By Rotary International

The San Francisco Evening club makes its presence known during a recent district assembly.

By Danielle Lallement, past president of the Rotary Club of San Francisco Evening

Walking into our district assembly recently, I looked up and saw fellow club members at the top of the bleachers in crazy wigs and big funky glasses, passing out noisemakers. When our president-elect, Ehlan Siddiqi, crossed the stage to receive his pin and banner for his presidential year, we raised the roof with our noisemakers and cheers.

This is just one example of the fun and energy that we are trying to create in our …read more

Source:: Rotary International Blog

By Rotary International

Members of Rotary, Rotaract, and Interact join community health workers in cleaning up an impoverished community near Naivasha, Kenya.

By Joe Kamau, service project chair for the Rotary Club of Naivasha, Kenya

My Rotary club recently completed a very successful Rotary At Work Day in January where we cleaned up a poor community near Naivasha, Kenya.

This activity was truly a collaborative and inter-generational effort, bringing together members of the Interact Club of Trinity Mission School, the Rotaract Club of Naivasha, members of Rotary, friends, community health workers, and local government officials.

In total, more than 300 volunteers turned up for the activity, which …read more

Source:: Rotary International Blog

By Rotary International

A member of the Rotaract Club of Caltanissetta, Sicily, records a section of an audio book.

By Mirko Gangi, Rotaract Club of Caltanissetta, Siciliy

There are many visually impaired children in Italy and Sicily who lack teaching materials and educational aids. The purchase and distribution of books in Braille is difficult, there is only one distribution house in Sicily, and the cost of audio books is very high.The present economic crisis and lack of public funds also does not help.

So as members of Rotaract, we joined together with the Rotary Club of Caltanissetta to record and produce three audio books which we distributed to 750 children with visual impairments in primary, middle, and high schools in Sicily. We intend to make the audio books available to schools free of charge as a teaching tool.

We held 15 different events, including a concert by the renowned master Luigi Mariani, who is himself blind, to raise money for our project. We worked closely with the ministry of education, the City of Caltanissetta, and the Braille Printing House of Catania.

We are also putting the files of the audio books on the Internet so they will be available to blind children anywhere in the world, and not …read more

Source:: Rotary International Blog

By Rotary International

Click to view slideshow.

By Isabeli Fontana

As a Rotary polio ambassador, I’m currently in India, participating in our vaccination program. I think everyone should have the best start in life, so as a mother, I made sure my two sons received the vaccine against polio.

The story of Rotary’s fight against polio is inspiring, and it always gives me hope to see the impact of Rotary’s work when I travel. For me, beauty is anything that makes you happy. The work of Rotary and health workers is certainly beautiful.

I can see the happiness in the faces of 500 schoolchildren when I visited their school in Uttar Pradesh. I also saw happiness in the eyes of the health workers who helped India become polio-free last year. I helped to vaccinate children as part of my visit. It’s so simple really — two drops to prevent a lifetime of suffering.

But I also felt sadness when I toured St. Stephen’s Hospital in New Delhi, the only place in India with a special ward to treat children suffering from the terrible effects of polio, before the disease was controlled.

No child should have to suffer from a preventable disease, and seeing the children in St. Stephen’s …read more

Source:: Rotary International Blog

By Rotary International

Rotary Youth Exchange Students help Rotary members in Minnesota pack school materials for a nonprofit in Guatemala.

By Rotary Voices staff

Rotary clubs in Minnesota, USA, have banded together to send boxes of textbooks to and purchase school supplies for an organization in Guatemala that is helping students from poor families receive an education.

In 2014, the step-daughter of James Benshoof, a member of the Rotary Club of Crystal, New Hope, Robbinsdale, decided to donate dozens of textbooks to Common Hope, a nonprofit based in St. Paul that works to provide educational opportunities, health care, and housing assistance to families outside Antigua and Guatemala City. The books were being replaced as part of a curriculum change at a Spanish-immersion school where she taught.

Benshoof’s Rotary club, and several others in the area, got involved in raising the money necessary to ship the books to Guatemala, and gathered together in December with several Rotary Youth Exchange Students to pack addition materials they had collected. They also received a $7,000 grant from their district to purchase school supplies in Guatemala once the shipment arrived.

“What inspires me the most about the project is the opportunity to benefit these children by giving them access to more books and …read more

Source:: Rotary International Blog

By Rotary International

By Wendy Coulson, Rotary Peace Center at Chulalongkorn University, Class of 2015

We talked a lot during our first two weeks at the Rotary Peace Center at Chulalongkorn University about connectors and dividers — what brings people or groups together and what drives them apart — in conflict situations.

As soon as our class of Rotary Peace Fellows arrived, we looked for ways to connect with each other. In fact, our tallest classmate found many of us on Facebook and began friendships and organizing workshops even before we arrived. We were so keen to meet each other that we threw open our doors to see who had arrived and threw open our arms to greet those we had only known virtually.

When you look at conflict situations around the world, dividers are typically differences in religion, language, ethnic group identity, or over resources. Our class has all of these as potential dividers, but they are used as connectors here. We connect through talking about sports, food, the arts, and celebrations. We also connect by talking about each other’s culture, families and places we’ve traveled, and things we celebrate. We put business cards on our doors, leave them open, send messages, hang out …read more

Source:: Rotary International Blog

By Rotary International

Mohammed Ishak, Rotary Club of Jalalabad, holds the torch during a joint event with the Rotary Club of Kabul City. Luke Beer, author of this post, is second from right in back.

By Luke Beer, president of the Rotary Club of Kabul City, Afghanistan

As some of you know, a Rotary “flame” was launched in December in Chennai, India, to commemorate India becoming polio-free and to promote the need to go the last mile in the battle to eradicate this horrible crippling disease. The torch has made its way through several countries already, and will pass through all three polio endemic countries – Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Nigeria – before arriving at the 2015 Rotary Convention in São Paulo 6-9 June.

I want to share with you just how inspiring it was to be part of the flame’s journey. As an Afghan club, we are so grateful for the energy it has given us as a club to refocus our efforts on polio awareness, working alongside the Rotary Club of Jalalabad.

We are not ignorant of the fact that Afghan organizations, clubs, and society have done a limited amount to raise funds for and truly engage the polio eradication effort. At first, we were …read more

Source:: Rotary International Blog