Early Riser Newsletter (Mar 22, 2019)

Gary Miller
(If you have any comments or questions, please contact the editor)

Aug 09, 2019

Club Forum

Aug 16, 2019

Jolly Lux

Guiding Light

Aug 23, 2019

Chris Allen

iDevice

Aug 30, 2019

Linda McGurn of The Good Shepard Foundation

Haitian Water Project

Sep 06, 2019

Tom Voorhees

Amber Alert

Sep 13, 2019

Lisa Gray

A Promise to Jordan

View entire list

President

Heather Pantano

President Elect

Alicia Canning

Immediate Past President

Michael Mezheritskiy

Treasurer

Gary Hyde

Secretary

Chris Lamadrid

Sergeant-at-Arms

Katelyn Kaplan

Foundation Chair

Joanne Santiago

Membership

Jim Gordon

Board Member-at-Large

Dale Bronson

Board Member-at-Large

Sue Budde

Asst Treasurer

Paul Cioffari

Interact Chair

Alicia Canning

Rotary of Avon-Canton - Founded 1973

Service above Self

We meet Fridays at 7:30 AM

Avon Old Farms Hotel

279 Avon Mountain Rd.
Avon, CT 06001
United States of America

District Site

Venue Map

Upcoming Meeting Speaker

Kim Morrison

BeanZ & Company Cafe

Sergeant-at-Arms Report

March 15, 2019
Members Present: 41
Make-Ups: None
Guests: Elaine Chagnon (Speaker), Bruce Deckert (Prospective Member)
Visiting Rotarians: Prasad Menon (Simsbury-Granby), Mark Brady DGE (Simsbury-Granby), Shean Layton (Bristol)
Happy Dollars: $37.00
Raffle Winner: None

Birthdays

Margaret Shea-McCarthy was happy to be back from Florida, sporting a dark tan.

Sean Blacker was very happy and reminded us that he has spent more than half his life with our club.

Happy Dollars

Margaret Shea-McCarthy was happy to be celebrating her birthday with friends.

Carrie Firestone said that she had attended the Opioid Task Force meeting last night. She had learned three preventative steps: (1) Educate yourself about your medicine cabinet. What's in there and do you still need it? (2) Get one of the chemical deactivation bags that completely neutralizes drugs. The sealed bag can be put in your household trash. (3) Keep Narcan handy. Carrie announced that April 27th will be National Return your Prescriptions Day. Gary Miller offered her the chance to present the Taskforce at the Canton Chamber's Volunteer Fair on April 27th.

Debbie Stanwood was happy to be back at a meeting wearing normal shoes after two foot surguries. She had just returned from two weeks in New Orleans visiting her grandson.

Prasad Menon was happy to be back enjoying breakfast with our club.

Paul Mikkelson reminded us about the Yard Goats night with Favarh on May 16th. Anyone wanting to attend needs to contact Paul. He also had been bicycling in Florida and took the opportunity to visit with Nancy Nation.

District Governor Elect Mark Brady was visiting with Prasad Menon in order to have a discussion with Jolly Lux after the meeting.

Heather Pantano returned from PETS (President-Elect Training Seminar) still sticky from the Rotary lemonade bath. She is very happy to be moving up to President in July. She and her family are headed off to the Bahamas on vacation.

Jolly Lux had an amazing trip to Uganda. She went with the goal of training 10 young women and ended up reaching out to nearly 1000. The women were instructed on personal hygiene and other health issues. They are learning how to make liquid soap and sew bags and personal hygiene items.

Josh Gillooly enjoyed Rotary Pub Night on Wednesday. Today is his wife, Lynn's birthday. TOTV plans are moving along. 12 restaurants and 5 alcohol vendors have committed. The push now is to reach the goal of 300 tickets sold.

Alicia Canning reported that her daughter had great news from her daughter's surgery. All her tissue samples were good and she was healing fast. Alicia thanked Colleen Grasso for all the great meals.

Announcements

President Mike Mezheritskiy reminded everyone that next week's meeting will be at BeanZ & Company.

Rotary Foundation chairman, Joanne Santiago, seeks nominees for our annual Community Paul Harris Fellow recognition. Please contact Joanne or any of the Rotary Foundation Committee members with your suggestions. We typically honor 2-3 citizens each from Avon and from Canton.

Gary Miller is seeks a few members to purchase Rotary website ads, at the excellent price of $100/yr. This funding supports our use of ClubRunner software and our website subscription. The ads cycle every few seconds at the upper left-hand corner of the website and are a good way to promote member businesses. Contact Gary if interested.

Calendar of Upcoming Events

March 22th: Club meeting at BEANZ - behind New England Pasta on Rt. 44 in Avon.

March 30th: Tastes of the Valley will be held Saturday, March 30 at 6 PM.

May 3rd & 4th: The Rotary District 7890 District Conference will be held May 3rd to 4th at the Doubletree Hilton Hotel in Danvers, MA. Five districts including 7890 will be represented. The event starts with the Rotary Foundation luncheon on Friday. For a full schedule and registration information follow this link: District Conference Registration

May 16th: Rotary Night at Hartford Yard Goats, Thursday May 16; Game time 7:05 PM. Contact Paul Mikkelson for details.

Induction of New Members

None today

Community Service Grants

Prasad Menon was introduced by Community Service Chair Gary Roman to receive a check for $1000 toward the Hartford Youth Scholars program. Prasad said you may or may not know about Hartford Youth Scholars Program. It is one of the most successful programs that is helping selected students from Hartford Schools to succeed in life by providing support at all levels up to college graduation.

Prasad was thankful for our Club's help to reach the $6000 goal with partnership from Hartford, West Hartford and Simsbury-Granby Rotary Clubs. West Hartford, Hartford and Simsbury-Granby Rotary Clubs have also committed to support this project to buy iPads for all 30 student scholars chosen.

HARTFORD YOUTH SCHOLARS

EDUCATION CHANGES EVERYTHING

An education starts in school, but it never stops impacting so many other facets of life afterward, from families to careers and communities. This is why the Hartford Youth Scholars (HYS) is committed to ensuring that deserving students from Hartford succeed in high school and college — so they can achieve even more in the neighborhoods they return to in the years that follow.

With an intensive, 10-year support system for both students and families, and an exceptional academic enrichment program, the acclaimed Steppingstone Academy Hartford, HYS prepares highly motivated middle school students for a rigorous high school education; assists them in gaining acceptance and financial assistance at top college preparatory schools; and supports them through the college application process, college experience, and beyond.

Our goal? Help Hartford’s underserved children realize their true, powerful potential so they can then help their communities and their city do the same.

Why? Because, Education Changes Everything.

Presentation

Elaine Chagnon

"Africa Education Project"

Craig Buhrendorf welcome Elaine Chagnon back to provide another update on the Africa Education Partnership. Elaine is heading off on her 10th trip to Nigeria in May. She has spoken to us before regarding the Graceland hospital and school. The hospital adjacent to the school is now complete. Both the hospital and the school were dedicated in October. Future plans include dormitories for male and female students. The school building houses a computer lab on the first floor and a large examination room on the second. A $1000 grant provided to her on her last visit was used for the computer lab.

On her last visit to Nigeria, Elaine viewed 3 school projects that are progressing slowly. Each of the schools are in remote areas miles outside of the villages served. The schools have no electricity, plumbing or water. The school buildings have no supplies--only teachers armed with a piece of chalk and no other teaching materials. Elaine said that the school buildings are so deteriorated that they are literally failing down around the students. Renovating the schools is extremely slow because water needs to be carried to the site to make cement. All the school sites desperately need wells which cost about $1500 and need to go down 50-60 meters to reach water. Learn more about these projects at: African Education Projects

Carrie Firestone asked whether their website had the ability for private donations. Elaine said that the site has a donation page. (The page features a picture from Elaine's last visit when she received our grant.) Carrie spontaneously stood to say that she would commit $1000 toward a well. Mark Brady DGE then rose to offer a $100 challenge to completely fund a well. By the end of the meeting members had donated $1500. We brought Elaine to tears with our generosity.

Craig that an application has been submitted to the International Service Committee for well funding.

Mail Bag

No mail this week.

Photo Credits

Photographs courtesy of Phil Worley unless otherwise noted.

Editor's Notes

Submission Deadline: Members are kindly encouraged to submit all materials for each week's Early Riser as early as possible. Please note that some editions may be published and distributed as early as the Saturday following our meetings, and during those weeks further contributions to the Early Riser will be included in the subsequent week's edition.

“The FOUR-WAY TEST of the things we think, say or do”:

1. Is it the TRUTH?
2. Is it FAIR to all Concerned?
3. Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
4. Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?