The Rotary Club of Irkutsk was the second rotary club to be
chartered in the former Soviet Union. It just turned five
years old and has 25 members. It is involved in a number
of projects in and around Irkutsk.
The club is involved in a number of community projects. Last
year the club coordinated and supervised the distribution of 1.8 million
dollars worth of medical supplies donated by the
Rotary Foundation
of Rotary International.
Their ongoing project is the support of a local orphanage for speech
and hearing impaired children. Their most recent donation was $5,000
dollars worth of hearing aids.
It also organizes local clean up projects and appears frequently
in the local media.
The club is very active in youth activities. It sponsers a
Rotaract
and an Interact Club that were formed in 1995.
Both clubs are organized like Rotary Clubs. Rotaract is
for people aged 18-30, and Interact is for high school students.
Both of these clubs are very interested in cultural
exchanges with other Rotaract Clubs.
Two outgoing ambassadorial scholars and two youth exchange students
(one outgoing, and one currently in California) are being sponsored
by the club. The club has also hosted an American Group Study
Exchange team and sponsored one in return. Pictured is Olga
Vasilieva, one of the ambassadorial scholars. She is a Junior
at the Siberian-American College of Business Management at
Irkutsk State University and will be spending six months at
a University in Texas. Olga was also my very dilligent and
patient tutor of Russian.
I was often humbled by the tremendous zeal and amount of work put
in by the members of the club. Life is still hard and uncertain
in Russia, yet the members devote large amounts of their time and
resources to club activities. I soon saw why. Many things are in
turmoil in Russia, and Rotary and its philosophy represents one part
of the new society they are striving to create.
I would be happy to relay any questions or ideas for projects or student and rotaract exchanges to the Rotary Club of Irkutsk. You can E-mail me at egropp@alaska.net or fax: [U.S.A.] (907) 562-1831.
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