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WHAT'S IN THIS BULLETIN

18th August 2020 

  • NEXT MEETING (via ZOOM)

  • Meeting Report August 11th 

  • Fundraising During Lockdown

  • Trivia Fun

  • GALLERY

NEXT MEETING (virtual) - TUESDAY  18th August
 

Ramona Mandy: Inclusivity from a Disability Perspective.  Why and how to include people with disabilities in your communities.

Ramona has worked in the public, private and community sectors for over 30 years and in a wide range of service roles, primarily focusing on training including braille or assistive technology support. She has served on many cross-disability advisory and management committees. she has been undertaking a project in the past two years with the Australian Federation of Disability Organisations to help people with disabilities and their families to better understand the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).

Ramona lives in South Melbourne, tries to get to the gym twice a week, loves horse riding, hates chilly and is blind. She is keen to help people understand the needs, abilities and contributions of all people who have disabilities.  She loves travelling, learning new things and encourages open discussion of topics that may be difficult for some and that may include disability.

Meeting Report August 11th
Report on RCM Zoom Meeting, 11/08/20
Speaker, Paul Waite
Paul Waite seemed to be headed for a suit-and-tie life, but met and subsequently married a girl who led him to international travel – South-East Asia – Laos and East Timor.  Returning to Australia after about 8 years led Paul to Victoria Government and a focus on multi-cultural affairs – primarily the Muslim community.  This led to many mosques, prayer rooms and friends.  It also led to an understanding of mounting concern at increasing extremism.
Tools for coping with polarisation in society, such as “Art of Hosting”, “World Café” seem to be sadly less effective in conflict arenas and social media tends to fracture communications.  Paul learned of an organisation in the USA “Essential Partners” which set up Dialogue as a vehicle for communication, understanding and acceptance following a terrorist attack on a Boston abortion clinic.  The organisation reached out to both sides of the issue – the pro-lifers and the pro-choicers – and led them to engagement.  An initial dialogue led to many get-togethers, tolerance and respect.  Not conversion.  The leaders of this organisation were women (this reporter not in the least surprised) and in due course they came out and shared with the press.
Paul now facilitates dialogue in conflict environments.  He gets parties to come up with a set of questions, governed by a communication agreement.  The process contains a number of go-rounds and targets understanding, not conversion.  He recently used the technique with a Rotary group, including members of our Club who reported that the process is helpful in countering one’s predisposition to rebut and counter-argue.  It is about listening­ and engagement.
 
Announcements
  • Allan D:
Reminder, next Friday 14th Rotary / Probis trivia night 5:30pm.  Invitations have gone out.
Allan mentioned his great pleasure, echoed by members, in the prospect of Jennifer Jones from Ontario, Canada becoming RI’s first ever female president.
  • Warwick mentioned that the latest mentoring project has begun.  The program aims to ease and improve the integration of students into university.  10 mentors and 10 mentees are in place and pairs plan to meet (on screen at this stage) for about an hour every fortnight.
  • Frank reported that Royal Talbot working bee is obviously off this year but Stephen Wells, Garden Guru as well as medical guru and rehabilitation guru, will be on Gardening Australia this week.  Friday, 7:30pm.
 
Special Report
Judy Jones gave a short report on the state of telecommunications services through the pandemic.  Initially there were many problems relating to people having to isolate and feeling very vulnerable with only social media for contact with the outside world – particularly if there was an issue within the family – health, providing, relationships etc.  Now that we are all “settled” into locked-down life it seems problems and stress are at lower levels than same time last year.  Apparently we have become able to ignore minor problems in the face of major ones.
 
Inquisition
Brett Jones, not wanting to be outdone by his wife, Judy, put Kevin Love under the spotlight.  Kevin revealed that as a young Brunswick lad, he always wanted to be a farmer, so his father counselled him to study agriculture at Uni.  Part of that study revealed to Kevin that farming is really hard work, so he opted for State Government Agriculture, visiting and advising farmers on many aspects of animal husbandry and developing a taste (not) for roast mutton.  In a logical progression from agriculture, Kevin moved to Department of Premier / Cabinet.  In that position, he was advisor to both Premiers Kennett and Bracks.  Now retired, Kevin is very involved in beautiful Phillip Island where he, Veronica and 5 children/grandchildren are seeing out the pandemic.
 
President Therese
  • A new Rotary Club is forming northside.  They are running a trivia night as a fund-raiser and to get the club rolling.  RCM members might like to join in – especially those members who have displayed a predisposition for trivia.  It would also be a nice “hand-up” gesture to a new club.  Therese will post details.
  • Therese invited visiting Rotarian, Zainab Sheikh, President Elect, North Melbourne RC to say a few words. 
    • Zainab reported on RC North Melb involvement in the recent lock-downs of high-rise towers in the area.  The occupants of these towers are from diverse cultures and have often not been long in Australia.  They usually have English as a second language.  The lock-down caught many by surprise.
There are about 70 families with typically 5 to 10 children per family and Zainab and team have lent a helping hand in delivering food.They have also assisted with “homework tutoring” for kids.
 
Steps Outreach Services Trivia
Trivia Fun
Stunning Trivia result: Keeps are Keepers
For the second time in recent memory, Coral-lee Keep and her equal half Russell won the ecumenical Rotary Central Melbourne/Sunrise Probus/Bearbrass Probus trivia night galah on Friday evening March 14. Russell (Sunrise) can be seen second row, left, slapping his own face. The 18-guest event was run by Cliff and Judy Stinson (Bearbrass), the immediate past winners, with a choice selection of questions that were NOT TOO HARD. They also introduced and applied (to author) 2-point penalties for smart-arse interjections. Next quiz night on Friday 5.30pm August 28 will be run by much-loved and honoured Rotary icon Tony Thomas.
Detailed point scores for last night have been uploaded to Rotary International’s data base in Evanston, Chicago.


 
 
 
GALLERY
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Chair Russell Rolls
 
 
 
Guest Speaker,  Paul Waite
 
 
 
 
Warwick Cavell
 
 
Zainab Sheik
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Meeting Responsibilities

Chair
JONES, Brett
 
Greeter/Zoom Host
DRIVER, Allan
 
Reporter
PASTIDIO, Lady
 
Photographer
THORNTON, Roger
 
Door
ELLIS AM, Stuart
 
Bulletin Editor
CLIFT, Nick
 
Social Media
LIM, Daniel
 

Upcoming Events

RCM August Board Meeting
Aug 19, 2020
5:30 PM - 7:30 PM
 
RCM September Board Meeting
Sep 16, 2020
5:30 PM - 7:30 PM
 
School holidays
Sep 19, 2020 - Oct 04, 2020
 
View entire list

Speakers

Aug 18, 2020 7:40 AM
Inclusivity from a Disability Perspective.
Aug 25, 2020 7:40 AM
Rotary Mentoring Academy
Sep 08, 2020 7:40 AM
District Governor's official visit
Sep 15, 2020 7:40 AM
The forecast for D-Day
Sep 22, 2020 7:40 AM
Project and program management – the art and science of delivery
Oct 13, 2020 7:40 AM
Helping young people to be the best they can be
View entire list
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