Notes:

1. The Madison Ridgeland Club is now meeting at Mint Restaurant, Thursday's at noon. Mint's address is 1000 Highland Colony Parkway, Ridgeland.

Posted on February 18, 2015

Women in Rotary make it happen

Posted on March 2, 2015

Editor’s Note: In celebration of International Women’s Day, which is 8 March, we are running a week-long series of blog posts from women who are making a difference in their communities and around the world through Rotary.

Celia Cruz de Giay

By Celia Cruz de Giay, 2014-15 Rotary vice president

If anyone had told me that I would be writing a blog post today as vice president of Rotary International extolling the impact of women, I would have thought that person was dreaming. But when I think about it a little longer, I can see how the idea of service modeled for me since my childhood through my Rotarian father, and then through my Rotarian husband, Luis, led to this day, and I recognize that Rotary was always part of my life. That is why I am a Rotarian committed to serve.

I joined Rotary 21 years ago. But I have been involved in service all my life, whether through preparing a grant to help the hospital in my town, or organizing vocational education classes for youth, or vaccinating children against polio, or organizing fundraisers for scholarship associations, and so on.

The most important lesson I have learned by serving is that to truly lead, we need to be in touch with the people we serve. Anyone can become a community leader, but to truly achieve something as a leader, we must be immersed in their agonies and inspired by their causes. True leadership is a commitment to help others reach their full potential.

As the world’s oldest service organization, Rotary has come a long way. Today we have more than 1.2 million men and women working to improve the lives of people in their communities and around the world. Around 250,000 of them are women, who bring a different perspective to the way we look at challenges and opportunities. These women are from diverse ethnic and religious background; they employ teamwork, persistence, determination, creativity, enthusiasm, generosity, self-confidence, and compassion; and they advocate for education and new opportunities for children, youth, and young adults.

I believe Rotary’s challenge today and in the future is to engage more women and more young people into our organization to allow them to grow as leaders, so we can together contribute to bringing about social justice, peace, and understanding.

Many times I have told myself that my legacy to my family, and to future generations, should be to leave the world better than I found it. So I will continue serving through Rotary and putting my heart into all I do, hoping to inspire Rotary members in my club, district, and worldwide to do our best to leave the world a better place than we found it. Because if we can dream we can do this, we can make it possible!!

Officer Maurice Young recognized as Pct. 4 Police Officer of the Quarter

Officer Maurice Young was recognized as the Pct. 4 Police Officer of the Quarter by the Rotary Club of North Jackson at its March 3, 2015 meeting. Officer Young is shown at the right with Club Past President Edley Jones in whose term the quarterly recognition program with Precinct 4 was initiated. Officer Young was recognized for pursuing and apprehending two carjackers in November 2014. In addition to the recognition, Offficer young receive a certificate and $200 gift card from McDade's Markets.

Our Club congratulates Officer Young on being recognized and expresses its appreciation for a job well done!

Dictionary Project Director Speaks to Rotary Club of North Jackson

Mary French, Director of The Dictionary Project spoke to the Rotary Club of North Jackson at its March 3, 2015 meeting. Ms. French, from Charleston, SC, described how the project has been successful in improving the literacy of dictionary recipients.

She said that Rotary Clubs have distributed 11 million dictionaries in the United States and Canada and that 200,000 dictionaries have been distributed in Mississippi.She gave an example of how the literacy ranking of South Carolina has improved from 49th or 50th of the states to 42nd since the project was implemented there.

Ms. French was introduced by club Past President Don Roberts. She gave credit to Tom Johnson of the Rotary Club of Jackson for getting the project started in Mississippi. Tom was at the meeting for her presentation.
The Dictionary project was started in 1992 when Annie Plummer, an illiterate, began distributing Dictionaries to third grade students near her home. Mary French became the Founding Director of The Dictionary Project in1995 when she reponded to a letter to the editor in her local newspaper. Since its founding, The Dictionary Project has distributed 24.5 million Dictionaries with nearly 10,000 organizations, including the Rotary Club of North Jackson, sponsoring their own projects. This school year, 2.2.million dictionaries have been distributed.

Ms. French is shown on the right during her presentation. We thank her for speaking to our club and for the work that she does with The Dictionary Project.

Steele Dehmer Inducted into Rotary Club of North Jackson

Steele Dehmer was inducted into the Rotary Club of North Jackson at its February 3, 2015 meeting. Steele is show below with his proposer Tom Bowen, Club President Elect Tom Parry (right), & his father, Madison Ridgeland Rotarian Josh Dehmer (left). Steele is an accountant with Marchetti, Robertson, & Brickell Insurance and Bonding. He and his wife Katherine live in Ridgeland. Steele is a lifelong resident of the Jackson Metro Area and is a graduate of the University of Mississippi. We welcome Steele into our club.