers and information about the Club, please go to our website at www.essexrotary.org   Be sure to also follow us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/EssexVermontRotary , on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/essexvermontrotary/ and on Twitter at https://twitter.com/essex_rotary

 

 

       Yours in Rotary,

 

Jason Ruwet