As Rotary club presidents embark on a new year, setting clear and achievable membership goals is paramount to the continued success and vitality of our organizations. Membership is the cornerstone of Rotary, providing us with the resources, diversity of thought, and collective strength to serve our communities effectively.
Why Set Membership Goals?
Increased Impact: A larger membership base enables us to undertake more ambitious service projects and make a greater positive impact on our communities.
Enhanced Diversity: Diverse membership fosters a more inclusive and dynamic Rotary experience, reflecting the rich tapestry of our communities.
Strengthened Networks: A growing membership expands our professional and social networks, creating opportunities for collaboration and mutual support.
Improved Financial Stability: Increased membership can lead to higher dues revenue, providing essential resources for club operations and service initiatives.
Examples of Membership Goals:
Quantitative Goals:
Increase membership by 10% within the next year.
Recruit at least 5 new members from the local business community.
Attract 2 young professionals to join the club.
Qualitative Goals:
Enhance membership diversity in terms of age, gender, profession, and cultural background.
Foster a welcoming and inclusive environment for all members.
Increase member engagement and participation in club activities.
Reflecting the Communities We Serve
Ensuring that our membership reflects the diversity of the communities we serve is essential to our mission. By actively seeking to include individuals from all walks of life, we can create a more inclusive and representative Rotary. This not only strengthens our connection to our communities but also enriches our own experiences as Rotarians.
By setting clear membership goals and implementing effective action plans, Rotary club presidents can play a vital role in ensuring the continued growth and success of their organizations. By fostering a welcoming and inclusive environment, we can attract new members, strengthen our impact, and create a lasting legacy of service.
The New Rotary Year is in Full Swing! Let’s focus on our Foundation. We can increase our impact.
Are you thinking:
Foundation Month is in November. Do you have a Foundation Program Planned? What can you and your club do to support the foundation even more?
Did you finalize your grant reporting from the 2023-2024 Rotary Year? We have some awesome projects. The projects from 2023-2024 include:
NAME OF CLUB
NAME OF GRANT
Allentown West
Community Park Communications
Bethlehem Morning Star
Kenya School Rehabilitation
Bethlehem Morning Star
Bicycle Transportation Community
Easton
Mindfulness Matters
Emmaus
Renovation Women’s Shelter
Harleysville
Garden of Health
Kutztown
Brandywine Library
Newtown
Adopt a South African Pre-school
North Penn
Fiara Therapy Blankets
North Penn
Easter Seals Eye Gaze
Norristown
Superkids
Nazareth
Renovation Historic Treasure
Springtownship Flourtown
Park Pavilion
Springtownship Centennial
Casa of Berks County
Upper Perkiomen
Little Free Library
Warminster
Community Park Development
Warrington
Park Preserve Equipment
Warrington
Fiara Project Blankets
Whitehall
Ironton Trail Bike Station Repair
West Reading-Wyomissing
Community Tree Planting
We are so proud: in 2023-2024 our district had 106 new contributors to our Rotary Foundation. Can we be a 100% giving district?
Do you know about Rotary Endowment funds? You can help secure more funding for our foundation.
Let’s Support our Rotary Foundation! Would you like a program at your club about any foundation topic? Contact Cindy Hornaman: hornamca@ptd.net and we will have someone come to you!
Don’t Miss Out - Register for the Vibrant Club Summit Today!
Join us for an electrifying day of collaboration, innovation, and inspiration at this year's Vibrant Club Summit on Saturday, September 14! People of Action know that turning vision into reality requires a solid plan. Rotary’s Action Plan is our roadmap to bringing more people together to create lasting, positive change in an evolving world. By focusing on four key priorities—Increase Our Impact, Expand Our Reach, Enhance Participant Engagement, and Increase Our Ability to Adapt—we empower our clubs to grow in membership, boost public awareness, and strengthen our foundation for impactful projects.
The Vibrant Club Summit is your chance to dive into the Rotary Action Plan through dynamic, interactive workshops and collaborative sessions. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn, connect, and grow. Register today to ensure your club is on the path to vibrancy!
September 14, 2024 8:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m. Advanced Technology Center at Montgomery County Community College Register TODAY
Polio Eradication and Rotary’s Focus on Disease Prevention and Treatment
We look forward to honoring World Polio Day on October 24. Polio eradication has remained Rotary’s #1 priority . . . and nothing about it has been easy. Their efforts to achieve this have been tireless.
District 7430 honors the Horsham Rotary Club for hosting this year’s Race to Zero in our district. The family-friendly Race to Zero is being held on Sunday, October 13, at Simmons Elementary School, Babylon Road in Horsham. Join us! Register Here!
The Rotary Foundation is equally determined in its efforts to spread the message about the power of vaccines to save lives. As we support the 2024 Race to Zero, let's focus on the Call to Action, that emphasizes the Area of Focus: Disease Prevention and Treatment. Rotary is encouraging us all to bring the message of the miracle of vaccines home – home to our OWN communities.
Feel free to contact me to speak to your Club about Polio Eradication and about ideas of fun projects on how your Club can support these efforts in YOUR Community.
Looking for a way to get younger volunteers involved in your environmental projects? Think about engaging with college students. You will find that many colleges and universities have student clubs and activities that are focused on environmental issues. Those student organizations are very often looking for environmental projects where they can get their hands dirty.
In addition, many schools have volunteer service requirements. Alvernia University in Reading, for example, has a program that requires all undergraduate and adult students to perform at least 40 hours of community service before being certified for graduation by the Registrar’s Office. Many other colleges have a similar requirement.
My club (West Reading-Wyomissing) helps with an annual fall cleanup at the Reading Public Museum’s Arboretum. We always get Alvernia students to help out. They are eager to dig in.
Also, don’t forget about your Interactors. We always ask our Wilson High School Interact Club to help out with all our environmental projects – highway and trail cleanups, tree plantings, our plastics collection project, the fall arboretum leaf raking, and they always help us give away tree saplings at our annual West Reading FallFest.
Think about how your club’s environmental projects can benefit from getting young people involved.
I volunteered to become a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) champion when our district sought leaders in this area. I truly believe that as an organization, we hold immense potential to drive meaningful change, and in my view, DEI initiatives are tantamount to peace initiatives.
People yearn to contribute, feel included, and be welcomed, and as Rotarians, we have the power to make that a reality. Rotary International has long been a frontrunner in advocating for DEI, and I am pleased to announce that our DEI committee will be integrating into the district membership committee, where our efforts will continue to thrive.
Serving as the co-chair of this committee has been both an honor and a privilege. I've had the opportunity to collaborate with remarkable Rotarians from District 7430, and I eagerly anticipate watching their commendable work persist and flourish within the membership committee.
D7430 Rotaplast Team Needs Your Financial Support!
What is a Smile Worth? It’s Priceless When Lost!
Imagine your child being born with a cleft lip or palate and your family not having health care insurance or money to fix the problem. There are children faced with these malformities who will never get the medical help they need and deserve. Children must learn to speak with a nasal lisp or struggle with eating issues because of a deformed palate.
Rotaplast International and our District 7430 Rotaplast volunteers work collaboratively to help children and families worldwide by eliminating the burden of cleft lip and/or palate. Rotaplast sends medical and non-medical teams to provide 100-percent-free reconstructive surgery. That’s right, FREE surgeries for every patient we serve. This, to our team, is the Magic of Rotary.
Did you know that one surgery only costs $800? Would you or your club consider sponsoring a surgery or partial surgery? Any amount will help us come closer to our large fundraising goals.
Do you want to learn more about our 2024 Medellin, Columbia mission trip? A trip where surgeons performed 101 procedures and saved the smiles of 81 patients? Rotarians who traveled to Columbia are willing to visit your club to share the compelling stories and pictures of this amazing humanitarian effort to save these beautiful children’s smiles.
Together we can bring hope to children who count on us to bring the Magic of Rotary to them. Please reach out to Steve Kendra at stevenkendra@gmail.com or Darlene Scott at dscott8956@gmail.com to donate or schedule a club presentation.
It’s back to school time for many and to the Rotary Youth Exchange committee it means welcoming our next group of exchange students. This year we are fortunate to have six students in our district. The first chance to meet them is during our inbound orientation September 6-8 in the Horsham area. If you want to learn more about the exchange program, let us know and we’ll share more details.
How can you and your club get involved now?
1. Recruit 15-18 year-old-students who want to study abroad for the 2025-26 academic year or for the Short Term Exchange program the summer of 2025. Applications will be accepted starting in October. District interviews are December 8.
2. Find host families willing to open their doors to an incoming exchange student. (Typically, we divide the year into 2-3 different families for each student. The host families must be in the same school district for consistency for the student.)
3. Join our committee – we meet monthly with the students and take them on short trips or experiences to enhance their time in the States.
Want to explore the exchange student program for our district? Check out the website: Rotary7430YEP.org If you want to attend any of our events, please email the contact. We don’t put exact location details online because they are minors and the site is public.
Help us make this the best year of their lives!
*If you have season tickets to sports or theater or a great vacation home or access to something unique to the United States, please share your treasures with these students. We’d be happy to connect you to the students to make their exchange year the best it can be.
Ana from Brazil sponsored by the Rotary Club of Willow Grove
Anaya from India sponsored by the Rotary Club of Allentown West
Antek from Poland sponsored by the Rotary Club of Bethlehem Morning Star and Bethlem
Emi from Agrentina sponsored by the Rotary Club of Emmaus
Leander from Germany sponsored by the Rotary Club of Kutztown
Zoe from Switzerland sponsored by the Rotary Club of West Reading-Wyomissing
Rotary District 7430 Partners in Life-Changing Global Grant in Cambodia
Reported by Mike Orbin
I recently returned from a mission to Cambodia, where I witnessed the transformative impact of Rotary District 7430’s Global Grant GG2343143. This grant, focused on improving living conditions, has brought hope and better health to many families in the Pursat Region of Cambodia. I am thankful to the Allentown Rotary Club for contributing the initial funds to the Rotary Foundation in support of this project.
This is also a shining example of Rotary’s commitment to creating lasting change in communities around the world. The collaboration of the Rotary Club of Pursat and the non-profit organization of Sustainable Cambodia has been instrumental in driving these efforts. Sustainable Cambodia was founded in 2003 by Richard Allen, a member of the Rotary Club of Gainesville (D-6970), Florida. Sustainable Cambodia has been empowering rural Cambodian families by helping them create a sustainable quality of life with safe water and sanitation, sustainable incomes, healthy food, and quality education for their children.
On this trip, I had the profound experience of escorting Sok Yi, a Cambodian student my wife Alicia, a member of the Emmaus Rotary Club, and I have been sponsoring, back to her home in Cambodia after successfully undergoing scoliosis treatment at Shriners Children’s Hospital in Honolulu. I first met Sok Yi in person at the Rotary-sponsored Kravanh Bright Future Center school she was attending. This medical treatment, which involved Halo Traction and Spinal Fusion Surgery plus some major dental work and vision screening, was initiated by me and coordinated with the help of Rotarians on the Sustainable Cambodia volunteer Board of Directors and with Sustainable Cambodia staff in Pursat Province and funded by donations from Rotarians and other supporters worldwide, with Shriners Hospital for Children providing all medical services for free. Sok Yi’s journey culminated in her return home four inches taller, straighter and healthier. This marks a significant improvement in her quality of life, allowing her to live with greater comfort and now giving her the opportunity to further her studies in information technology at a university in Phnom Penh, where she is applying for a scholarship.
We encourage all Rotarians to stay informed and continue supporting these vital efforts. You can also join a trip with other Rotarians to Cambodia sponsored by Sustainable Cambodia this November 2024 and January 2025 to see the positive impact Rotary is having on the children and villagers in rural Central Cambodia (click on link to Visit SC in Cambodia-Sustainable Cambodia Trips to learn more).
Congratulations to D7430. With 19 Hero Clubs ($1,000 minimum donation), D7430 was the US leader this past Rotary year. We were also a leader with nearly $40K contributed. Your generous support helps us save lives and give hope to displaced persons to be able to rebuild their lives. A map of our current deployments is below.
A critical part of Shelter Box’s work is prepositioning supplies to allow a more rapid response to disasters. Locations in the Philippines, Panama, and Turkey allow for rapid deployment in emergencies such as Hurricane Beryl in the Caribbean. The “Stock the Box” campaign runs through September and contributions go towards emergency preparedness. Go to https://www.shelterboxusa.org/ to learn more and to donate.
Shelter Box is committed to sustainability. We have dramatically reduced the amount of single-use plastic to curb pollution. Other efforts are ongoing and will be reported upon completion.
Do you want a Shelter Box presence at a club event or do you need a presentation to your club? Contact D7430 Ambassador Bill Tuszynski at bill.tuszynski@gmail.com or 267-374-1631 to put us on your calendar. Contact Bill if you are interested in getting more involved with Shelter Box, either as a co-Ambassador or Club Champion.
Many other colleges have a similar requirement.
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