HISTORICAL
SUMMARY OF ROTARY YEAR 2000-2001 AS SUBMITTED TO DISTRICT
5840 FOR BEST IN DISTRICT COMPETITION
This
report was compiled and submitted by Roy Huff to the District.
Our
Club was selected as the best Rotary Club in our district
in this competition. The following is an extract
of the document submitted for judging by the District Committee.
Club
Service
Public
Relations: We have received publicity for our meetings and
club activities in the Express-News, with numerous pictures
having been published. We have also had coverage in
the Scene magazine. We are working on a joint project
with the local Red Cross chapter to publicize its Adopt A
Shelter program.
One
of our members conceived the idea of and is organizing the
effort for funding for and construction of a float for the
two surface-level parades in this year‚s San Antonio
Fiesta. That float will represent all Rotary clubs,
not just ours.
New
Member Orientation: Chair Alan Johnston has for two years
vigorously continued a one-on-one prospective member orientation
program, started in the early eighties, giving the prospective
member such items as the attendance requirements, history,
Rotary Foundation information, classification system, Rotary
history, motto and Four Way Test, organization, etc. This
is followed up by a biannual Fireside Chat with the officers
and the new members to ensure that what was presented earlier
has not been lost.
Club
Assemblies: We have them at a minimum twice a year. They
are utilized most notably to report on and make final preparations
for, and later on to provide results of, our annual fund
raiser, Alamo Heights Night. We also schedule one for
the District Governor’s annual visit
Other
Club Service Lane activities: We have a Tree Committee
which calls each member in case of any important matter that
arises and must be acted on before the next regular meeting. Unfortunately,
Rotarian or spouse death and funeral information has been
the primary information passed on this way, but this committee
also disseminates meeting changes.
We
also have an off-site meeting program, in which we meet at
an interesting location for lunch and a tour. The most
recent such event was at the Witte Museum, on February 27,
2001.
Community
Service
We
sponsored four students at the January, 2001 RYLA Conference.
Interact
Club: The faculty sponsors of the Alamo Heights High School
club are honorary members of our club. The student
officers annually attend one of our meetings to introduce
themselves and to describe what they have done and are going
to do.
Among
their activities were:
Assisted
with the Alamo Heights Rotary operation of a Red Cross shelter
at their high school during the Hurricane Brett evacuation.
Sponsored
the school’s Howdy Night as a first annual fund raiser
Assisted
the Habitat for Humanity, Children’s Shelter, and a
local Christmas gift program for needy children known as
Elf Louise
Assisted
the Animal Defense League
Sponsored
and manned a booth at our club‚s annual Alamo Heights
Night fund-raiser
Our
Rotary Club is actively exploring the possibility of sponsoring
an Interact Club at MacArthur High School.
Rotaract
Club: Our Club is currently working with a student
at the University of Texas at San Antonio who with about
15 other students is starting a Rotaract Club.
Our
Club has been a long-time sponsor of a Rotaract Club at the
University of the Incarnate Word, but the group there is
not currently active.
Sponsorship
of Youth Activities (Little League, Scouts, etc.): Financial
support is being and has been for some years provided to
the Alamo Heights Little League. The Alamo Council,
Boy Scouts of America, is also an annual recipient of funds
from our Club.
One
of our members is Scoutmaster of Boy Scout Troop 59. We
are annual donors to, and have members on the boards of,
Big Brothers/Big Sisters, Any Baby Can, and Youth for Christ. One
of our members is the founder of the local Fellowship of
Christian Athletes and is currently on its board. Another
is the Director of the Youth for Christ here.
Literacy
projects: Our Literacy committee gathers book donations from
club members and other sources, which are donated to school
classrooms. Our weekly speaker recognition includes
a book donated to an area school library in the name of that
speaker. One of our members and his spouse are mentors
at an elementary school, and there are efforts to expand
this effort. Targeted for recruitment are mentors and
readers for elementary and preschool children.
Drug/Substance
Abuse projects: We expect to assist the County Youth Commission
by member participation.
Other
Community Service Lane activities: The club has an annual
fund raising activity, Alamo Heights Night, to enable its
annual support for charities in our area. The annual
net profit, distributed to a number of such organizations,
has averaged $70,000 to $80,000 over the sixteen years of
its existence.
Donations
made from the April 2000 effort are: City of Alamo Heights-$2,000,
Alamo Heights School Foundation-$4,000, Alamo Heights Little
League-$1,000, Alamo Heights Pony League-$500, Junior Achievement
$1,200, Rotary Foundation-$3,000, Boys and Girls Club of
San Antonio$2,000, Christmas in April-$1,000, Northeast ISD
Community Education-$1,000, Daily Bread Ministry-$1,000,
Alamo Children‚s Advocacy Center-$560, Epilepsy Foundation-$750,
Alamo Heights Special Olympics-$750, Fisher House-$500,Alzafar
Shrine Hospitals-$1,500, Any Baby Can-$4,500, Texas Burn
Survivors-$1,000, San Antonio Youth For Christ-$2,000, Witte
Museum-$2,000, Madonna Neighborhood Center-$1,000, Colonial
Hills Elementary Family Center-$500, Prevent Blindness of
San Antonio-$1,000, Rape Crisis Center-$1,000, Roy Maas Youth
Alternatives-$1,000, San Antonio Rescue Center-$1,000, USO
of San Antonio-$1,000, Boysville-$500, Juvenile Diabetes
Foundation-$500, Salvation Army-$1,890, and Visiting Nurses
Association-$500
The
club is the first service organization in the County to adopt
a Red Cross disaster shelter. We operate the shelter
at the Alamo Heights High School gym, and hosted 450 evacuees
from Hurricane Brett. There are 20 active members of
the Shelter Committee. Its most recent activity, on
Saturday, April 7, 2001, was completion by five of its shelter
team members of the Red Cross first aid and adult, child,
and infant CPR classes.
One
of the club members is a member of the Red Cross Chapter
Shelter Committee, and there is in progress a joint AH Rotary-Red
Cross publicity campaign for the Adopt A Shelter program. Rotary
Club presidents in area clubs will be contacted as the first
step in offering this excellent opportunity for Service Above
Self to the other district clubs. That in turn will
be lead to recruiting other area service organizations, such
as the Lions and Optimists.
The
club donates Christmas poinsettias to the Santa Rosa Children‚s
Hospital and to the Pecan Hill Assisted Living facility.
Our
club members are chairman of the board, president, or the
director of the following community service organizations:
Local
chapter of the American Diabetes Association
St.
Luke's Episcopal School
Witte
Museum
Boy
Scout Troop 59
We
have in our club members of the boards of the following organizations:
Our
Children‚s Coalition, a child abuse prevention effort
Sunshine School for the Deaf
San
Antonio Zoo
Docents
of the Zoo
Goodwill
Industries-two members
Providence
High School
Salvation
Army Advisory Board
Elf
Louise, a Christmas program that acquires and delivers gifts
for needy children. Delivery is made, in our case,
by Santa teams of three, usually one of our Rotarians and
family.
Committee
head, 2002 Final Four
Any
Baby Can
San
Antonio Youth Literacy
USO
San
Antonio Art League Museum
Four
of our members are working with the Delta Group, a program
for taking trained dogs to children‚s hospitals and
to nursing homes.
Our
club members are active members of the following community
service organizations:
KLRN
San
Antonio Conservation Society‚s NIOSA
San
Antonio Area Chapter, American Red Cross
American
Heart Association
Two
of our members are on the District RYLA Committee and one
is on the International Committee.
Vocational
Service: There are 12 academic and 11 vocational scholarships
awarded each year; each of the 21 is an award of $500, for
a total of $10,500. The vocational scholarship contestants
are drawn from four institutions in the city which traditionally
have student bodies composed of primarily needy people. This
includes high school student mothers and students in adult
vocational education programs.
Workplace
Tour: The club holds what we call off-site meetings, the
two most recent of which have been a tour of the Culligan
Soft Water facility and of the Witte Museum.
Community
Leader Recognition: The program for our April 10, 2001, meeting
consisted of recognizing the Texas Elementary School Teacher
of the Year, who is a special education teacher in one of
our club area‚s elementary schools. We annually
recognize a firefighter and a police officer from our bedroom
city that have been selected as the outstanding officer of
the year for their departments.
Other
Vocational Service Lane activities: Our scholarship program
actively seeks out deserving vocational students and provides
to the winners $500 scholarships to help further their vocational
training.
One
of our members is a mentor for five art students.
International
Service
Our
Club has submitted an application for a Foundation Matching
Grant, for a shelter for street children in Mexico, D.F.
Our
Foundation Giving for the 2000-2001 Rotary year is: New
Paul Harris Fellows: Nine. New Paul Harris Sustaining
Members: 11 Per capita Foundation
giving: $30.15
We
are a Centurion Club in which all members contribute $100
or more, on average.
Our
club maintains regular contact by visit by two of our members
to our sister club, the San Rafael Club of Mexico, D.F. We
are prepared, when its members visit us, to offer as our
opening prayer in Spanish the one used in that club.
Approximately
30 of our members are in key positions for hosting the International
Convention. Eight or nine of the approximately 27 committees
are chaired by Alamo Heights Rotarians.
One
of our members is the host for the motorcycle riders who
will attend the International Convention.
Our
club will host at a zoo dinner and tour in excess of 300
attendees from other countries during the Convention.
|
