Regular Meeting, May 19, 2010

(At left, five of our six guests who were from the CLK, LL/Hubbell and Horizons school systems.)

Attendance: 20 Rotarians and six guests: George Twardzik, Principal, CLK High School; Chris Davidson, Horizon’s School; Dave Hein, CLK Schools; Barbara Jones, Lake Linden/Hubbell Schools; and Craig Sutherland, Superintendant, LL/Hubbell Schools. In addition, Bob Sharkey, our ADG and District Governor-elect joined us.

President Jim called the meeting to order, introduced the guests, and then announced that the Board Meeting has been re-scheduled to Wed may 26 at 4 p.m. in the River Valley Bank conference room, Calumet.

Question: Why was Phil sitting by himself during the meeting?

After lunch, President Jim introduced the Rotary program, CHOICES. This program was presented to 9th grade students in the CLK, Horizons, and Lake Linden/Hubbell Schools. CLK Rotary members who worked as the instructional teams were Jim Lowell, Tom Tikkanen, Kathy Johnson, Kevin Store, and Keith Stenger.

Each group presented a one-hour program to a class followed by another hour the next day. There were two classes presented at the Lake Linden/Hubbell schools, three classes at CLK and one class at Horizons.

The CHOICES program helps students identify choices they will have to make in terms of Self Discipline, Time Management and Money Management. As students work through the program they discover consequences (both good and bad) for making certain choices.

As we moved through the condensed CHOICES program, Jim Lowell (with the help of Tom Tikkanen) displayed a Time-line chart that demonstrated the long-term effect of one's choices, a very effective visual presentation.

As part of the presentation, the school administrators who were present gave positive comments. One recurring theme was: "Nice to have the message comes from community members as opposed to the teachers as it might carry a little more weight."

At the conclusion of each "Choices" class, the Key to Success was presented to each student participating, a small token reminder of their "choices."

Before adjourning, President-elect Tim Baroni extended an invitation to the school administrators to join CLK Rotary.