Stories

Calls from Claus

Club Meeting notes from Tuesday, October 14, 2014. 

Minutes for the Plainview Rotary Club meeting, September 15, 12:00 Noon at the Plainview Civic Center.

Plainview Rotary club minutes for September 2, 2014

Meeting minutes for Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Meeting notes from August 12, 2014 (Program honoring Richard and Carol Sue Purcell)

Weekly Meeting of the  Plainview Rotary Club, Tuesday, July 22, 2014 at the  Plainview Civic Center.

President David recognized the Plainview Rotary Club officers on Tuesday,  June 24, for helping the club earn recognition as District 5730 Club of the Year for 2013-2014. Pictured are front row (l to r) Buddy McGehee, Dorothy Morton, Ron Hanby, Eloise Soliz, Richard Porter, and Carla Edwards, and back row David Kopp, Brandon Ahrens, Ted Baker, Stan Demerritt, Rob Wilkenson, and David Hawkins. 

Lydia Castillo was named Plainview Rotary Club's Rotarian of the year for 2013-2014. Lydia took the lead on many beneficial club projects including student of the month and scholarship awards, Rotary Youth Leadership Award camp, Running Water Draw Arts and Crafts Festival and others. 

Rob Wilkinson have the club an excellent report on the YMCA's important contributions to Plainview. 

Felecia Bowser and Brad Charboneau of the Lubbock NWS.  They gave the Plainview Rotary Club an excellent program about how the recent rains have relieved the drought. 

Rotary President David Kopp (right) presents JB Roberts (left) with a certificate inducting him into the Rotary History and Heritage International Fellowship Hall of Fame.  JB and his wife Ramona have helped compile an extensive collection of artifacts and documents about Rotary's 100 year history in the Texas South Plains and Panhandle. The club also presented JB with a $1000 donation to Hunger Plus. 

Plainview Rotary Club welcomed another new member on June 10. Robert Riojas (leftĺ, himself a recent new member, sponsored Billy Ray Garcia (rightĺ who was inducted today. President David Kopp (center) congratulates both new Rotarians. 

The Plainview Rotary Club was named "Club of the Year" (large clubs) at the Rotary District 5730 Conference held at the Overton Hotel in Lubbock, Texas. Club President David Kopp is congratulated by fellow members of the Plainview Rotary Club (l to r) Coralyn Dillard, Kopp, Michael Graves, Charles Starnes, and Steve Long.

The Plainview High School Navy Junior ROTC Color Guard displayed their skills at the Tuesday meeting of the Plainview Rotary Club. The Color Guard presented the colors while Chuck Starnes led the singing of the "Star Spangled Banner." Scott Franklin was vigorous in his singing. Senior Naval Science Instructor LCDR Dave Sandahl (U.S. Coast Guard, retired) brought (l to r) Cadets Cassandra Contreras, Maritza Arrasco-Buscos, Blanca Garcia, and Able Ceniceros who each explained their duties in the NJROTC Unit. Each demonstrated the value of leadership skills that cadets can gain by participation.

We enjoyed classification talks from three of our newest Rotarians on April 15. Danny Wrenn described the importance of the individual impact a teacher has on their students, Scott Franklin discussed the worldwide impact of Wayland's Virtual Campus, and Emily Bollinger explained and demonstrated the personal impact of music on both performer and audience. Our club is blessed to have these new members who add their skills and passions to those of the membership.

In Tamil Nadu, India, two doctors, both members of the Rotary Club of Srirangam, discovered an alarming trend in the remote city outskirts of Trichy, women dying of breast cancer.

Drs. K. Govindaraj and K.N. Srinivasan knew that much of the death and suffering could be avoided, and both were motivated by their personal experiences with the disease. Govindaraj watched his mother die of breast cancer a decade earlier, and helped found the Dr. K. Shantha Breast Cancer Foundation in her memory.  Srinivasan, an oncologist, witnessed unprecedented growth in the number of younger patients coming to his clinic with advanced stages of the disease.

According to the National Cancer Registry of India, 20 to 40 women per 100,000 are suffering from breast cancer.  And because many women lack the resources to travel to the city, or the$50 fee for proper screening , the doctors needed a unique approach. During a trip to South Korea, Govindaraj saw a large van outfitted with X-ray equipment parked outside a mall, and thought a moving doctor’s office and lab -- or “mammobus” -- could overcome the challenges they faced.

Through a Rotary global grant, the men were able to buy and outfit their own bus. Since April 2012 the Shantha Foundation’s mammobus, supported by local Rotarians and the Rotary Club of Rockville, Maryland, USA, has administered 2,500 free breast cancer screenings. Early stage cancer has been detected and treated in six women, and thousands have been taught how to conduct regular self-exams, an important means of early detection.

“Women have started feeling that they have easy access to health without compromising their day-to-day work and earnings,” Srinivasan says. “Women come out to our health workers with their health-related problems and discuss freely about various aspects of health and diseases, not just about breast cancer.’’

The mammobus cost $34,000 and is equipped with a mammography machine, an ultrasonogram, and materials that teach the method and importance of self-exams. The Shantha Foundation maintains the vehicle and reaches out to nongovernmental organizations, women’s groups, and employers to arrange visits. The bus stops anywhere a large group of women congregate, with priority given to rural areas. The Srirangam club also helps line up visits and widely promotes the bus through various media.

The Plainview Rotary Club made a special presentation to three students at Plainview High School who had amassed a perfect attendance record for the 3rd and 4th six-week periods. Pictured are (l to r) Rotarian Charles Starnes, winners Hagen Kelly and Cassandra Delgado, Rotarian Cynthia Gregory, winner Jasleili Zubia Salgado, and Associate Principal Brandt Reagan. There were 303 eligible students for this award and the three winners were randomly selected for the prize of an iPod Nano.  Mr. Reagan said that attendance this year has been improved from previous years and that the Rotary Club's Perfect Attendance Project had made significant contributions to that effort. Mr. Reagan said that higher state reimbursement from better attendance is important, but that having the students in school is the greatest value of the program. 

When the editors at Reader's Digest made a list of the "50 Surprising Reasons We Love America" for their July 2013 cover story, they placed Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi at No. 50, Bill Gates at No. 25, and at No. 11, sandwiched between sliced bread and tumbleweeds, was Little Free Library, a homespun-tribute-turned-international-phenomenon started by Rotary member Todd Bol.

People in 55 countries have installed more than 16,000 Lilliputian lending libraries, run on the premise of "take a book, return a book," since Bol built his first in 2009 in memory of his mother, a teacher who loved to read. Called an "international movement" by the New York Times and a "global sensation" by the Huffington Post, the libraries have garnered coverage from media outlets including Japanese public television and French and Italian fashion magazines.

Participation is simple: Mount a wooden box (many of them look like birdhouses) on a post in front of your home, workplace, or school. Fill it with books. Delight as neighbors stop by to browse your selections or leave books of their own.

Bibliophiles aren't the only ones willing to trade a patch of lawn for a box of books. Bol, of Hudson, Wisconsin, calls Little Free Library "a new canvas for community groups" – such as artists in New York City, who held a competition to design the boxes; inmates at a Wisconsin prison, who are constructing them as part of vocational training and community service; and corporations, which are building them on service days to give back to their communities. Rotary and Rotaract clubs from the United States to Canada, Mauritius to Ghana, are installing the libraries in their areas too.

About three-quarters of the operators build their own libraries; plans are available on the nonprofit's website, www.littlefreelibrary.org. The rest purchase readymade ones for $175 and up, depending on the model. The proceeds fund the staff, website, and educational outreach, as well as the organization's programs to build more libraries for people in need.

Herminia Amendariz told us all about the Big Brothers Big Sisters program.  Several guests enjoyed the meeting including Plainview's new Chief of Police, Ken Coughlin. 

Ramkumar Raju of India and Winfred Karungi of Uganda have never met, but they have a great deal in common. They're both Rotaract club members and district Rotaract representatives. They're also promising young community leaders who helped plan successful Presidential New Generations Conferences in their countries.

Rotary International President Ron Burton hosted the conferences, which were held in Chennai in October and Kampala in November. (A third conference took place in Rosario, Argentina, in March.) The goal of these international conferences was to bring together young community leaders and Rotary members to share ideas for attracting new members and engaging young people.

Raju, a member of the Madras Central Rotaract club, and Karungi, a member of the Kampala City club, were asked by Rotarians in their areas to be part of the conference planning committee. Both describe the experience as a great learning opportunity. "I learned decision making and communication skills, how to be a team player and handle crucial situations, and last but not least, I learned the power of Rotary," Raju says.

Karungi says she also improved her relationships with Rotary members in her country and learned that "with proper planning, anything can be executed, even a task as great as organizing a conference, a service project, or a dinner for President Burton."

IMPROVING THEIR COMMUNITIES

Each conference included a community service component. Rotaractors in India chose projects that focused on education and disease prevention. They collected thousands of donated books, which will be used to establish libraries in rural areas. They also collected more than 300 units of blood, held a rubella awareness camp hosted by a panel of local doctors, and offered free vaccinations.

In Uganda, Rotaract members also focused their efforts on fighting preventable diseases and promoting child and maternal health. Working alongside community leaders, they organized a hand washing campaign and classes on soap making, distributed mosquito nets to children and expectant mothers, held blood drives, and offered cervical cancer screenings.

"We formed committees to identify a suitable Rotaract community project that President Burton could visit and worked to get at least 1,000 young people to attend the conference. We ended up with almost 3,000 attendees," Karungi says.

Covenant Hospital Plainview leads the area with its hk2020 children's program in creating a healthier next generation. hk2020 was created as a community partnership and initially funded through initiatives of the Saint Joseph Health System. It is a FREEprogram with monthly healthy family activities and motivational tools to encourage families to lead healthier lives – body, mind, and spirit.

Signing your family up for hk2020 is easy! Download the hk2020 registration form and return to the hk2020 office any Tuesday between 4pm and 6pm and get your family on the right track to healthy living!

Keep up-to-date with all hk2020 activities through the program blog atblog.myplainview.com/hk2020.

Hk2020 Headquarters

Covenant Hospital Plainview 
Coralyn Dillard 
Room 409 
806-296-4256 
cdillard@covplv.org

In her new album, “Eve,” Grammy award winner Angélique Kidjo honors the women in Africa, and pays tribute to Rotary’s work to end polio worldwide.

The singer and activist from Benin chose to include Rotary in the soon-to-be-released video of the album’s signature song, “Eva.” Rotary’s presence in the video is no coincidence. The relationship between the singer dates back to 2011, when she joined about two dozen celebrities, including Jackie Chan, Jack Nicklaus, and Jane Goodall, in Rotary’s “This Close” polio awareness campaign.

“I am the cherry on top of the cake,” says Kidjo in an exclusive interview with Rotary News. “The important work is done by the people in the field.” With the voices of Kidjo and collaborator Nigerian signer Asa as a backdrop, the video shadows a young girl as she wanders about in an old novelty shop. The curious girl turns on an old TV and sees the singers on-screen, followed by footage of a Rotary Family Health Day project in South Africa.

She finds old photos and album covers of Kidjo and Asa and later, photos of polio survivors and polio immunization activities. The girl also finds a polio vaccine cooler used in immunization campaigns, and focuses on an "End Polio Now pin. 

In addition to Rotary’s prominent role in the video, Kidjo has lent her voice to the “This Close” campaign, and authored a 2011 World Polio Day op-ed and also attended a ceremony that illuminated the “End Polio Now” message on the New York Stock Exchange Building. She was also the keynote speaker at the 2012 Rotary World Peace Symposium and Rotary International Convention in Bangkok.

“It’s great for Rotary to have Angélique Kidjo as such an engaged supporter of polio eradication,” says Petina Dixon-Jenkins, Rotary’s PolioPlus communication manager. “When she talks about helping others -- particularly girls and women in Africa -- it’s clear that everything comes from the heart.”

Rotarians needed help with a meeting location on short notice and the fine folks at the Texas Woodfire Grill not only accommodated, but hosted us with a terrific meal and great service. The meeting had great attendance with a few special student guests...

Rotarians had a lot to brag about and contributed to the Rotary Foundation!

Mary Jane Buerkle, from the Plains Cotton Growers, Inc., Gave us some insights into the new Farm Bill.

No polio vaccinator had ever set foot in Killi Baksho, near Pakistan's rugged northwest border with Afghanistan. Most people there have long opposed immunization, believing the polio vaccine causes infertility or AIDS.

The combination of that public mistrust and intimidation from militant groups has been nothing short of deadly. In 2013, 20 polio vaccinators and nine police officers assigned to guard them were killed in Pakistan. With that memory fresh in their minds, a team from a Rotary-supported polio resource center went to the village to promote acceptance of the vaccine. They expected an uphill, potentially life-threatening battle

It took the team a month just to persuade village elders and religious leaders to meet with them. But their persistence paid off. Immunizations were allowed to begin.

read more on www.Rotary.org

 Lynette Bowen teaches us how to do environmentally beneficial "Lasagna Gardening" at today's Rotary Club.

Lydia Castillo introducing her guest, Our February Student of the Month.

If you look close, you'll understand why we couldn't hear President Dave Kopp very well.

Gabrielle Chargy, our Club's Exchange student from France, travelled to Carlsbad New Mexico and visit the Caverns. Everyone made it back safely. Enjoy the video and wait for the surprise ending. 

Gabrielle has completed a full week of school, and is glad to say that it will be O.K. for her. The classes will be challenging, but not impossible, the teachers have high expectations, but are accessible and friendly, and there are students in each of her classes that have taken care to help her in whatever way that she needs. I think she already knows more people in Plainview than I do!

Gabrielle has hung out at the Brew with some of the First Pres Youth Group, attended a birthday party of a cousin of a friend of a sister of a somebody, I don’t know, it was too complicated for me to keep track. She has gone shopping with some friends, and spent Saturday over at Ransom Canyon with the Holloway family.

She also took in her first American Football game on Friday night. At first she didn’t know any of the rules, but after the first quarter, she had a pretty firm grip on how the game worked, especially fourth down situations, and could, with a fair amount of accuracy, predict the decisions the coach was going to make. She, along with the rest of the crowd, felt like the team was robbed at the end of the first half with that terrible call allowing for a last second (?) field goal by Randall.  She also enjoyed the band during halftime.

Next week she will be going down to Lubbock to see a Texas Tech game, and will meet up with some of the other exchange students from around the area. She is looking forward to that.

The Plainview Rotary Club's Student of the Month for September is Monique Lucio. She is the daughter of Maricella and Pete Rojas, and is the oldest of ten in her house and twelve total. She is a member of DECA, TAFE, FCCLA, and Hale County Junior Literacy Council.

She enjoys reading, playing her piano, traveling, New Life's GYSM, and most of all summer mission trips to Kenya with Dr. Richard William Shaw's WBU mission teams. Monique plans to get a bachelors degree in biology at Oklahoma Baptist University, attend medical school at Washington University in St. Louis, complete her residency, become a general surgeon and open up schools, hospitals, orphanages and churches in Africa and other third world countries. 

Includes the Texas welcome to Foreign Exchange Student

Matthews begins term as first woman vice president

Monthly Address from Rotary International President

Biographical Information about District 5730 Governor, Ken Patterson

Fellow Rotarians:

Program: Jill Harrell (Camp Ryla); Elliot Benge (Ambassadorial Scholar, Salamanca, Spain)