(Many thanks to Past President Janine for the evening's Bulletin report)
Past President Jenny was our chair for the evening.
We welcomed Visiting Rotarian George from the Rotary Club of Beaufort, our Defying The Drift speaker, Jessie Morrow with her mum Cheryl and brother Lachlan (who was a Rylarian this year) and Saba Asary, a friend of Jenny's who is a lecturer at Deakin. University in medical imaging.
We also welcomed our guest speaker Peter Jacobson.
Defying The Drift
Jessie Morrow is a Year 11 student from Christian College. She had a wonderful time at the Defying The Drift program and was impressed at each of the sites visited.
Key learnings from the program for Jessie included "attitude above skills", "do what you enjoy" and be adaptable and resilient and show initiative.
were lessons learned and Jessie's She wants to work outside - sport maybe - but she is adding many of the new vocations in agribusiness to her list of possibilities. Jessie's presentation was excellent and she was grateful to the Club for the opportunity to attend. George thanked her also and made a presentation.
Peter Jacobson - The Geelong Project This was a fantastic talk from a man committed to improving the situation of youth homelessness. Tonight, there are 200 young people awaiting housing support and 1,200 each year come through Peter's door.
They are not involved in education or employment and youth unemployment is rising.
Each homeless person costs $15,000.00 for additional costs just in health and community services so getting stable homes for young people makes good economic sense apart from anything else. It is a BIG ISSUE. Whilst there is a lot of funding but possibly it is not a very effective use of these resources. The question is what will make a difference?
As family dysfunction leads to homelessness, connection is needed with the child. If they see a variety of workers for their multiple needs, the connection is not made and kept with the child. Answer: INTERVENE early........ The typical person who presented is a 16 year old female, out of home 6 weeks, exhausted, no income, enrolled at school but not attending.
She receives support for accommodation after having exhausted her couch surfing options. Now, a survey of schools has been completed with screening interviews by youth and family workers for students attending school less than 40%.
The aim is to engage the young person, assist with family mediation and provide ongoing support, and support at school, and the young person remains on the school monitoring list. This is the process presently occurring at Northern Bay Secondary , Newcomb Secondary College and Geelong High School In 2016, 3040 students were surveyed with 209 students identified.
The social return is considerable as for every $1.00 spent there is a $20.00 return - a success by any measure. Swinburne University is involved in the program and in the pilot schools. School retention has improved and there has been a 40% drop in homelessness. Great success!! THE AIM is to increase the program to all schools. Peter Jacobson has travelled to Canada and other states with this very successful program where it is being used. Funding is a very important issue and this is running out. He sang the praises of his committed, caring and professional staff. It was an inspiring talk.
At the time of writing, Club members and friends, families, partners and other community members have been working long hours to raise funds for our community service projects.
You are a wonderful, dedicated group who through friendship and service demonstrate the Rotary ideals.
David Sykes is working on the list of roles and committees and we are invited to notify David of any changes or corrections required.
Ballarat South Raffle
Many thanks to Robert Wheeler as he is once again organising the roster for our Club's sale of the Rotary Club of Ballarat South raffle tickets.
Robert will organise roster for October but needs someone to take over November.
If you can assist, please see Robert.
Catering Changes at The Hub Mean Changes in Whoozin RSVP Times
A change to catering at The Hub means Whoozin RSVP is needed by Friday 12 pm prior to the meeting.
Christ Church Meals
Jenny Acopian tells us that our Christ Church meals catering 5th Monday occurs again on Monday October 30th Let Jenny know if you can help.
What Other Clubs Are Doing
The Baldarchie Art competition supported by the Rotary Club of Geelong is being held at the National Wool Museum between 14 October and 11 November.
Australian Rotary Health
October is the month to support Australian Rotary Health and we will take our hats off to mental health with Allanah's help on Tuesday 31 October.
We are invited to make a donation of $2.00 if we come hat'd and hatless means a $5.00 donation.
Surveillance Laboratories Assist in Achieving a Polio Free World
As the world entered 2014, only three countries were listed as polio endemic – Afghanistan, Pakistan and Nigeria, and after the latter identified its last case in the July, the country was removed from the list.
Then in August 2016, the devastated Nigerian Minister for Health advised the World Health Organisation and the U.S Centre for Disease Control that the 13 month old son of a family fleeing from Boka Haram was limping on arrival at a temporary camp holding 15,000 internally displaced people
His condition would probably have gone unnoticed had not a member of a Polio Surveillance Team been present. Stool samples from the boy and his siblings were sent to the nearest Laboratory in the 145 Global Polio Network and they were found to contain polio.
They were then sent onto a more sophisticated laboratory where scientists performed genetic sequencing to identify the strain and map where and when it has been seen before.
In this case it was found that the strain had emerged in Chad almost five years earlier and had circulated in that country and parts of Nigeria. While it had been eliminated in accessible areas it turns out it had never left parts of northern Nigeria controlled by Boko Haram. Unlike in areas controlled by the Taliban, vaccinators found they could not negotiate to gain admission to enter Boko Haram areas.
When polio cases are identified, local authorities also collect samples from sewerage systems and in places that don’t have adequate sanitation facilities, from bodies of water near large settlements. These samples are similarly processed to those from stools.
The situation created by the 13 month old boy resulted in more than 850,000 Nigerian children being immunised within five days and countries bordering Nigeria coordinating efforts to increase their own polio free status.
The worldwide scale of these surveillance efforts is massive and costs about $100 million to investigate something like 100,000 cases of polio around the world annually.
So what will happen to these laboratories when the world is certified free of polio?
They are currently monitoring other deadly diseases such as measles and ebola and ongoing discussions with the WHO are aimed at resolving how the network can be maintained to go on hunting other diseases.
Our 7th November meeting - Polio Plus - East Geelong Uniting Church - Soup Saver Night
PDG Eddie will be focusing our attention on this most important program of The Rotary Foundation.
We will have a Soup Saver Night at the East Geelong Uniting Church to raise funds for TRF and we will have a first class guest speaker who speaks of his own polio experience. It is on 7 November and we aim to raise $1,000.00.
Instead of meeting at The Eastern Hub, will be meeting at the East Geelong Uniting Church and for $20.00 will be enjoying a choice of three home-made soups, crusty bread and bread rolls, slices and seconds and thirds if required. All money raised will be sent to The Rotary Foundation, to be put towards the End Polio Now program. John Birrell is kindly allowing us to use the church facilities for free.
The guest speaker for the night is a well-known radio and television presenter, Gary Newton. When Gary was not yet one, he contracted polio (the paralysis type) and has lived with this challenge all his life. His is an inspiring story and he is a wonderful advocate for positive thinking as well as an outstanding worker in the fight against polio. He is a director of Polio Australia and hopes to travel to India in February next year to help administer oral vaccine to children in last resort locations.
With Partners, Friends of Rotary & Rotaractors, we are hoping to attract around 50 people to this meeting.
October 24 is Polio Plus Day. Triple any donation you make with The Gates Foundation.
Our Glorious Leader's Glorious Leadership Team
President Bryan announced the formation of a “Leadership Team” to assist the current president with planning for the next President’s year. The initial members are President Bryan, Past Presidents David S, Tony A, Ross and Jenny, and if there are others who wish to assist to speak to Bryan.
Melbourne Cup - The Rotary Club of Geelong Central - 6 November
We are invited to an evening of pre-race fun Melbourne Cup Eve 6:00pm for 6:30pm on Monday 6th November 2017 at Thomson Football Club, 85 St Albans Rd Thomson for drinks and dinner, cup sweep, trivia quiz and more - with lots of prizes and plenty of fun.
The cost is $35.00 per head for a 2 course meal with drinks at bar prices.
Bookings should be made online at www.trybooking.com/RXVR Please call Christine Heath on 0413 133 631 if you have any questions.
The dress is "racing" including hats for both ladies and gentlemen (optional).
Bring family, friends, business colleagues - why not make up a whole table? Proceeds to Barwon Health for Patient Transport.
Cambodian Adventure with Purpose
Join Rotarians in a travel adventure to Cambodia in the first two weeks of February 2018, to experience first hand the culture and friendship of Cambodians and see the results of our D9780 Project in Cambodia.
If you are interested in joining this Rotary Cambodian Adventure please express interest by contacting Bryan by email on bryan.humphrey53@gmail.com by October 30th 2017.
The Rotary Club of Pakuranga invite you to join The Ultimate 17 Day Rotary Tour of New Zealand 6th – 22nd April, 2018.
The 17 day Tour Price is approximately: AU$6,200pp share twin. AU$8,000pp single.
The 4 day pre-tour Price is: AU$1,420pp share twin. AU$1,800pp single.
Apologies: Bill Bailey, David Beretta, Sue Beretta, Michael Carroll, Graeme Fleet, Peter Gillham, Sue Hill, Bruce King, Yannick Le Grand, Sharon Meek, Andrew Rofe and Ross Taylor.
