Today’s agenda was very full with new potential members, new member introductions, a board update and our speaker, Lisa Chesko, president of Twin Cities Rotaract.
President John Chandler called the meeting to order at 12:15 p.m. and the Club 10 Band (Jerry Faletti, Doug Hartford, Bill Given, Ed Coleman and Joe Kovarik, fronted by lead singer Susan O’Neil) led the club in a rousing rendition of George M Cohen’s “You’re a Grand Old Flag!” President John led the Four Way Test and Bob Cardinal offered inspirational minutes.
Thanks to our greeter, Paul Meekin, and to scribe Michael-jon Pease who also introduced visiting Rotarians and guests.
The board has established a 60-day membership task force to explore new membership models
Due to schedules, upcoming board meetings are moved back a week to April 18 and May 16 (at noon, location TBD)
Speaker recognition gifts will now be made to Treehouse as part of our pledge to end trafficking in MN. Our long support of the Read with Me Program at the St Paul Public Library created great outcomes and we’re excited align our gifts with this new vital mission.
Grand Old Days Parade June 2. Please join the Rotary parade contingent by contacting Chad Roberts or Elyssa Weber.
Paul Harris Fellows
Brianna Vujovich* recognized three of our new Paul Harris fellows (in honor of gifts made to the Rotary International Foundation totaling $1,000 per person). These fellows earned their points during November Foundation month by making their first donations and being matched by other club members as part of our wonderful “live auction event.”
Honored today were:
New Member Marvin Anderson
Dr. Meaghan Johansen
Jim Hart (getting a multi-stone pin to recognize his 5+ Paul Harris fellowships)
* (President John got that pronunciation correct multiple times today! Way to go!)
New Member Introductions
Michael-jon Pease introduced B Kyle, the dynamic President and CEO of the St Paul Area Chamber of Commerce and veteran US Army Officer
Bill Collins introduced John Smith, the new Director of Sales for the Chamber with 14+ years of experience in sales, management and relationship building
Jim Hart introduced Marvin Anderson, the visionary behind the new Rondo Center for Diverse Expression
Program: Lisa Chesko, President, Twin Cities Rotaract “Where Service Above Self Meets Reality”
Lisa works at 3M and first go acquainted with Rotary when her brother was a youth exchange student, which prompted Lisa to do youth exchange as well.
Rotaract is a Rotary group for young professionals that meets twice a month and has a modest annual membership fee to encourage participation. Their tagline is “Connect. Develop. Serve.”
Rotex is the college Rotary program that often drives membership to Rotaract clubs or directly to Rotary.
The Rotaract name comes from “Rotary in Action” and this club is dedicated to service! Every year they partner with a nonprofit on a signature volunteer/fundraising project. Successful annual partnerships include:
American Refugee Committee (2018-2019) – starting a Rotaract club in a refugee camp
Books for Africa (2017-2018)
Neighborhood House (2016-2017)
Northside Achievement Zone (2015-2016)
Rotaract has 10,904 clubs and 250,792 members world wide (fast-growing in Europe and India).
The Twin Cities club has already logged 152 service hours in the past 7 months and accomplished more than 350 service projects.
Why do some younger Rotarians choose Rotaract? It’s a space designed for young people’s schedules, budgets and lifestyles – it simply works best for some.
Rotaract and Rotary support each other by co-sponsoring events, inviting each other to their own events to build fellowship and networks, and through monetary sponsorships. TC Rotaract has cash sponsorships for their service projects in the $50+ range so it is easy to make an impact with projects like supplying laundry supplies to those getting food stamps (which don’t cover these basic life necessities).
And please join Rotaract for their signature fundraiser on March 27, the Spelling BEEr at Summit Brewing company. Come and watch the spelling teams compete, or gather four friends and make your own team to win spelling domination!
Closing
Remember there is no meeting April 30 so that we can all attend St Paul Sunrise Club’s Community Forum on Thursday, May 2 from 7:15 a.m. - 9:15 a.m. at the Town and Country Club. The topic is climate science. Register here.
Please register for these great upcoming opportunities:
In honor of World Rotaract Week, Lisa Chesko, President of Twin Cities Rotaract, will present on her Club's mission, service projects and membership.
Twin Cities Rotaract is a young professional organization focused on helping 18-35 year olds connect with their community and the Rotary world, develop into principled leaders, and participate in impactful service projects. Their club holds meetings twice per month in the evening, and monthly service projects with different organizations throughout the community, as well as choosing an annual partnering non-profit to fundraise for. Currently, their partnering non-profit is the American Refugee Committee, and they are striving to help implement a second Rotaract club in one of the refugee settlements in Uganda.
Originally from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Lisa Chesko gained her first exposure to Rotary when her older brother went on Youth Exchange to Russia in 2003. Inspired by his decision, Lisa went to Turkey as a Youth Exchange Student herself in 2007-2008. Following high school, she attended the University of Pittsburgh for Global Management and Supply Chain graduating in 2013. Upon graduation, Lisa began work for 3M in a rotational program which took her to Alabama, Iowa, Belgium, and finally Minnesota. Currently, Lisa works at 3M in the Display Material Systems Division as a Supply Network Planner for the Privacy Solutions Business, and is President of the Twin Cities Rotaract Club.
At 12:15 pm on March 12th, President John Chandler called the meeting to order at the Intercontinental Hotel. Laurie Murphy lead the club in the Pledge of Allegiance and as part of the invocation quoted Helen Keller, “Optimism, the faith to lead to achievement”. Sherry Howe introduced a number of guests, including Peter Grayson, a former president of the club and father to current member, James Grayson. Linda Mulhern was the scribe for the meeting and Susan O’Neil greeted members as they arrived.
The meeting was a reminder for all members of the role of women within Rotary. In 1987, the Supreme Court decision ruled that Rotary could not discriminate based on gender. Lindsay Moser talked about 1905 being the start of Rotary, but even in 1964, with Bob Dylan’s song, “The Times, They are a-changin”, Rotary was not yet inclusive for women. Luckily, Club #10 has had women included with the club since 1989, including Carolyn Brusseau, who later became president in 1994-95, Nancy McKillips who became president in 2005-06 and Carla Hauge in 2015-16, as well as our administrators, Sherry Howe and Jodi Erickson.
Brianna Vujovich was able to give Paul Harris Awards to both Jason Bradshaw and Susan O’Neil at the meeting based on the fund raising done in November. New member introductions included Ginny Arthur from Metro State, who was introduced by Nancy McKillips, who bequeathed her original Rotary pin to Ginny. Doug Bruce introduced Crissy Kochendorfer and Katie Shaw. Crissy is well known to Doug because her son played goalie on Doug’s son’s team.
Kristin Geer was introduced to the club. She is the CEO of Bleachr and she has a office in downtown Minneapolis. Kristin has always been active in communications and believes it started with a speech to the local VFW in her hometown of Perham. She spoke about “hotdish” as a mirror to the melting pot of the people in Minnesota. She worked for a number of years as a reporter at KSTP. She later got her master’s degree from John Hopkins in digital communications. Her company, Bleachr creates sport apps for mobile devices in which fan engagement is the platform and strategy for any company seeking to promote to a target audience and to fulfill their needs. They build apps through a loyalty and rewards program, which is important to super fans and even “fanatics” of a particular sport. Rewards might include gaining points to buy a hotdog or beer at a baseball game. They will then continue to participate at games in the future by fulfilling the need which is ultimately what any team wants with their fan base. Colleges are now starting to work with her firm as well. They have found that people do not want to be spoken to from their TVs any longer, but rather want to communicate via their mobile devices for information needed. In particular, people are looking at their mobile devices for information 39% of time versus TV at 31% of the time. People use their mobile devices to check into social media 36% of the time and are even gaming 11% of the time when using them. The only problem at sporting events with mobile devices is the lack of bandwidth at most stadiums which were not wired to handle the demand of thousands of users currently at a game or match, but they are starting to work on improving the bandwidth within the older stadiums.
Another opportunity for the apps created, will be with sports betting opening up with the recent Supreme Court decision and state governments opening up the possibilities. Bleachr is also able to provide detailed data to their sponsors as to who is using the apps, how often and the length of time used which is normally 5-6 minutes versus 30 seconds for most users. Sponsor challenges are often finding that 400-500 fans are participating, taking pictures as part of a challenge to gain points as part of the rewards program provided by the app. The “Super Fans” will return again and again by spending money on tickets and merchandise, which is what ultimately the companies want from the money spent to promote themselves. John provide a certificate to Kristin for speaking to the club and a donation will be made to the Reading to Me program with the St Paul Library.
President John reminded the club that at the 3/19 meeting, we will learn more about Rotaract and the 3/26 meeting will be a Rotation day for the club.
