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Service above Self ---- Service above Self ---- Service above Self ---- Service above Self
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Walk the Test Way 2017, our main fundraising event, was a stunning success. There were 698 walkers who dusted off their shoes, boots and trainers and spent a beautiful sunny Sunday raising money for their own favourite charities. In total they walked the distance from Heathrow to Adelaide in Australia. What an achievement in a single day.
They were accompanied by almost 100 dogs, a giraffe, a lion and a zebra.* The 196 who walked the 25.5 miles from St Mary Bourne back to Romsey were registered in the Crosfield Hall before dawn and some were not back in the Memorial Park to receive their medals until 5pm. Every walker was greeted and encouraged by our course marshals along the way and St John Ambulance were there to deal with a thankfully small number of incidents.
How do you measure success? Well, the sponsorship money is still being collected and our Treasurer is always very cautious but we are heading for a total income of around £80,000. Cheques will soon be on their way to the charities and there were 157 of them. 17 teams raised over £1000 each.
So, well done everyone and thank you for taking part.
Next year The Walk will be on Sunday October 14th. Please put it in your diaries and start to think about getting a team together for your charity. It is a great day.
As Liz Blunt the fundraising officer at Clic Sargent said
"The Club organised the Walk extremely well. It was great to have the option of different distances to walk too. I really enjoyed taking part myself, and was pleased to raise 20% funds for Rotary and 80% for CLIC Sargent. I am looking forward to taking part next year. A big thank you to all the organisers and volunteers for making the day so successful ”.
If you want to know more about the walk the latest updates and a gallery of photographs can be found on the WTTW web site.
In the meantime here is a taster of what the day was like.
* By the way, the African wildlife (only in costumes) were raising funds for Asante/Citizens4Change who support a school in Kisumu, Kenya.
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Our President, Jon Livingstone, after presenting Business Partner awards to WTTW sponsors Specsavers, Bettavend and Wheelers Travel.
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Walk the Test Way - Saying thank you
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Walk the Test Way takes an enormous amount of organisation and the costs of running the event are far from trivial. The Walk benefits both from the time given by our members, friends and supporters who run the event on the day but also from business sponsorship.
This year we were able to give a public vote of thanks to three of our business sponsors. They were the Club's guests at the Rotary Wessex District Conference held in October at the Ageas Bowl in Southampton. The theme of the Conference was Rotary's links with business and we were pleased to recognise the the contributions of our major Walk sponsor Specsavers (Romsey). Wheelers Travel have the daunting task of providing coaches to get walkers to their start points throughout the day and Bettavend who for many years have supplied us with water and snacks as well as logistical support.
If you read this and think that you would like your company to sponsor or support Walk the Test Way - or any of our other events please contact Sandy Dunn.
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As I write this Newsletter we will be nearing the end of handing out Dictionaries4Life to almost 300 year-4 children in 8 primary schools in the SO51 postcode area (Awbridge, Ampfield, Cupernham, Halterworth, Lockerley, Romsey Abbey, Romsey and Wellow). This is the 6th year we have done this and the level of enthusiasm from children, teachers and parents is most gratifying. So much so that we need to start planning for next year. (The books are ordered in December, delivered from the printers in May and handed out in September and October).
As Romsey grows, with many new houses and families, so does the demand for books. We will need over 300 next year and the cost will rise above this year's £1000 level. We were fortunate to have business support in 2017 from Wheelers and from Hays Travel with the balance covered from the Club's Youth Opportunities budget.
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Some of the feedback we received on Facebook.
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We have submitted a bid to the Aviva Community Fund for £1000 to provide most of the books for 2018. We need to get as many votes as possible before the cutoff at noon on November 21st
You need to register your e-mail address with Aviva (to avoid multiple voting) and are then allocated 10 votes.
We have over 800 votes so far (November 6th) and need to get as many as possible before the cutoff date to ensure that we are one of the finalists.
Please click on the link above and give your 10 votes to D4L in Romsey.
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Three of our local primary schools, Halterworth, Awbridge and Wellow have taken a lead from the senior schools, Mountbatten and Romsey, to start to engage in projects aimed at developing community spirit and raising awareness of social issues both in their own communities and overseas. The seniors attended a Peace Jam at Winchester University earlier this year. The primary schools held Peace Slam in Romsey Town Hall to show people the projects they had been involved in. There was a great pop-up cafe too!
Here are some of the projects and topics for discussion
• Toilet twinning - raising funds to improve sanitation.
• Sals shoes - collecting shoes for children who presently
walk to school barefoot.
• Books for Burundi - sending books to Africa from Awbridge
(as reported in NL17).
• A project to learn about the black South African troops lost
in the sinking of the SS Mendi in the English Channel in 1917.
• Discussing whether it is a good idea to use phones at the
dinner table.
Our Club was pleased to be able to sponsor this display.
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The next Peace Jam will be at Winchester University March 3-4 2018 when our Romsey-based secondary students will have a chance to hear and interact with the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize winner, 37 year old Yemeni, Tawakkol Karman. She leads the group "Women Journalists Without Chains." (See a poster for the event).
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Our latest meeting of the RCG was a breakfast meeting (with bacon rolls or croissants) and was held at the Academy Studios . The theme of the meeting was Corporate Social Responsibility and the subject was introduced by Paul Bryan, Manager of Hays Travel. Paul’s talk highlighted the causes that Hays support through their 150 branch based budgets and a central foundation set up 37 years ago. The former make donations to local charities. The Foundation issues matched funding for projects. Paul highlighted the importance of asking the staff to recommend causes for the branches to support.
Much of the "added value" from the CSR comes from activities rather than straight financial donations – things like staff doing sponsored fixed cycling and rowing in the branches (as well as sponsored leg waxing for men!). The benefits to Hays include being seen to have a connection to the community and being seen to give something back.
There followed a group discussion which highlighted:
- That charities need to be as effective as they can in showing how supporting their causes is beneficial to the potential donors.
- The move from “begging” to “offering a valuable service” is an important message. This was reinforced by Claire Sutton who mentioned some of the benefits that accrue including greater staff satisfaction and lowered turnover and recruitment costs. Her blog on the subject can be found at https://minerva-marketing.co.uk/blog/
- Local companies prefer to support local causes rather than more “corporate” big name charities
- There can be value in a cause and a potential provider of support working together to approach larger funding organisations for money. A potential example of this is the new Prescription Arts initiative http://www.hampshireartandcraft.org/prescription-arts.html
- Smaller organisations often feel they are too busy delivering their underlying good cause to market themselves effectively.
- Practical engagement with charities can be as valuable as financial support and sometimes this is at zero cost to the supplier e.g. donation of unused office space
- Gaining funding for revenue expenses is a major challenge – most supporters want to have their name tied to a specific capital type of project
- Major benefit is the feel good factor that employees gain.
The next RCG meeting is being planned and will be announced shortly.
On the evening of February 14th some of the people who have atetnded past RCG meetings come to our regular meeting in the Romsey Town Hall. It will be a chance for them to learn more about what Rotary does around Romsey and further afield and for Rotary to hear the RCG's interests and concerns.
More details to follow.
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Speakers and outings
We've had some interesting speakers outings.
- Lady Hamilton, Nelson's mistress was a remarkable person about whom we now know a great deal more thanks to the reseraches of one of our members.
- Continuing the nautical theme, in a talk "Beyond Boaty McBoatface" we were given a fascinating insight into how robots are changing the ways we explore the hidden depths of the ocean. Blue Planet II makes it look so easy. It isn't, and the National Oceanography Centre in Southampton is a world leader
- We went to see how Bombay Sapphire Gin is made, and happily got to do some tasting.
- We learned how a young family's life has been transformed following a spell in a local refuge and practical help from our Club. In another talk we were made aware of how much human trafficking there is and how we might become more aware of it.
- After finding that we knew so little about the test that prospective British citizens must take we discovered that we knew even less about the Highway Code.
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New member Andrew Crowley (left) is welcomed by membership secretary Steve George. Andrew is a black belt in karate - a new talent in the Club that we hope we will never have to call upon.
Sadly we recently said goodbye to Steve Irish who for a number of years led our Youth Opprtunity activities.
If you are interested to learn more about what Rotary does please contact Steve using the link above.
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Meetings and events for next 3 months (and beyond), at Romsey Town Hall. (7.00 for 7.30 unless otherwise indicated).
- Nov 8 "Wot - no engine!" . Gliding experiences. (Romsey GC).
- Nov 15 "A grandmother's legacy". Cookbook of the year.
- Nov 22 " Men in Sheds". Wellow GC Breakfast meeting
- Dec 6 Business Meeting
- Dec 13 International (TBC)
- Dec 20 Christmas dinner (Ampfield GC)
- Jan 3 Business Meeting
- Jan 10 Youth Opportunities (TBC)
- Jan 17 "The Greek Economic Crisis"
- Jan 24 Breakfast Meeting Wellow GC
- Feb 7 Business meeting
- Feb 14 Meeting with Rotary Community Group, Town Hall
Looking ahead in 2018
- Mar 3-4 Peace Jam, Winchester University
- Mar 7 Young Technologist Competition, Crosfield Hall
- Mar 10 Reminiscences of Romsey, Crosfield Hall
- July 1 Rotary Mayor's picnic, Memorial Park
- Oct 14 Walk the Test Way
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Who's who for 2017/18
President Jon Livingstone
Senior Vice Pres Stuart Wineberg
Junior Vice President Bill Gidley
Secretary Roger Shepherd
Trust Fund Treasurerer David Upton
Club Treasureer Nick Bellamy
Community Service Richard Jordan-Baker
Youth Opportunities Bill Gidley
International Philip Kirkland
Rotary Foundation Stewart Mitchell
Fundraising Sandy Dunn
Walk the Test Way Sandy Dunn
Membership Steve George
Sports and Social Tony Abbott
Communication John Gould
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The Rotary Club of Romsey Test was started in 1990 and presently has 57 members (2 honorary). The Club was an offshoot of the Rotary Club of Romsey (the lunchtime club) that meets on Tuesday lunchtimes at the White Horse hotel. We are part of Rotary International and Rotary International of Britain and Ireland. We are guided by the principle of Service above Self
The Club’s activities focus on
• Community Service – dealing with service to the local community
• Fund-raising – our major fundraising event is Walk the Test Way.
• Youth Opportunities - working with young people around Romsey
• International – dealing with our international giving and including our partnership with Dentaid to produce the Rotary Dentaid Box.
• Foundation - Rotary Foundation is Rotary’s own charity and deals with such global projects as the eradication of polio.
• Club Service - responsible for running the club.
• Membership - recruitment and retention.
• Communication - internal and external
• Sports and Social
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