My Atlanta Experience at RI 2017
About 40 Rotarians from our district, including JC Burcham and Jason and Jacci Leib, attended the Rotary International Convention in Atlanta. Stories
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About 40 Rotarians from our district, including JC Burcham and Jason and Jacci Leib, attended the Rotary International Convention in Atlanta. |
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Lenexa Art Fair RecapOn Saturday, May 13th, our club teamed up with the Western Johnson County Rotary Club to run our beer and wine booth at the Lenexa Art Fair, which was located at the Southeast corner of 87th Street Parkway & Renner Boulevard. From Phil: "Thanks so much to all for a very successful Lenexa Art Festival. We made $1,431 of which we receive 1/2. and $142 (19 bottles) of wine will go to The Lenexa Rotary Club." Thanks to all our club members who helped out: Phil Hammond, Moe Cougher, Andy Ramsey, Erik Troy, Terry Tevis, Jerry Bowmer, Pat Thomas, and Doug Gorham. |
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District Conference--Fellowship and Service A total of 181 Rotarians registered for the District 5710 Conference held May 5-6 at the Overland Park Sheraton, including 16 members from our club! If there was an award for highest percentage of club participation at the district conference, I'm pretty sure we would win! It was thrilling to see such great participation from our club, as well as other clubs around the district. Lenexa Rotarians in attendance included: Terry Tevis, Matt Janes, Pat Thomas, Steve Nettles, Phil Hammond, Mike Dix, JC Burcham, Dinah Sykes, Jason Bledsoe, Milton Jeffrey, Tobias Scheffler, Ron Tennissen, Moe Cougher, Greg Peterson, Alan Kruckemyer, and most importantly, Jason Leib, who chaired the planning committee for the whole conference!  Indoor skydiving at a Rotary conference? You bet!! Greg Peterson, Steve Nettles, Dinah Sykes, and Jason Leib (with his wife, Jacquelyn) suited up and gave it a try. Other participants visited the Prairiefire Museum or played at TopGolf.Also at the conference, attendees packaged 13,000+ meals for Rise Against Hunger--in record time, under an hour! Please take a moment to thank Jason Leib for his efforts in organizing this year's conference. He and his committee did an excellent job. |
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SMNW Interact Club.jpg) SMNW Interact and Lenexa Rotarians packaging meals for Rise Against Hunger. |
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Photos from our 50th Anniversary Thank you to Marshall Rimann for taking so many great photos of our fun anniversary celebration on Feb. 3rd! We had close to 90 people in attendance--wow! If you haven't already seen the pictures on Facebook, you can check them out here: |
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City of Lenexa Recognizes Our Club's 50 Years of Service On Jan. 17, 2017, Lenexa Mayor Mike Boehm presented a certificate of recognition to the Lenexa Rotary Club on behalf of its 50 years of service to the community and the world. A handful of club members, including Pat Thomas, Phil Hammond, Jason Leib, Milton Jeffries, and Jerry Harper were in attendance. Charter president Charles Smith and current president JC Burcham accepted the award. Charlie shared some history about the club and its role in the community. |
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Greetings from Denmark Zach Ziegenhorn is our outbound youth exchange student. He shared this post on Facebook recently, marking his 100th day in Denmark! You can follow his adventures on his blog: https://zchzg.wordpress.com/
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Happy Holidays from the Interact Club! Interact Club at Shawnee Mission Northwest, with Rick Morton, Greg Peterson, and Jan Berg
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Final Coat CountAs you know, the Lenexa Rotary Club challenged the Rotary Club of Shawnee to see which club could collect the most coats for the Johnson County Christmas Bureau this fall. Well, the results are in!
Lenexa: 178 Shawnee: 201 It was a close competition, and although our club fell short, we're all winners because 379 people will be warm this winter, thanks to our combined efforts! President JC Burcham will pay a visit to the Shawnee club this coming Friday (they meet at 7:15am at Town Hall, 11600 Johnson Drive, Shawnee, KS, for anyone interested!) to make her concession speech. Cheers to all who helped us collect so many coats!! |
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Union Horse Distilling Co. TourPictures from the Union Horse Distilling Co. tour
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HopeBUILDERS Update On a chilly Saturday morning in November, SMNW Interact students and Rotarians from the Lenexa Club (Terry Tevis, Rick Morton, Matt Janes, Steve Nettles, Greg Peterson, Jason Leib, Jim Blaufuss, Phil Hammond), and Western Johnson County Club (Kelly Vaille), volunteered with HopeBUILDERS to build a wheelchair ramp for a paralyzed KCK teenager. The young man was injured in an accident earlier this year and completion of the ramp was a requirement to allow him to finally come home from the hospital. These kinds of projects can take all day to build, but with so many dedicated volunteers, the ramp was finished before 11:30am! Great work!! |
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Stop Hunger Now update
On Nov. 29th, members of the Lenexa Rotary Club and Shawnee Mission Northwest Interact Club, as well as friends and family, gathered together to assemble more than 14,000 meals for people in need around the world. What a great way to celebrate Thanksgiving and feed thousands of people! Lenexa members in attendance (not all are pictured here): Phil Hammond, Pat Thomas, Greg Peterson, Alan Kruckemyer, Mike Dix, Moe Cougher, Andy Hoedl, Matt Janes, Rick Morton, Steve Nettles, Dennis Moore, Bill Schutte, Doug Gorham, Fred Spears, Lenet Compton, JC Burcham, Alma (exchange student from Italy), Ana (exchange student from Romania) For more pictures, visit the photo album on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pg/lenexarotary/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1195606503820841 |
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Our Youth Exchange StudentsAna (top/left) dressed as a vampire for Halloween! I don't have a picture of Alma in costume, but here is her beautiful school photo! Our club is proud to sponsor these two amazing young ladies as part of the Rotary Youth Exchange program for one year. Ana is from Romania, and Alma is from Italy. Ana is looking for a different host family for the 2nd semester, if she can find one with kids. If you think you might be able to help out, please contact Lenet Compton asap: lenetcompton@gmail.com
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Volunteers Needed for Holiday ShopUse this signup link to volunteer for the annual Johnson County Christmas Bureau Holiday Shop:
This year's Holiday Shop is located at:
16100 W. 135th St., Olathe, KS (Between Mur-Len and Black Bob, behind the Applebees)
Our club is participating on Dec. 2nd, 2:30-6:00pm. Please sign up for that time slot if you can!
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Follow Zach on his travels in Denmark.jpg) Zach Ziegenhorn is our outbound student. His parents are also the host of our exchange student from Italy, Almi. Zach's mom tells me he is having an awesome time in Denmark!! His e-mail address is zacharyziegenhorn@yahoo.com and you can also follow his blog as a great way to keep connected – "hopefully he will keep writing on it!!" The blog is at https://zchzg.wordpress.com/ and if you “follow” you will get an e-mail every time he posts a new entry. As Zach's sponsoring club, we have a duty to support him during his adventure. I sincerely hope you will periodically check in and let him know Rotarians back home are interested and proud of what this year will mean to the rest of his life. |
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Meet Our Youth Exchange Kids (arriving early August!)Alma from Italy
Birthday is November 28 and she is 17 years old. Her father is a dentist and mother a housewife. She is an only-child. Her English is "fair" and her strong areas in school are math, computer science, physics, chemistry, biology, philosophy...so we will let her slide a bit on the English proficiency. She comes from a school of 1730 so will fit right in to the big-school environment at SMNW. However she comes from a small, quiet village.
Her counselor is Becca Coleman. Her 1st host family is Matt and Kamille Merz from Lenexa.
Ana from Romania
Birthday is September 22 and she is 16 years old. Her father is an engineer and her mother is a doctor. She has a brother, Teodor. She is fluent in English and is fair in German. The number in her school is 2140 and she also lists math, chemistry, etc. as her classes. Other interesting classes are Logic and Plastic Art.
Her counselor is Lenet Compton. Her 1st host family is Greg and Judith Schieszer from Prairie Village.
More on school and home life next week. The girls are arriving early August!
Please reach out to me if you are interested in hosting January thru May 2017 or know someone who may be interested in hosting. I can be reached at 913-209-3864 or lenetcompton@gmail.com
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Chris Swanda gave an enjoyable talk about Survival Skills in the Business World, blending his barefoot survival techniques, an ability to "MacGyver" his way out of any situation, a sense of humor to our club on Sept. 2nd. If you want to follow what other interesting stories Chris is weaving his way into, follow him on Facebook: 
On Aug. 26, Anne Brewer, volunteer with SAFEHOME, talked about recognizing signs of domestic abuse and its effect on small businesses. Her presentation, “Domestic Violence Impact on the Workplace”, is available to businesses to educate employers on strategies to help employees who may be in an abusive situation. She emphasizes the dollar and productivity loss companies experience when people miss work due to abuse. She gives concrete information for employer and employee resources, along with how to respond to such a delicate situation..jpg)