Rotaracts are members of Rotary under the age of 30. In July of this year the Rotaract Club of Bahir Dar had 6 members, now they are up to 15 with 10 more to be inducted into the club later this year. There are currently 3 women in their club. They are a very active club and are not sponsored or receive any funding from any Rotary club.
Some of their activities include support for the eradication of Polio through Rotary. A local project of theirs was the beautification the Bahir Dar park and walkway beside Lake Tana. Most importantly though, is that they are caring for some orphans in 2 homes and they have a kindergarten which they manage and run. Some of our team visited the kindergarten and were very impressed, both with the school and the children. They have 50 students per class, with a total of 150 students attending the school. It costs the parents 50 birr ( about $2.50) per month to attend and 300 birr ( about $15) at the beginning of the year to cover the cost of a uniform and textbooks. We were able to give a few footballs and pencils to the school and they were well received.
Their club has again volunteered to assist us, as they have done in the past with our missions to Bahir Dar and Addis Ababa, . We have been told that our missions have inspired 1 or 2 of their friends to become Rotaracts this year.
Some of the children having lunch at the kindergarten sponsored and run by the Bahir Dar Rotaract Club.
The Classroom
On Wednesday, we hosted a dinner, to thank them for the hard work that they have done for us while we are here and for the preparation they did before our mission started. Some of them have taken vacation time in order to help us.
I believe that their club is a world class example of what young people can do together and they have set a standard that any Rotaract club could do well to emulate.