Programme Week Commencing 16th February 2012

Do you remember what influenced you when you were younger? Who in history left an impression on your life or influenced some of the things you belong to today? When Paul Harris, a Lawyer in Chicago, started the first Rotary Club on the 23rd February 1905, he wasn’t to know that in 2012 there would be 1.2 million members who had followed in his footsteps, but he had a good idea and took action to make it happen. We wonder what were the influences that made Paul Harris form a business Club, what was the opposition to his idea, the people who thought this was madness? To read more about Paul Harris and how he founded Rotary please visit Rotary International.

If you have visited our Induction pages on the District 1100 eClub website, there is a video where Paul Harris explains to non-Rotarians what Rotary is all about. Our challenge on Rotary Day is to mention to one person (a friend, work colleague, customer) ‘Rotary’, what it is and does, and why you’ve become a member of the District 1100 eClub. Just this small act will help more people become aware of Rotary International and what it is achieving in local communities and around the world. Preparation for doing this will be vital, so reading information on our eClub Website, RIBI Website and Rotary International’s Website would be a good plan of action – so in 5 minutes can you help to influence someone’s view of Rotary?

During the 23rd February Rotarians have also been asked to promote Rotary by Social Media e.g. Twitter, Linked In or Facebook.  If you see posts or tweets please share with your friends, again this is about awareness raising, so that when someone is asked to become a member of Rotary International, they will be aware of what Rotary is, what it stands for and what it is doing in carrying out its motto Service Above Self.

So back to building Rome or the District 1100 eClub, it has been very encouraging to see over the past week everyone engaging in the website and some discussion about our Charter event, whilst others have attended Zone meetings.  As Conrad suggests in his comments we are starting to put the building blocks in place and things are steadily moving forward. One exceptional occurrence last week was President Tim’s presentation at the District 1140 Council meeting on how to get an eClub up and running, plus the sharing of this information on our new web page eClub Toolkit (our learning curve). The visits to this page have been fantastic, we are pleased we can help others who are thinking about membership recruitment and the establishment of eClubs in the UK and Internationally.

Finally, how are you helping to get your Forums operating? It is good to see there is some discussion in the Public Relations Forum, we need to follow in Paul Harris’s steps, let us try out some of these good ideas. In the Foundation Forum we are asking members to become the eClub Champions for one aspect of the Rotary Foundation Programme, so they can help other members learn about the exciting programmes delivered all around the globe, plus we need to consider how we might contribute. The Service Projects Team is starting to consider our contribution to the Festival of Rotary on the 22nd April in Bristol, Virtual Pet Shows, Dancing and how to use facebook, sounds really exciting and different. The Club Administration Forum is looking into creating our Charity Account, establishing an eClub Directory and our input into the District Directory. Our Club Membership Forum is awaiting the return of Shelley from her visit to India, in fact we all await this to hear her experiences and engagement with the Rotary Club of Bangalore. Yes we are moving forward and continuing to build our eClub, we welcome Karen Stephenson as a provisional member and are excited that there are others considering joining us.  We celebrate Rotary International on the 23rd February, by continuing to be active in our new Rotarian roles.