Gallipolitan
President Deb Rhodes presided over the regular meeting of the Gallipolis Rotary Club, and thanked VP Bonnie for subbing last week. Attendance was down a bit today. It was great to see Marlin Rose and Clyde Evans with us again! Marlin turned in a Rotary coin box today for the Foundation. It was heavy, but not heavy enough to beat Bonnie’s record!
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‘Who Would Have Thought’ Department–President Deb reported that the past year’s sale of Ohio license plates with the Rotary emblem have brought a total of $2,010 to the Rotary Foundation! That’s amazing. I’ve seen them around Columbus, but not down here. What say we get a few Rotary emblems here too!
Literacy Project Update–President Deb showed off the labels we’re going to be using soon for this year’s dictionary distribution to Gallia County 5th Graders. The label bears this year’s Rotary theme and the 4-Way Test. Deb also showed off the labels for the books that will be donated to the elementary schools in honor of our speakers who address the club this Rotary year. This is partially funded by a District 6690 Simplified Grant. The Speaker will also receive a nice certificate for the occasion similar to the one we presented to District Governor Tom Kokensparger.
Split-The-Pot–Dan Whiteley ran STP for the meeting and raised a small pot of $7 bucks or so so. Dan had Clyde Evans draw the winning ticket which was held by Matt Willis! Matt carefully drew a card for the large of $7 (since Paul drew the Queen last week and took all our money!) and came up with the 3 of clubs. Matt assessed the Foundation Fine against anyone who ‘doesn’t have a daughter starting her senior year in college today!’
Fellowship–Lou Ellen Werry ran club fellowship for the meeting and talked about some Olympic news. How about that Jamaican sprinter, ‘Lightning Bolt’? Other interesting oddities that have occurred this Olympics included the Thai woman weightlifter who took the gold, and the Tunisian swimmer. These were amazing performances. On this day in history in 1909, Lou Ellen mentioned the Indianapolis speedway held its first auto race showcasing breakneck speeds of 57.4 MPH!
Happy Buck$–Matt Willis paid a buck to announce his mother will be having a book signing at the Bossard Library this Sunday, 24th. Mel Simon offered a buck to brag on our club and read DG Tom’s letter of thanks for his recent visit. John Ellison bought two Happy Buck$–one for Tammi who is starting at the Holzer Center for Cancer Care, and the other for his daughter, who is soon to graduate from THE Ohio State University in Anthropology. Congratulations, one and all!
Program–President Deb introduced John Ellison, this year’s Membership Chair, to speak to the club about membership and recruitment. John reminded everyone that August is Rotary Membership Month and that membership recruitment show also be on everyone’s mind. Membership retention is also extremely important because we work hard to bring in new members and we don’t want to lose them off the ‘back end.’ John described the process as a formula–E=3R — Extend the club by Recruit, Retain, and Revitalize.
Our club is going to take a careful look into the way we take care of our members and establish a good retention model for the club. John emphasized we need to analyze where we are and closely follow our members through the Red Badge process and beyond. We also need to take a close look how we recruit and introduce Rotary to prospective members.
Every Rotarian is on the ‘Membership Committee’ and we should all have some Rotary materials at hand. John promoted a number of resources through Rotary International–”How to Propose A New Member”, ABC’s of Rotary, as well as our own club brochure. RI has some great resources on their web site and many younger candidates appreciate the opportunity to look through the dynamic programs shown on the web that make Rotary unique. Most of us can become reinvigorated just by visiting Rotary.org and taking the time to look through the many pages. One of the great PR pieces is Rotary’s ‘Humanity In Motion” series of PSA spots.
At the conclusion of his talk, President Deb asked John to sign a book label for the first elementary school donation to one of our school’s libraries. John, thank you very much for emphasizing the importance of membership recruitment and retention!