Bob Edwards & Eleanor Chevor (Reserves: Geoff Duggin & Valda Andrews)
Set up & pack up:
John Bolton & David Robertson (Reserves: Andrew Rennie & Michael Bartok)
Speakers & topic:
Don Wilson - Winning the War on Waste
Rotary Club Meeting 9 July 2019
Welcome
President Peter Antaw welcomed all members to his first meeting as club president for the 2019-2020 year. He also welcomed our guest speaker, Tony Jones.
Toast
Andrew Rennie gave a toast to the Rotary Club of North Sydney, a club chartered in 1928 with 18 members. The club was visited by Paul Harris, the founder of Rotary, who on 14 March, 1935 planted a memorial tree in St Leonard’s Park, a tree still in existence today. The club’s first female president was elected in 1989. As well as supporting the usual Rotary projects, the club runs the annual Crows Nest Markets.
Announcements
President Peter spoke about a dinner to be hosted on Monday, 23 September 2019 by new 2019-2020 Rotary International President Mark Maloney at the Deckhouse, Woolwich. He commended the dinner as a wonderful opportunity to hear from a current RI president who is an inspirational speaker. Numbers are limited so if you are interested you can book online at www.tyrybooking.com/523543 . The cost of the dinner is $70pp.
Luke Keighery announced Malcolm Lye as the winner of the Super Rugby Competition. The competition raised $550 for the charities account. He is looking at more members taking part in the competition next year and enjoying the fun of the event.
Ian Burnet advised that $3000 has been raised for ShelterBox, and thanked all those who contributed, especially Malcom Lye who donated his Rugby tipping competition prize winnings to the cause.
Peter Grinter advised that the Welsh Choir will be performing on Sunday, 28 July at 46 Levi Street, Glenbrook if anyone is interested in attending.
Sergeant's Session
New Sergeant PeterRussell conducted his first sergeant’s session and successfully managed to extract funds from all present.
PP Paul Sullivan auctioned two lots of a variety of wines which raised a total of $205 for the charities account.
Guest Speaker - Tony Jones - Accessibility in the Workplace
Helen Gulson introduced guest speaker Tony Jones, General Manager of JobReady. Originally from the UK, Tony has a background in major IT transformation projects and his company represents a new way of managing the complex human journey through study, work and career transitions, in particular adapting workplaces to make them accessible to all workers.
Tony said JobReady has 160 employees and 3,600 customers for whom they develop software systems. The company floated on the ASX only a few months ago. Their income is primarily derived from subscriptions for the programs developed for their clients. They do a lot of work with educational institutions and employment service providers. The development of education systems is a high growth area in today’s market.
Tony spoke about accessibility in the workplace, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and the company’s commitment to it. They run an Accessibility Day where job seekers with various abilities/disabilities come in to the office and are given the opportunity to see how a tech company runs and to find out what type of jobs they might be interested in. Tony showed a couple of videos which demonstrated how the Accessibility Day runs and how some of the people in JobReady’s workplace go about their jobs. For instance, Elizabeth Gulson has worked for the past 5 years as an office assistant undertaking a variety of tasks; and through AimBig’s Busy Bean program (https://www.aimbigemployment.com.au) Naomi is employed 2 hours, 3 days a week to work as a Barista making coffees for their staff.
After a number of questions from the audience, Rob Coote thanked Tony for his interesting talk.
Funds raised by Northbridge Rotary via a bucket appeal at Northbridge Plaza have been put to good use as reported below.
During Tropical Cyclone Debbie in 2017, the Sarina Range in Queensland experienced a massive landslide that effectively cut off 16 families (30 students) from the school campus. Education Queensland quickly established accommodation for the isolated students. However, suddenly and rather traumatically, the 30 students and their families had to adjust to changed life circumstances, grief and loss, separation from their previous school community and increased cost of living to travel extended distances to access shops, doctors, workplaces and other social supports such as scouts, sporting activities and dance.
This project, funded by the Northbridge Rotary Club totalling $3255, provided support for children’s skill development (swimming classes) and social interaction with peers at Inter school athletic activities. These monies paid for bus services to transport children between schools, then on to the swim classes and their athletics carnival. Without this grant the school, P&C and students would have been financially disadvantaged and unable to provide the access and learning opportunities that were offered to the students at the temporary accommodation.
The Rotary Club of Sarina and the Swayneville State School students, parents, teachers and community are thankful to the Northbridge Rotary Club and Townsville District 9550 Disaster Management grants that facilitated the social, and emotional well-being of these school children, alleviated a potentially onerous financial burden on the P&C and parents who were already financially disadvantaged. Your financial and club support has provided joy, growth, opportunities, personal development, pride, skill and water safety in all the children of the Swayneville State School Campus. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.
Dianne Barnett
Secretary, Rotary Club Sarina, Qld
Outcome measure evaluation: The project success was measured through the implementation of the project plan within the time frame below.
May 2018: 24 children and 8 parents affected attended that inter-school athletics event at Sarina State School. The children participated in all events and several children were successful in securing places in the district events.
December 2018: 30 students from the Range campus attended all school swim classes held at the Sarina Swimming Pool over a seven- week period. These children were transported by bus and participated in classes with other students as well as attending their swim classes through the day. All students passed the required water safety standard requirement for their age.
Full acquittal of funds occurred in January 2019 for the bus services that took students between their accommodation, school and swimming.
The Rotary Club of Northbridge is building on their long-standing support of youth with expanding support across 6 different youth specific, leadership and experience focus programs. The outcomes of these programs continue to motivate the club to build on these programs with increased support.
Among these programs are high school leadership, science, engineering and experience programs. One of these programs is RYPEN (Rotary Youth Program of Enrichment) aimed at year 9 & 10 who want to build their confidence and self-esteem. RYPEN provides young people the opportunity to build leadership potential, encourages them to explore their ideas in problem solving, team activities, and experiences that will assist them in forming their own values. RYPEN is about building confidence and developing skills to cope in a range of situations. The Rotary club of Northbridge has doubled it’s support of this amazing program from sponsoring 4 awardees each of the last 2 years to 8 awardees this 18/19 year. Follow this link https://rotarydistrict9685.org.au/page/rypen for more information about RYPEN.
Another program worthy of mention is the Rotary Youth Leadership Awards (RYLA). RYLA is a transformational leadership program designed for young adults aged 18-27. This intensive program over 7 days, enabling leadership to grow and develop to its full potential. RYLA combines amazing Australian speakers with activities and challenges in a supportive environment. Unlike other programs, RYLA has a focus on practical hands-on opportunities testing leadership in a controlled environment. The RYLA program is unique in linking outcomes to self-improvement with considered reflection; building a better leader with the necessary skills for improving their leadership as they move forward in life. RYLA is run annually, with close to 90 candidates in Elanora Heights, on Sydney's Northern beaches; the Rotary Club of Northbridge has sponsored 9 RYLA awardees over the last 3 years. Follow this link http://d9685ryla.org.au/ for more information about RYPEN.
The Rotary Club of Northbridge is also supporting the initiation of the North Sydney Rotaract Club; a new Rotaract Club which is a driven community of young professionals aged 20-30 who are committed to creating social change in their community whilst developing as leaders. The inaugural meeting is scheduled for February 20th and the following links are available for further information.
The life changing effects of these sponsored Youth programs continues to motivate our club and members support; the Rotary Club of Northbridge will continue a focus on our local Youth and our leaders of tomorrow as one of the most rewarding areas where we support our community.
