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March 7, 2007 Rotary Program for March 7, 2007 Mr. Juan Pedro – Membership and Retention Director for Rotary International
Mr. Jim Graham, District Governor Elect for District 6560 and Mr. Juan Pedro, the Membership and Retention Director for Rotary International, were two very welcomed guests at the Attica-Williamsport Rotary Club on March 7th. Mr. Juan Pedro presented the program about what his club in Argentina is doing and why he was visiting the club. Mr. Pedro is currently touring many Rotary Districts in the United States and had a weekend layover between commitments with Rotary Districts 6540 and 6560. Mr. Pedro honored the club with a weekend stay in Warren County and was most welcomed at the morning meeting. Mr. Pedro belongs to the Santa Rosa Rotary Club located in Argentina. He was excited to share with the club the many service projects his club has been involved with. In particular, the Santa Rosa club was gifted by a Pennsylvania Rotary Club with six containers of wheelchairs for his district in Argentina. Each container carried between 150-180 wheelchairs. Mr. Pedro and his wife will be visiting the areas that received the wheelchairs and visiting the Pennsylvania Rotary Club that worked so very hard to provide them. The Santa Rosa Club is also involved with a project in Thailand called the “Lighthouse Project”. This program allows Rotary workers to help the citizens of Thailand to learn to read. The emphasis is to teach the “quick learn” method. Since many of the citizens are not literate, this method is a quick way to teach whole reading concepts and is very successful. Mr. Pedro then spoke about the youth of Santa Rosa. The Santa Rosa Club has an active Rotaract program. This club enables youth to meet for fellowship and to learn to be future philanthropists not only in their communities but also throughout the world. Rotaract is the youth equivalent to the adult Rotary Clubs. “Youth involvement and teaching leadership skills are so very important,” says Mr. Pedro, “These young people are the future leaders of our world; they are our future!” The theme of a worldwide focus came up repeatedly in Mr. Pedro’s program. He mentioned that one never knows where Rotary will take them, from community level projects to worldwide projects like PolioPlus. Mr. Pedro wanted all to know Rotary stretches way beyond the local club level. His vision is to see much more involvement at the international level including an emphasis on leadership programs. Mr. Pedro closed his program by gifting the club with a copy of the book, The Duties of Men. It was a delight to visit with Mr. Pedro and learn more about what Rotary Club’s from all around the world are doing locally and internationally. Mr. Pedro has certainly proved the Rotary motto of: Service Above Self! |