Min-e-grantee Panel
This is the meeting for the week of November 13, 2017 through November 19, 2017
This Meeting at a Glance:Program: Min-e-grantee PanelProgram Description: Learn about our club's mini service grant program (called "Min-E Grants") from a panel of our club's experts!Speaker: Andrew Taw (Club President-elect), Heather Shaw (Club Treasurer), Tzviatko Chiderov (Min-E Grants Committee Chair)
Is this your first time to visit us? If so, welcome to our weekly online meeting! To complete our meeting, please continue reading from here to the bottom of this page. Each Monday our week’s meeting is posted early in the morning, U.S. Pacific Time. These meetings are designed so that you can read and watch what we post anytime during the week. The entire meeting takes about 60 minutes to complete, with the video conference recording of the program being the bulk of the time.Note that you can easily read this meeting with your favorite device, so feel free to take our meeting on the go with you; read it while on public transit, waiting in line for coffee, or even at the park! Please also make sure to complete the attendance form at the bottom and leave a comment. Enjoy!
Welcome to the Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley!
Here's a message from President-elect Andrew:
Greetings members and guests!
With Thanksgiving a week away, I've been thinking a lot about what I'm thankful for. One of the magical things in my life is this club. The idea that a bunch of people all over the world get together every week to be inspired by service and fellowship every week is something truly wonderful.
This week, Tzviatko hosts Heather and me to talk about our e-Club's Min-e-Grant program! You'll learn more about it below but I just want to highlight here how thankful I am to have avenues like this one for our club to support the service work of any of our members around the world.
Members and guests, please leave a comment at the bottom of our meeting page and tell us your thoughts about our meetings and if you have any ideas of how one of these grants can be used!
Sincerely,
Andrew Taw,
President-elect
Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley
Weekly Funny with the Lady of Laughter (LOL)
We believe laughter is an important part of life, and we should all make time to laugh a little. This segment of our meeting is meant to tickle you just enough. These funnies are curated by member Yvonne Kwan, our "Lady of Laughter!"
From our club's Lady of Laughter, Yvonne Kwan:
"A sprinkle of rain jokes to celebrate the precipitation in California.."
What did one raindrop say to the other?Two’s company, there’s a cloud.
What is a king’s favorite kind of precipitation?Hail!
What kind of shorts do clouds wear?Thunderwear!
Weekly Inspiration: How Virtual Reality Helps Surgery Patients in Rural Mexico
Every week we start our meetings with a short video highlighting innovation, inspiration, entrepreneurship, or social change. This week we are featuring a video from Great Big Story about how virtual reality is helping surgery patients in Mexico.
In the high alpine region of Mexico, 12 hours from the country’s capital, Dr. José Luis Mosso Vazquez explores the use of virtual reality as a painkiller in the operating room. Why? Because in this economically marginalized rural area, it can be difficult and costly to rely on general anesthesia. On a recent trip, he performed 12 free operations, removing cysts and tumors. It may sound like a frightening alternative, but combined with local anesthetic, these patients felt almost no pain during their surgery. Dr. Mosso sees his work as his way of repaying the country that helped raise him.
What a brilliant way to integrate virtual reality technology into a medical use. Where do you envision virtual reality to go in the future, and what other ways can it help people?
Coffee with a Rotarian
Every month our club members are paired with fellow members and special guests for an exclusive one-on-one coffee session called Coffee with a Rotarian. The idea is simple: spend 1 hour of your time during the month to get to better know a fellow Rotarian! Some of the greatest friendships were spawned that way. Members report on their coffee sessions here.
This week we feature a coffee session between two of our members: Nate Gildart (Japan) and Yvonne Kwan (California, USA)
Here is what Yvonne had to say about Nate:
"Nate recently moved from Tokyo to Nagoya, where he is teaching at Nagoya International School. Being a huge history buff, it’s appropriate that Nate is a history teacher. This is his 21st year in Japan and 18th year of teaching at an international school. As a budding educator myself, Nate imparted his decades of wisdom on me; he encouraged me to build my personal learning networks (PLNs) and to apply to become a Google Certified Educator. Fun fact: Nate has a whole slew of these credentials -- he is a Google for Education Certified Trainer, Google Certified Educator & Innovator at Levels 1 and 2, and an EdTechTeam spotlight speaker and guest blogger. He also runs his own educational blog, Learning Light Bulbs (http://learninglightbulb.blogspot.com/), where he posts about innovation and technology ideas in education."
Thank you, Yvonne, for sharing!
A big shout out to Tzviatko Chiderov for continuing to chair and organize these Coffee with a Rotarian sessions! If you are not yet signed up for a Coffee Session, please email Tzviatko at tchiderov@gmail.com to sign up!
World of Rotary
The over 1.2 million members of Rotary Clubs around the world form the largest humanitarian service organization, Rotary International. We're part of this global family. This segment is a tribute to stories and to good deeds Rotary clubs around the world are conducting.
Every year Rotary International holds the Rotary International Convention -- the largest annual gathering of Rotarians and Rotary program members. Last year it was in Atlanta, Georgia, the year before that it was in Seoul, South Korea, and the year before that it was in Sao Paulo, Brazil. This coming year in June 2018, it will be in Toronto, Canada. Over 25,000 people are expected to attend the International Convention next June.During the International Convention, you'll be exposed to Rotary members from around the world during breakout sessions focused on project development and club development, as well as in open-space networking halls (i.e. House of Friendship) and organized social events. Going to an International Convention means you walk away with the international Rotary experience, along with new friends from around the world."The Rotary International Convention is the best networking and friendship opportunity any individual can possibly be exposed to." -Past President Mitty Chang, who has attended 10 Rotary International Conventions
Reasons to Attend
Learn best practices from successful projects
Share unforgettable experiences at exhibits and events
Immerse yourself in diverse cultures and develop rich relationships
Unparalleled lineup of speakers, entertainment, and events
Preconvention events
House of Friendship
Breakout sessions
Discover Toronto including Tour Casa Loma (Toronto’s renowned Gothic castle), explore Kensington Market (the legendary outdoor market), delight in traditional bakeries and delis in Roncesvalles Village, and much more!
Exclusive for our club members: During the 2018 International Convention in Toronto, we will have two organized social events for our club members and select invited guests. Members, don't forget that your registration to the Rotary International Convention can be included in your annual USD$150 Leadership Development Grant allotment. If you are planning on going, please be sure to reach out to Mitty, who will be chairing the socials for our club members.
Register for the June 2018 Rotary International Convention in Toronto, Canada at http://www.riconvention.org/en/Registration prices go up on December 15th!
Service to Others
Service is at the heart of every Rotary club. As an eClub, our members do service both locally in the Silicon Valley and abroad globally. This segment of our meeting is devoted to sharing stories of service our members have participated in.
So, when was the last time you devoted time to serving others? Did you know we try and track that as a way of inspiring each other? We have a form that asks what you have been up to, asking just for a short description and how much time you put in. Care to share? Here you go:
Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley Service to Others
What have our members been up to recently? Here's a sampling:
Shags Shagrin has devoted time as a cashier for the Pleasant Hill Art, Wine & Music Festival, and also as treasurer for the Treasurer of Storytelling Association of California.
Nate Gildart participated in a fundraising walk for HOPE International Development Agency, aimed at an ongoing clean water project in Ethiopia.
Catherine A. purchased, collected, and delivered six bags of food to Our Daily Bread for meals provided by local Rotary club members to the homeless in Silicon Valley.
Heather Shaw spent time preparing, promoting, donating services, and delivering supplies from her business' school supply drive for Scott Lane Elementary.
John Lozano organized a family event for Peace One Day for the CISV (Children's International Summer Village) non-profit that educates and inspires action for a more just and peaceful world.
Rushton Hurley helped a local Kiwanis club learn to use simple digital media tools to tell the stories of how they help others.
Raquel D'Garay-Juncal helped adults and children with various disabilities take part in a surfing program.
Inspired? Let us know what you've been doing, whether big or small - if you inspire someone else to take a moment to help others, you're multiplying the good you can do. (The link up there beckons!)
For Members Only: Updates
This segment of the meeting is dedicated to our club members. This section includes announcements and new initiatives. Guests, you are welcome to read this section or just skip it.
Message from the Club's Programs Committee:
Ready to introduce someone to the club's programs committee? Email Committee Chair Rushton at programs@siliconvalleyrotary.comMembers: NAMEBADGES ARE COMING! Update your info please!
The Membership Committee is working on ordering new magnetic name badges for each member! We are missing the info for many members!!!
These name badges will have your name on it and your profession. Perfect for wearing when you attend any Rotary events or meetings. In order to do this, we need your most updated information. Members,
please click here to submit your info.
Past Member Announcements:
Active members now have yourname@siliconvalleyrotary.com email forwarders! Your forwarder should be your full first name plus the first initial of your last name. Emails going to your @siliconvalleyrotary.com email will be forwarded automatically to the email you have on file with our club. If you want your email forwarder changed to a different variation of your name, please email Webmaster Mitty at mittyc@siliconvalleyrotary.com.
Service Blotter Submissions: Click here to fill out The Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley Service Survey
Our Events & Projects
We hold our meetings online, but we hold regular service projects and social events in the Silicon Valley every month! This section is updated every week with our upcoming events. We welcome guests to all of our events and service projects listed here.
Also be sure to join our Meetup Group for automatic calendar updates and to RSVP for our events! These are open to all guests as well!
https://www.meetup.com/siliconvalleyrotary/
Recent Events Recap:
Award Leader Training for the Duke of Edinburgh's Award
Over the past few months, our club has agreed to become an award organization for The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award. We are now the only active non-school based organization for The Award on the west coast of the USA. The Award focuses on encouraging young people from ages 14 to 24 on learning new skills and giving back to their community through commitment and perseverance. As an award organization, our members opt into becoming mentors (known as Award Leaders). This past Sunday, Nov. 12th, we had a day-long training session for our members to become certified Award Leaders for The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award. Members Kenneth Oku, Leanza Tupfer, Yvonne Kwan, Maxi Bustos, [redacted], and Mitty Chang were able to make it out for the training. Congratulations to each of them as they join the international ranks of Award Leaders! We appreciate the time they each took to give up their Sunday for the training session, but also for the service they are committing to as mentors for young people. Here are some photos from the training event: (redacted at the request of a member].
Upcoming Events:
All times are Pacific Time! (San Francisco time)
Food Adventure & Mini-Golf Social in SF on Sunday, November 19, 2017
Members, join your fellow club members this Sunday, November 19 for our club's November social from 2-4 pm at Urban Putt (www.urbanputt.com) 1096 S Van Ness Ave, San Francisco, CA 94110 (at 22nd Street, in the Mission)!
Guests are welcome to join as well! Please make sure to leave a comment if you are planning on attending as a guest. You can also email Mitty at mitty@siliconvalleyrotary.com
Urban Putts is known for delicious food, their full bar (menu), and indoor mini-golf (golf for adults is $12). Members and guests, be sure to check in with our event chair, Monique, once you arrive!
Event Chair: Monique Ziesenhenne
Other Upcoming Club Events:
Friday, December 8, 2017 - Save the date for a club dinner (Details TBD)
Saturday, January 13, 2018 - Save the date for a club outdoor expedition (Details TBD)
Saturday, February 28, 2018 - Save the date for a club skydiving event (Details TBD)
More events coming soon! All events are open to guests, unless otherwise mentioned. Feel free to join us! If you ever have questions, please email inquiries@siliconvalleyrotary.com
What would you like to do?
Hey Members! What would you like to do? We're working on putting together some exciting socials and impactful service projects for our upcoming quarter's event calendar. Let us know what you want to do by posting in our members only Facebook Group (if you don't have access, please request it with Webmaster Mitty). Remember, you're only taking advantage of the full impact of Rotary when you're stepping up to get involved.
Happy Dollars: Do Good by Sharing Something Good
Each week we ask our members to share stories with the club and toss in a few dollars to support our efforts. The primary goal of this section is to provide a fun way of getting to know each fellow members and guests, while giving back to a good cause.
Happy dollars is an opportunity to share something positive that has happened in your life whether it is personal or business. Think of it as your opportunity to brag a little, but also put a little bit into a karma jar. The money donated through happy dollars is put to charitable use, and the message that you leave for happy dollars will be posted in our online meeting the following week for the entire week for folks to see! (Pending that it's appropriate!)
Last week's happy dollar contributions went towards our club projects. Here are some of the happy dollar messages from last week:
Thank you to member Rory Olsen for his generous $15 donation. Rory had this to say:"Cold spell today! Mercury will drop below 50 degrees today."
Thank you to member Brian Liddicoat for his generous $15 donation. Brian had this to say:"Just being happy"
Thank you all for your donations last week!
Happy dollars is also a great opportunity to share with the group about something good that has happened to you, while giving back to a great cause. Next week's happy dollars will go back to powering our club's projects locally and globally.
So what are you happy about? Share with us below to help with doing good around the world.
Selected Six
Every week at the bottom of our meetings, there is a comments section for members and guests to tell us what they enjoyed about the meeting or to ask questions to the speaker. We select six comments every week from last week’s meeting to be featured during this week’s meeting.
Here are six comments selected from last week's meeting featuring the program on Muzinda Hub: Digital Skills Training in Zimbabwe:
Member Maxi Bustos (California, USA) had this to say:"Vimbai, thanks for your presentation! The work you do is very inspiring and high impact. I have one question: how did you decide which technologies to teach? You mentioned PHP, which is still popular in web development, but many companies (specially startups) prefer Python or Ruby on Rails. I also suggest exploring Javascript (in particular frameworks like Angular4, React, NodeJS). I wish you the best! Maxi"
Member Raquel D. Juncal (Mexico) had this to say:"I never fail to be inspired by new initiatives around the world! Vimbai, great to hear about Muzinda Hub. Keep up the good work! To all the members and guests who contributed in the last two weeks with their generous donations for the relief efforts in Chiapas, Mexico... Thank you! You guys are amazing! :D"
Guest Jacob Willey had this to say:"Vimbai, this was my first SV Rotary Club meeting and I loved hearing about the particular challenges your country faces and how you are attempting to solve them! We could use a group app to order goods in bulk in local Rotary Clubs, so I'm excited to hear about innovation coming from Zimbabwe! Thanks for meeting with us!"
Guest Dr. Carlos Gabuardi, Ph.D. had this to say:"This session has made me think about very many different things and how to cope with these issues. Two extremely radical sides of development in a single word, on one side, Artificial Intelligence and on the other one, the challenges that are being faced by a country like Zimbabwe. I have learned a lot attending to these on-line meetings. I will need more than a few sentences to explain all the effervescence of ideas coming out from these two topics. I extend my congratulations to the members of the Silicon Valley Rotary Club preparing these on-line meetings, and of course to Dr. Boeree and Ms. Gwata. Thank you."
Member Leanza Tupfer (California, USA) had this to say:"AI for poker?! There are so many amazing applications of AI - what I hope is that with AI/technology it can help curb people with addiction to gambling rather than exacerbating a gambling addiction."
Member Mark Dohn (USA) had this to say:"Thank you Vim! I love that you are looking for strategies to overcome the challenges the you are facing not in the past or old economic models but what will be successful and sustainable in the future."
Be sure to leave a comment at the end of this week’s meeting after you watch the program below, and perhaps you’ll see your comment featured next week!
Program: Min-E Grants Panel
Every week we bring to you a new program on innovation, education, technology, and humanitarian service. This week we have a special program, featuring a panel of our club members Andrew Taw, Heather Shaw, and Tzviatko Chiderov.
One of the benefits of membership of this club is access to grants that are available to members only. One of these grants is called "Min-E Grants," a matching grant of up to USD$250 that members can request for service projects. The idea behind Min-E Grants has always been to empower our members to do good in whichever part of the world they call home. Being an eClub, we have members local in the Silicon Valley where we have club service projects, but we also have members who are abroad throughout the USA and in Canada, Australia, South Africa, Mexico, and Japan.
But what types of projects have been approved so far for Min-E Grants? What qualifies for a Min-E Grant? And if you are a guest or visiting Rotarian watching this video, is there a way that you can get involved? (Hint: You can partner up with one of our club members!)
During this week's special program, we have a panel of our club's Min-E Grant experts who will be answering a variety of questions on Min-E Grants. Our panelists include our Club President-elect Andrew Taw, Club Treasurer Heather Shaw, and our Club Director Tzviatko Chiderov (who also serves as the chair of the Min-E Grants Committee).
Members and guests, please join us in welcoming our members Andrew, Heather, and Tzviatko!
What did you think? Let's hear from you!
Share with us your thoughts in the comments at the bottom of this meeting page! If you have questions for the panel, feel free to ask in the comments!
Upcoming Program Schedule
All of our guest speakers and programs are recorded live online over Zoom video conference. We welcome members and guests to join us in one of these upcoming recordings. Recordings are approximately 30 minutes long and are subject to change without notice.
Upcoming Weekly Programs:
Week of
Host
Guest Speaker
Topic
Week of 11/20/2017
Heather Shaw
Joe Choi
TheraBaby for Seniors with Dementia
Week of 11/27/2017
Ferheen Abbasi
Zahra Billoo
TBC: Council on American-Islamic Relations
Week of 12/4/2017
TBA
TBA
TBA
Upcoming Recordings:
If you would like to join us for any of the live recordings, you are welcome to join us. Our online video conference room link for these recordings is always https://zoom.us/j/5104080000. Please note the timezone for all recordings are listed for San Francisco, California, USA time (Pacific Time).
You’re Almost Done! One last thing: The Attendance Survey...
Thanks for reading and watching this week’s meeting. You have two last things to do before you’re done. First, we have a very short attendance survey below for you to fill out to record your attendance.
Visiting Rotarians, this is how you can get an email receipt to pass along to your club’s secretary as proof that you’ve attended our meeting if you need it for makeups.Non-Rotarian Guests, we would love to see who is dropping by our meetings! This part is optional for you. If you think you may want to join our eClub at some point in the future, we would strongly recommend you fill out the attendance form as it will improve your chances of success for your membership application.More importantly, for all members and guests — we strongly recommend and ask that you leave a comment below in our comments area below. Tell us how you enjoyed the program. Ask this week’s speaker any questions you might have. Or just stop by and say hello and tell us where you’re from!
