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Chair Roy Garrett opened the meeting with a toast to Rotary International. President Neville Taylor welcomed guest Peter Nichols, and Neville John introduced guest Le-Hoa Wysham. Michelle Crawford introduced us to mental health week and the “Lift the Lid” awareness raising efforts, noting that raffle money today will be donated to “Lift the Lid”, and she invited us all to “just keep shining”. Headgear worn by members this morning lifted more than lids -- some of it raised some eyebrows!!!!! Millie Swan told us an amazing tall tale about alcohol, hotels, WA, missed opportunities, cluelessness and naivety, at least some of which turned out to be true (we are sure the cluelessness was not true). Note: By this time, there was standing room only, come early next week for a seat! Announcements Russell Rolls reminded us that the next DIK effort is on Saturday 27 October, and called for additional volunteers. Peter Duras reported the recent sausage sizzle at Collingwood Bunnings was a great success with $1230 raised for the Indonesian Tsunami Relief Fund. Therese Robinson informed us of the Unite to Fight Cancer event in support of Peter MacCallum on Sunday 28th October. Marshals are required who can work 6am-3pm. You will be provided with a t-shirt, a meal every 4 hours, snacks and water. Let Therese know if you are interested. Frank O’Brien reminded us of the Sunday 21th October Echuca Moama joint social event. Tom Callander and Russell Rolls are running in the Melbourne Marathon, the 10km event, and would appreciate sponsors (see either of them). Alan Seale announced that Raphael Wong recently returned from his NGSE to D1950 in Bavaria, Germany. Unfortunately he had to come home early as his wife fell ill, nevertheless he had a very full program mostly in Bayreuth which included solo performances. His visit was featured on local media, both print and TV, and he has been invited to return next June to perform at the 2019 International Convention in Hamburg. We have confirmed with D1950 that they would like to repeat the exchange next year. Kevin Love reported that a recent LMP graduate Senior Sergeant Steve McRae has secured funding ($200,000 State Govt. grant) for supporting a ‘Mental Health First Aid’ education initiative in the Monash LGA secondary school network (with the help of the Rotary Club of Glen Waverley) . The program will be rolled out to every Year 10 secondary school student (about 9,000 students) in the Monash LGA over the next 12-18 months. A great flow-on outcome from LMP.
President Neville’s Announcements Ludovic Grosjean, aged 29 of the Melbourne City Rotaract Club, one of only six young innovators worldwide to win the 2018 “Rotary People of Action” award, for humanitarian work involving cutting-edge technology and community collaboration. In particular through his engineering consultancy OceanXGroup designing and delivering anti-pollution work combining artificial intelligence with sensors and drones. RI President Barry Rassin picked the winners personally. A reminder to members to pass on to Suzette Taylor contact details of partners and friends to build the friends of RCM with the first friends event coming up on Sunday 28th October. Laneway Learning Class, “The Essential Writing Workout”, like a physical workout with a personal trainer but tailored to your ‘brain’. rsvp Suzette at suzette.taylor5@bigpond.com no later than Friday 19th October.
Guest Speaker – Robyn Hunter, newly appointed CEO of Mind Australia Mind Australia aims to improve the quality of the lives of people having ongoing mental health issues. Mind Australia (Mind_A) is community-managed, non-government, with commitment to the individual, families and carers, has a recovery-based approach, helping people to self-manage their condition, and has been already operating for 40 years. Services include sub-acute efforts, residential services, Recovery College (an education and training platform), and aiming for genuine partnerships. Mind_A also runs a Mind Equality Centre opened in May 2017 for alternative communities, hoping to meet unmet needs in this area. It is also working through the NDIS to achieve the maximum benefits from the new funding and operating models, as well as planning new specialist accommodation facilities. A relatively new initiative is their Caring Fairly campaign – a co-operative campaign around carers, particularly volunteer carers, including young carers. Question and discussion included the current incidence of mental health and the issues for young people (including technology and social isolation). Before President Neville closed the meeting, he expressed appreciation for the morning’s program and advised that we had raised $295 for Australian Rotary Health’s National annual fundraising day for mental health research. Well done all! President Neville then closed the meeting with reference to this year’s Rotary theme of “Be the Inspiration” to do good in the world. |
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Guest Speaker Robyn Hunter
