We are living in rapidly changing environment. What may be right today may well be wrong or different tomorrow, so we need to be agile, responsive and willing to change as our communities need us more than ever before.
In an effort to maintain engagement during this time when we have cancelled our in-person meetings, projects or social events, I am suggesting the following ideas and strategies for the members to consider.
I would like members to email or call me with your thoughts, ideas, concerns about the Rockport Rotary Club turning these ideas into actions. We had been having 14-18 members in attendance at out weekly meetings. I would like at least that many members from our membership of 31 to agree and support any activity.
I will be using Zoom, a video conferencing tool, for board meetings. We could also use it for weekly meetings, virtual coffee morning meetings or a virtual happy hour meeting just for social interaction? – Just have a chat.
Service ideas – just a few. Do you have an idea? – please send it to me.
Colored Care Card Alert System – Householders display a Colored Card in their window or on their door to indicate GREEN ‘I am OK”, ORANGE “I need assistance” RED “I need urgent assistance”. To enable people to have a system other than online/social media of advising they need help. A simple solution to reach out to community members who may not have access to online social networking and where volunteers can take an active roll to check up on friends, and neighbors or people who do not have many community connections.
A variation on "Pay it Forward": For example, Pay for a meal for home delivery from a local Restaurant for some one less fortunate or send a Rose or Bunch of Flowers to cheer someone up.
Choose a local charity and ask all members to highlight it using their social channels. Choose a new charity each week! This is a great way to leverage the influence of Rotarian leaders to elevate causes that matter to your local community (and it might even sprout a future project collaboration!).
Ask members to record themselves reading children’s books and post through your club’s social channels for parents to share with their children for alt-tv time during school closures.
Start a gift card drive. Ask members to purchase gifts cards (bonus points if it’s a local small business) and then mail them along with a note from the Rotarian to organizations that would be able to put them to good use.
Our 1.2 million-member organization started with the vision of one man—Paul P. Harris. The Chicago attorney formed one of the world’s first service organizations, the Rotary Club of Chicago, on 23 February 1905 as a place where professionals with diverse backgrounds could exchange ideas and form meaningful, lifelong friendships. Rotary’s name came from the group’s early practice of rotating meetings among the offices of each member.
