January 29th, 2014 Meeting - Welcome back!

Hello, everyone!
It's been a long time, but we are finally back in session! We had a meeting on January 29th to welcome the club back and go over the plan for the semester. The meeting began with a discussion about future e-board members. Our current president, vice president, secretary, and treasurer are all seniors, so the group will be going through a transition at the end of the semester. Several people expressed interest in taking over one of those positions.

Jenn announced to the club that our $1,000 donation to the Global Uganda project was sent.

Next we discussed upcoming events, including the Swimarathon and Dump 'n' Run. The Rotaractors who are available signed up for Swimarathon and agreed to hang posters around campus about the event. Dump 'n' Run will be covered in an upcoming meeting.

Another topic brought up was Adopt-a-Highway. Josh was contacted by someone from PennDot and was told that the section we originally thought was ours will be expanding. All Rotaractors agreed that this was a good thing and that we will plan a highway clean up day once the weather becomes warmer.

Have a great day! :)

November 4th, 2013 Meeting - Rotaract Club Raffle Begins!

The Slippery Rock Rotaract club is pleased to announce that the Rotaract Club Raffle has begun! Following the 2 week delay, our members kicked it into high gear and solidified details and acquired prizes. I believe all members can agree that we thought this raffle would be easy to assemble. This was certainly not the case! Due to this being a new endeavor, businesses were less willing to donate than we had anticipated. We were still able to snag some donations, but the club also had to use some money from dues to purchase gift cards from different businesses. But in the end, we did what we had to do! We amassed enough prizes that we'll be able to select three winners. The prizes are as follows:

1st place
$30 gift card to North Country Brewing Co.
$25 gift card to Ginger Hill Tavern
$20 gift card to Sheetz
$10 cash prize

2nd place
Rachel's Roadhouse gift basket
gift card to Chili's
$10 cash prize

3rd place
coupons for freebies from Subway
coupon for a free haircut in downtown Slippery Rock
$10 cash prize


We're extremely proud of the prizes we've gathered! At the November 4th meeting we had 15 members there. Each member received a packet of 10 raffle tickets that they must sell with tickets being $5 apiece. We've agreed as a group that either everyone sells all 10 of their tickets, or they must make up the difference out of pocket. These prizes are so great that we don't anticipate selling to be an issue! On top of selling our own booklets of 10, we will be selling extra tickets in the quad during common hour times. We're hoping for this raffle to be very rewarding, but as anything in life, we will just have to wait and see!

To members that missed Monday's meeting, please email Jenn about getting your own packet of tickets to sell! To anyone not in our club, email Jenn to buy raffle tickets! Her email address is jln5962@sru.edu.

Have a great day, everyone!

October 21st, 2013 Meeting - Rotaract Club Raffle

Good evening, folks!
At tonight's meeting the Rotaractors focused primarily on the upcoming raffle. Unfortunately, fall break has caused a disconnect in the planning process and the raffle must be pushed back two weeks.

However, tonight's meeting was successful because we devised a more concise plan as to how we will get this raffle off the ground. The "Business Committee" will be contacting local businesses asking for donations by the start of the raffle on November 4th. If we do not receive enough donations we will use money we have collected from dues to purchase gift cards as a Plan B. Next, the "Planning Committee" will be focusing on where we will sell these tickets on campus and getting permission for solicitation. They will then set up dates and times when we will stand with tables at local businesses and in the quad to sell to the public and students. The final committee is the "PR Committee". They are in charge of creating the logo for the raffle (as seen below), printing out the tickets, and compiling the prize baskets. The raffle will run from November 4th to December 2nd. This will be a wonderful way to wrap up the semester and will be a fun project that is entirely our own. We have a lot of work ahead of us, but we feel confident that we can do it!

The raffle logo, created by Josh Duman

September 23, 2013 Meeting

On Monday, September 23rd we had a very exciting meeting! First, we reviewed the outcome of Village Fest. We are very pleased to announce that we made $500 to donate to Lukaya, Uganda! We're very happy with this amount, however, we don't want to stop there. At this meeting we decided we wanted to do another fundraiser for this cause. We have decided to have a raffle in which the prizes will be small monetary sums and donated goods from local businesses. We do not have the details solidified yet, but at our meeting on September 30th we will be moving along with this project and hopefully have more plans in place!

Our next upcoming event is the "All Night Bowl In". At this event, volunteers will go to the ceramics building and create bowls which will be used at a later time for soup. This is always a fun event and the Rotaract club is looking forward to it!

Slippery Rock Village Fest

Our beautiful booth

Hello, all. Today is a great day, because Village Fest was very successful! The Rotaract club sold so many funnel cakes that we ran out of batter, 15 gallons to be exact! The funnel cakes went for $4 each. In addition, we ran out of french fries, which were sold at $2. We had a steady stream of customers all day with very little down time. We also sold most of the wonderful homemade dog treats that were so graciously donated by Judy Hughes.

Jan, Hannah, and Ashley making funnel cakes

The day started off bright and early at 7:30am to begin setting up the booth. We had quite a few Rotaractors there to help, as well as Jan, the owner of the funnel cake supplies, and her husband, to show us the ropes. At 10:00 the festival opened and customers started pouring in. From there it was smooth sailing all day. Village Fest ended at 5:00pm and the booth had to be torn down completely by 6:00, which was no problem for our hardworking group!

We were very fortunate to be able to use Jan's equipment yesterday. She stayed all day and made every single french fry and funnel cake we sold. She was so pleasant to work with and genuinely enjoyed helping us and spending time with our Rotaractors. She worked so hard all day and asked for next to nothing in return. It's wonderful people like Jan that remind us of why we love this organization! We were also lucky to have Ken Bennett there for a large portion of the day. He spoke to customers that were waiting for their funnel cakes about what we were raising money for and inspired many people to make extra donations to the cause. Ken was a wonderful addition to our booth!

We don't have the final figures for our donation to Uganda yet, but as of now we do know that we did very well! Check back later to see about our official donation to Lukaya, Uganda!

Carlie, Austin, and Eric setting up the booth

Jan

Zak helping to unload the fryer

A.J. deep in thought

Josh setting up the beverage display

Mariah tired but pleased before tear down

Off To a Great Start!

Tonight was our second meeting of the semester. It was so encouraging to see all of the fresh new faces amongst the group! We have a wonderful variety of students from all academic majors and years of schooling.

Ken Bennett, Slippery Rock Rotarian, was the featured speaker at tonight's meeting. He came to speak about a global grant he's applying for that provides clean water to the people of Lukaya, Uganda. Lukaya is an impoverished, truck-stop town along the "AIDS Highway". Sadly, it is one of the poorest countries on earth. Ken has done work with the Mustard Seed Academy in Lukaya, which has created a sustainable learning community. His grant includes water sanitation, well drilling, quality education for children, and to teach the inhabitants of Lukaya about sustainability amongst other things. Through a unanimous vote by the Rotaract club, it has been decided that the money raised at Village Fest this upcoming weekend will go towards this cause. The Rotaractors are very excited to work with Ken and to help the hard-working people of Lukaya. If you would like to learn more about the Mustard Seed Academy, go to www.realpartnersuganda.org.

Another exciting international project that was discussed is the possibility of teaming up with Duquesne's Rotaract Club to do a similar clean water project in Honduras. The club has been exploring twin clubs and it appears that this could be a perfect way to do that. Just think of all that we can accomplish if we work with a club in Honduras as well as Duquesne's club!

 This Saturday, September 14, 2013, is Slippery Rock's annual Village Fest. This year the Rotaract Club will have a tent set up next to the Slippery Rock Rotary Club. We will be selling funnel cakes! Yes, you read that right, FUNNEL CAKES! With our competitive pricing, fabulous customer service, and smiling young faces we should be able to attract many people. We are all very hopeful and would like to see this be a great success so that we can make a nice donation to Lukaya, Uganda! Check back for updates on the outcome of Village Fest.