Membership

Visitors this week included:

• Kaden Webber – Jason’s son
• Milee Hicks – Crystal’s daughter

Announcements

Please remember to reach out to our fellow club member, John Thompson. Unfortunately, his Parkinson's Disease makes it very difficult for him to get to Rotary Meetings anymore. He has asked that we call to talk and come by to see him if possible. His home phone number is (865) 463-8956 and cell is (865) 292-3021. His address 736 Blockhouse Valley Rd., Clinton, TN 37716. This is in South Clinton. Please give him a call when you get the chance.

Our 4th Annual Thanksgiving Breakfast with Hallerin Hilton Hill has been scheduled for November 26th at 8:00 am. Our goal is to have 100 people in attendance this year. Please invite people to come and help get the word out. If you or your business would like to sponsor the event, it is $125. Please let Ronnie know at your earliest convenience so that we can have your name put on the banner.

The Clinton Rotary Club will be a sponsor of the Clinton 5k this year on October 19, 2019. We’re delighted to take part in the race, as it is a big fundraiser for the Education Foundation, which helps our area schools. They have graciously provided us with two free entries as part of our sponsorship. If you are interested in running the race and would like one of the entries, please reach out to Ron as soon as possible. The free entry codes will expire on October 12th. Additionally, as a sponsor, we’re invited to set up a complimentary booth space at the Start/Finish line staging area if anyone would like to work a table on behalf of the club. We would have a 10’x10’ area for our booth space and would need to supply our own canopy, tent, tables, chairs, etc. If you are interested in participating in any way, please see Ron.

Upcoming Speakers

October 15

Jennifer LaRue – Rotary Foundation

October 22

Jerry Mustin – Over Mountain Trail Association

October 29

Natalie Ivey – Director of Advocacy for Human Trafficking

November 5

Scott Turnbow – TVA’s Ongoing Work at Bull Run Steam Plant

Rotary Club Officers

Ron Eslinger
President and Website Administrator
Jay Birkbeck
President – Elect, Youth Exchange Program Coordinator and CHS Interact Advisor
Vicki Violette
Past President
Jerry Schlandt
Secretary
Mike Shrader
Treasurer
Ronnie Fox
Speaker Coordinator
Gary Coleman
Foundation Chair
Tom Connolly
Youth Service Chair
ET Stamey
Membership Director
Bear Stephenson
Membership Director
Leighann Green
Public Relations Director
Bill Gallaher
Social Committee Coordinator

Club Support Officers

Trey McAdams
CHS Interact Advisor
Regina Copeland
ACHS Interact Advisor
Don Whitaker
Service Projects Chair

District News

October 24th is World Polio Day. Many clubs around the world hold special events to commemorate this day. At the district level we will once again run the Purple Pinkie Donut Project. Order forms will be out soon so you can pre-order boxes of donuts. Each box has 10 donuts and costs $20. On the form will be a place for your name and Rotary Club so that you will receive Paul Harris credit for your donation to PolioPlus. Pre-ordering is important so that Dunkin’ knows how many donuts to bake. Last year 366 boxes were order and another 2,533 donuts were purchased with walk-up business.

Once again, the Rotary Regional Golf Classic tournament will be held in the Spring. We will need four players again to represent our club. Be looking for more information on this coming soon. If you are interested in playing, please see Ron.

Our 2019-2020 District Governor, Greg Maciolek was with us last week and outlined his goals for the upcoming year. Please review these below and consider ways that you and/or our club may be able to contribute.

2019-2020 Rotary Goals –

1. Membership – Greg’s benchmark membership goal this year is to increase membership by 128 members. However, he has set a highly ambitious goal of 192 new member additions, which equates to an additional 3 new members per club. He believes the key to increasing membership is to engage and educate new members. When people are engaged, they are more likely to stay.

2. Club Annual Reports – He would like every club to calculate the time, talent and treasure that its members give to the club. Combined with the monetary donations the club gives, this should give a complete picture of the impact that the Rotary Clubs have on their community. This report should then be made accessible to everyone so that the general public can gain awareness of how much the Rotary Club is actually doing to help their respective communities.

3. Third Grade Reading Levels – Greg would like to focus efforts on increasing Third Grade reading level percentages within our District. Up until the Third Grade, a student learns to read. But after the Third Grade, a student reads to learn. If a student is not a proficient reader by this time, then there’s only a 10% chance they will ever learn to read well. This is also what they base prison projections on! He believes that utilizing Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs may be a way to intervene for these children. Many of them can’t possibly succeed in school because it’s not a high priority to them when they are worried about not getting enough food to eat, having a place to stay or feeling safe. He wants to start focusing on meeting the kids’ basic needs first and attempting this well before the Third Grade. He suggested a few ideas including the establishment of reading and mentoring programs, as opposed to or in addition to, our Third Grade Dictionary Project. While it’s a great thing that we do, he is more interested in getting to the root of the problem and intervening early on. He referenced a great Ted Talk on ACES for those that might be interested https://www.ted.com/talks/nadine_burke_harris_how_childhood_trauma_affects_health_across_a_lifetime?language=en

4. Establish a $250 Club – He challenged each member to give $200 to the Annual Fund and $50 to Polio Plus this year. He would love to see our District make a bigger impact this year and help more people!

5. Clean up DACdb & Rotary Club Central – Greg asked each club to utilize the Rotary database system. This would first require cleaning up our members on the books and adding more information about each one such as birthdates, photos, classifications, and current contact information. The system can also be used to publish a Member Directory too.

6. Bomar Foundation – Greg is looking for at least 10 clubs to step up and donate $500 each to the Bomar Foundation.

7. Public Image – Lastly, he would like to see club websites and social media channels consistently updated to create a strong presence within the area. There shouldn’t be people that live in our town that have never heard of Rotary. There’s a great video that the Cookeville Club has to help raise awareness that we could use as well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Rc2iBzTHwY&feature=youtu.be