Last Saturday night I and several others from our District Leadership Team attended a fundraising event held by the Cedar Falls Rotary Club. The proceeds will be used to fund a global grant to provide water wells in several Honduran villages. During the event, an eight year-old girl named Lyra Benjamin was honored for her charitable work to help people in need. To celebrate her First Communion, she chose to raise charitable funds instead of receiving personal gifts. Lyra raised nearly $1,800 to help victims of Hurricane Irma. The really impressive thing she and her family did was to research which charitable organizations she could trust to handle disbursement of the funds. What did her research tell her? Trust Rotary International!
Lyra gave the funds to the Cedar Falls Rotary Club to make sure the funds made their way to the disaster fund of The Rotary Foundation. We are honored and humbled by Lyra’s story. If you are inspired by her story, you are welcome to give to Rotary’s Disaster Response Fund at
rotary.org/en/donate. Thank you, Lyra, for your inspiration!
Katie Wilford—2018-19 Global Scholar
Katie Wilford is studying at the University of Melbourne in Australia this academic year, pursuing her Master of Education Degree. She’s pictured here with Past RI President, Ian Riseley, while attending a Rotary District Conference last February.
Katie is from Pocahontas, Iowa.
We’ll feature more of Katie’s experiences in next month’s newsletter. If you know of a candidate who may be interested in being a future Global Scholar, please reach out to our Global Scholar District Chair, John Stewart, a member of the Dubuque Rotary Club. You may reach him at
As We Enter the Final Quarter of our Rotary Year—Here are Reminders!
- Has your club met your goal for PolioPlus this year? Don’t miss out on the Major Donor match of 2 to 1, along with the Gates Foundation match of 2 to 1. You have until June 30, 2019 to take advantage of this opportunity. If you don’t know if your club has made it, ask your President or Club Foundation Chair. Or ask our District PolioPlus Chair, Amy Weber, at amyweber54@gmail.com
- Attend the District Conference in Clear Lake on April 26 and/or 27. It’s a great opportunity to celebrate Rotary with your own members and those from other clubs around the District. Come and be inspired! And watch your club’s duck win the Duck Race!
- Make sure your club will meet your goal for the Annual Fund this year. You have three months to make the goal by June 30. The best way to help your club meet its Annual Fund goal is to make a gift yourself! If your club needs ideas to help meet your goal, please contact Don Meyer, District Foundation Chair, at 641-251-4655 or at foundationchair@district5970.org.
- Contribute to the Silent Auction at the District Conference. If you have an item for the Silent Auction, please contact District Secretary, Suellen Kolbet at des@district5970.org with the description of the item. Remember, all funds raised go to the PolioPlus fund.
Thanks for all each of you do to be the inspiration for the great work of Rotary!
Yours in Rotary,
Don Meyer
District Foundation Chair
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