Remarks by Out-going President Bill Applegate on the past year of Rotary
(This is the text of his talk and
during the luncheon
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At my installation last July 1st, I mentioned that I didn’t want to dictate what we as a club should do. Instead, I said it should be a bottoms-up approach, and it should only be about the Club. So, this was not MY year as President, this was your year as Club Members. And with that I am going to rattle off several accomplishments that you made.
Liz Messier kicked off our year with a Rotary After Dark event at her home. It was great food and drink, and she has a great space to do it again?
School Supplies for Harry Kizirian School – Mary and Rob Brewster led the charge and want to do it again. Our members donated for the supplies and Bob Morse supplemented the effort before he died.
An RIFC Evening for Rotarians provided funds to help get students from San Miguel to attend the game – Emily Bernstein coordinated that.
Legends for Literacy Gala – Pete Brock and Susan Kearney co-chaired again last year.
The Gala raised over $101,000 with $66,000 coming from sponsorship prodded in by Don Saracen, $17,500 from the countdown, $13,750 from our live auction, and $2,100 from the new option of a wine pull promoted by Bill Efthimiades. After expenses and 50% of the appeal going to classroom books, we contributed roughly $46,000 to the Childhood Literacy Initiative.
This year’s committee is well on its way to another successful gala on October 29th. They are the second largest committee in the club and are welcoming members to join.
San Miguel Luncheon – Anthony Landi coordinated with the school and provided us with another enriching experience with the men of San Miguel. Several Members of our group are mentors to this 5th to 8th grade students (and it is a four-year commitment). Thank you to the Rotarians who have mentored students at San Miguel and thank you Anthony for another great day with San Miguel.
Coat Drive – Pete Brock enlisted Ocean State Job Lot to donate along with our fellow Rotarians clothing for those in need, which Anthony Landi helped distribute.
Members got out and supported the Salvation Army with Bell Ringing.
Mike and Kathy Kelly hosted a Christmas Party again, with more to come, I hear.
We held our Second Annual Valentine’s Day cards to the VA Hospital patients – thank you Holly and Jane for coordinating.
Tent Suppers for Nepal – Mary Brewster coordinated and Rotarians pitched in to host dinners at their homes. Also, we put up a store to support “Her Future Coalition” on the website. (it is still active in the menu bar of the website.)
Robin Singer, who spoke at a meeting this past year, sent a thank you note indicating:
A Nepal Scholarship donation of $2900 was sent by your foundation (proceeds from the dinner parties) and was received at Her Future Coalition. It will be designated for post tenth grade educational support for hostel girls in Nuwakot, Nepal.
A big THANK YOU for the life-changing help which will allow these wonderful girls to seek opportunities rarely available to girls from this at-risk area. As you know, this is an epicenter of child marriage and human trafficking and having the funds to make use of the educational help we have been providing for five years will help the current cadre of girls pursue careers in teaching, animal care, and hotel management. This is a huge improvement over subsistence agriculture and exploitation!
Your example is also excellent for our club. Next year is our club's 100th anniversary and we won't be able to do our usual one night fundraising event (because the 100th anniversary gala will take up that spot). Instead, we plan to do a distributed event of dinner parties - copying your model - to raise funds for the next cohort of girls who pass the tenth grade exams.
Thanks for leading the way and for working alongside us when we brought solar up there to enable uninterrupted zoom classes, and now to help the girls use their education for sustainable careers.
Rotary partnerships are really powerful.
Fond regards,
Robin Singer
Rotary Club of Falmouth
Membership committee hosted two new member events (one at my home and one at India Restaurant) and manned the first of two Rotary awareness events at the Providence Farmer’s Market at Lippett Park in Providence. Thank you, Anthony Hollingshead, for leading the huge effort. You will see his results committee’s at the end of this ramble.
Environmental Committee got restarted and helped with planting at Station Meadow, thank you Tracy Boothman for pushing that rope up a hill.
I was particularly proud of the response from our club to join the district awareness and training events. It made us a shining star with our neighboring clubs.
Literacy Committee
Another very active and productive year for our Literacy Initiative funded by the Gala of 2024.
With George Babcock’s death, and the request of his wife, we have renamed the initiative The George W. Babcock Literacy Initiative. He was the Rotarian whose imagination and leadership transformed a modest series of service projects at one school into a club-wide literacy support program in partnership with two schools right now.
This year they continued several popular annual activities and initiated two pilot efforts. Continuing activities included:
Purchasing multiple copies of books written and/or illustrated by Rhode Island based authors and illustrators for placement in classroom libraries at both Kizirian and West schools
Purchasing hundreds of books for the vending machines at both schools. Students who achieve literacy-related goals receive tokens they can use to select books from the machines and take home.
And mini-grants requested by teachers for literacy-related activities.
The pilot programs conducted this year were:
Tutoring at Kizirian school in partnership with the Lifelong Learning Collaborative
An initiative to promote family involvement in students' literacy learning at West, in partnership with the nonprofit group Books Are Wings.
The committee is evaluating the results to determine the success.
But one of this year's true highlights has been the deepening of relationships between multiple members of the literacy committee and leaders at both schools. Planning for next year has involved a series of meetings featuring open exchanges between Rotarians and administrators and literacy coaches.
Everyone on that committee should be proud of your work. This is by far our biggest initiative and the committee includes Art Norwalk, Jane Berkowitz, Michaela Hermann, Matt Schmitz, Sharon Garland, Pete Brock, Mary Cullen, Mary Brewster, Rob Brewster, Tracy Boothman, Craig Creller, Carina Pinto de Chacon, Cristina Innarino, Heide Abelli, Victor Pricolo, Charles Donnelly, and the current president (ex-officio).
This last week we received a Thank You note from the principal, assistant principal, literacy coach and literacy interventionist at George J. West School that stated:
"Your partnership makes a meaningful difference in the lives of our students. Thank you for believing in our school, investing in our future, and showing our children the power of service, generosity, and community involvement."
And a big thank you to the Providence Rotary Charities Foundation for distributing funds to 24 deserving organizations. And this year they initiated an Annual Margaret Kane Award to an organization that best exemplifies her life. They had two winners this year. And if you read my last newsletter bulletin, you will remember that I thanked the committee and listed the organizations.
We did have Sad news in losing three active members - Bob Morse, Richard Leone and George Babcock; and one honorary member - Nondas Voll.
The Positive news in from the membership committee was inducting eighteen new members
Bill Monahan
Fatima Rodrigues
Bill Efthimiades
Gregory Bowman
Larry Setty
Yani Hernandez
John Adams
Jeff Binczyk
Michael Geoghegan
Claude Leboeuf
Victor Pricolo
Heide Abelli
Tracy Boothman
Carina Pinto de Chacon
Craig Creller
Charles Donnelly
Matt Schmitz, and
Tom May
Finally. A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that I got an email from David Hirsh of The Rotary Club of Chicago, that is, Rotary Club # One. He invited us to visit with him on his tour of the fifty states, and he was going to be at Bitty and Beau’s on North Main Street in Providence. (BTW, great Bagel and coffee served by people with special needs and disabilities). I went on the morning he was in town and met with a small group. He gave me a gift of his book about Dads Raising Children with Special needs and disAbilities.
BUT, Has anyone here ever heard of a challenge coin? He gave me one, which I will keep on me. It is pretty special.
According to legend, a WWI army Lieutenant gave everyone in his unit a memento to remind them of their service.
(At this point Bill presented a challenge coin momento to each attendee.)
I felt this would be fitting for everyone in this room to get a memento from me to remind you of your service to this club. My challenge coin has on one side the start of Rotary International on February 23, 1905, with an embossed Paul Harris, and on the other side it lists The Four-Way Test of the Things We Think, Say or Do.
This way, I hope you will never forget them.
BUT, also with a challenge coin, if you cannot produce it when asked – you owe me a drink of my liking at the time. So, keep it on your person and hopefully, you will always remember the service that you have done this year.
So, go to the tails side of the coin and you can end this meeting by helping me recite the things we think, say, or do:
Is it the TRUTH?
Is it FAIR to all concerned?
Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?
Thank you and see you next week for the installation of our 116th President.
