The President’s Corner
December 7, 2015
It’s finally chilly here in northeast Florida. We have a big week this week at First Coast Rotaract. We have our only monthly Membership Meeting this week on Thursday, December 10th at High Tide Burrito, and we have our social, the Annual Holiday Party on Saturday, December 12th. As always, guests are welcome to our monthly membership meetings, but this social is one of two socials that is members only.
Our speaker at our meeting this week will be Natasha Hines. She is a Career Advisor at the Florida Coastal School of Law. She will be speaking about “Perfecting your Elevator Speech.”
As a reminder, please see our Treasurer, Patrick Horvath, to pay your dues or to set up a payment plan.
Our next service event is Saturday, December 19th from the time has changed from 12:30pm to 6pm. The full details are below.
Have a great week & see you on Thursday!
– Jen Suharmadji
First Coast Rotaract meets at Hightide Burrtito Co. the 2nd & 4th Thursday of each month. Join us for networking & socializing at 5:30pm, followed by our meeting at 6:15pm. Guests are always welcome at our meetings, service, and social events.
Check out our Calendar, Follow us on Facebook, or Look for our Meet Up events!
Club Social
Save the date for our next social event: Our Annual Holiday Party.
It will be on Saturday, December 12th at 7:00pm at our President-Elect Tony Brazell’s House. Our Annual Holiday Party is a time for the club to come together and celebrate and be merry. It is members only plus significant others.
We will be having a potluck style dinner and Rotaract will be providing the main dish of a turkey and a ham. Please see Tatty to see what you should bring as a side.
There will be a white elephant gift exchange with a price point of approx. $20. This always brings some laughs with some memories are made.
RSVP to the facebook page.
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Community Service
Please note the time revision. We will be filling and distributing toys with the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots Program. We will be gathering and and distributing toys to approx. 50 families every 15 minutes. The first wave of families is at 1pm, but arrive by 12:30 to receive direction. We will be at Regency Square Mall in Arlington. We will most likely go out to dinner as a social after the event so plan for that as well!
The mission of the U. S. Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots Program is to collect new, unwrapped toys during October, November and December each year, and distribute those toys as Christmas gifts to less fortunate children in the community in which the campaign is conducted.
To learn more about the organization, you can visit their website: http://jacksonville-fl.toysfortots.org/local-coordinator-sites/lco-sites/Default.aspx
The intent is that a Recipient will enter to pick up their toys at the appointed time. There should be 50 families every 15 minutes and 150 an hour (50 at 8:00am, 50 at 8:15am, 50 at 8:30am, 50 at 9:00am, etc…). This may seem like a lot but it won’t be bad at all if we have 50 volunteers. The Recipient will go to the entry station to check in. The will show the volunteer their ID and the volunteer will pull their application (printed and separate by appointment groups). Once the volunteer verifies it is the same ID on the application, the Recipient will be asked to have a seat in the waiting area. The entry station volunteer will hand the toy runner the application to fill. The toy runner will take the application to the toy area and have the toy fillers fill the bags. It will be not unlike Halloween. There will be 2-3 volunteers per age group and gender (2 for boys age 0-2, 2 for girls age 0-2, etc…). The Toy Runner will simply hold out a bag and state the number of children they have for that group. The Toy Fillers will place 3 toys in the bag and the Toy Runner moves onto the next age/gender group. After the bag is filled, the Toy Runner will grab an age-appropriate book (while supplies last) and add it to the bag. They will then go out to the waiting area and call the name of the family. The Toy Runner will escort them to the exit station and then return for a new application at the entry station. The exit station will confirm the Recipients identity and have them sign the application. At this point, the Recipient will leave. The total time for a Recipient to be in the shop should be about 2-3 minutes.
There will be additional emails sent out to the confirmed volunteers with various pieces of information, to include: safety information, points of contact, do’s and don’ts, etc… . I have also enclosed a Gratuitous Service Agreement that will need to be signed by every volunteer. There will be some printed out at the distribution center so don’t worry if you are unable to print. We will not be accepting volunteers under the age of 14 for various reasons. We appreciate their help but don’t want them to get trampled. The appointments have a 15 minute gap at the end of each hour to offer a chance to catch our breath.
First Coast Rotaract 