Fort Worth Southwest Rotary Club participates in Neighborhood Litter Stomp-out hosted by Keep Fort Worth Beautiful
Saturday October 16th was "Neighborhood Litter Stomp" hosted by Keep Fort Worth Beautiful. The club responded with 4 volunteers to team up and clean Chisholm Trail Park. Shown in photo are Tammy Terra, President Bern Havey , Chris Castoro as they began their trek to pick-up trash and avoid rattle snakes in their assigned area. People of Action showing the community some Service Above Self.
Members participate in Neighborhood Litter Stomp-out
Several years ago the Fort Worth Parks Department installed park benches along the Trinity River. Without maintenance, their condition deteriorated. Members of our six Fort Worth Rotary Clubs met one Saturday and refurbished 35 benches. In addition, our team placed our Rotary logo in each refurbished bench.
Home Depot provided $500 in gift cards for sanding supplies and outdoor varnish. Check out the before and after photos.
Our flag project is one of our major sources of funding for community service projects. Partnering with a local Boy Scout Troop, a flag is put out in the front yard of Fort Worth area residents during each of the major holidays.
Our partnering scout troops receive a portion of the revenues for their scouting projects.
The Rotary Club of Fort Worth Southwest funded plaque's for students that graduated from Tarrant County College under a Catholic Charities "Stay the Course" scholarship program provided to qualifying students.
Member Jim Evans represented FWSWRC at the Stay the Course awards ceremony.
Fort Worth Southwest RC partners with Catholic Charities
Together, Fort Worth Southwest and Tucson, AZ Rotary Clubs developed a Rotary International Grant to purchase a Sonogram and provide the necessary training to certify the staff for a Kenya Health Department Clinic medical staff. Now that the clinic is certified, families in the area are able to use health insurance.
During the training, an expectant mother was asked if she would allow them to check her and here baby with the sonogram. When the sonogram results were made available to the mother she discovered she was going to have twins. This $6000 project will continue to change lives for years to come.
Fort Worth Rotary Southwest Rotary Club partners with the Rotary Club of Tucson to purchase Sonogram
The Fort Worth Southwest Club has established a fun and heartwarming sistership with the Portlaoise Rotary Club in Portlaoise, Ireland.
The program team researched a global club that met at the same time as the Fort Wort Southwest club so that they could participate in a true joint meeting. After considerable digging, they contacted the Portlaoise Rotary Club in Ireland and had their first joint meeting in November. The Fort Worth club meets at noon on Thursday and the Irish club meets at 6 pm. Club secretary Jim Ervin noted that it was interesting to see the similarities and differences in practices between the clubs.
The Ireland Club does not recite the four-way test at their meeting, but the clubs will be swapping banners by mail. The clubs and are now working to identify a project that they can do together and plan to continue to meet by Zoom in 2021.
The Pandemic of 2020-2021 may have prevented us from meeting face to face, but it certainly did not prevent us from seeing and hearing quality speakers at our virtual meetings.
If you are interested in learning about what membership in the Fort Worth Rotary Club can mean for you please complete the "Contact Us" in the menu bar at the top of this website.
Fort Worth Southwest partnered with the Rotary Club of Seattle, Washington to provide a laptop for a needy university student in Uganda
Rotarians have a knack for partnering with others to help those in need. Sometimes these partnerships with other clubs 2000 miles apart, but it works. Through a Rotary Club in Seattle, Washington, we found out that a student attending the University of Kampala located in the Republic of Uganda was in need of a lap top. We shipped a used lap top to the Rotary Club in Seattle. In turn they were able to insure all private information was removed and updated the programs. This lap top was then shipped to Uganda.
This is a photo of Fred Kanene at Kampala University in Uganda, with the laptop we sent. We are in the process of encouraging members to donate laptops.
Student attending the University of Kampala located in the Republic of Uganda provided a lap top.
A converted YMCA building was repurposed as a Community Center by the City of Fort Worth. In need of a library, the centers library has been started through a partnership between Friends of the Library and the Fort Worth Southwest Rotary Club.
The City of Fort Worth purchased a former YMCA for the purpose of turning it into a community center in the Las Vegas Boulevard area, an underserved region of Fort Worth. But the center was in need of a library. Our club partnered with The Friends of the Library to provide the initial inventory.
Since 2014 we have donated more than 6,000 books to second graders at three elementary schools in underserved areas of Fort Worth.
Many of the children have said the books they received were their first books ever to own themselves. We provided the books in partnership with The Friends of the Library in Fort Worth.
Fort Worth Southwest RC partners with the Friends of the Library to provide books for 2nd Graders
Over the years we have donated more than 18,000 dictionaries to schools in underserved areas of Fort Worth
Our club has donated new dictionaries to third graders at six Fort Worth ISD elementary schools since 1992 when the project was started by club member Paul Curtis. Over the years we have donated more than 18,000 dictionaries to schools in underserved areas of Fort Worth. The children have told us again and again how excited they are to own their own dictionaries.
Fort Worth Southwest has given new dictionaries to third graders in Fort Worth ISD since 1992
Rotary International is the
world's first service club organization, with more than 1.2 million
members in 33,000 clubs worldwide. Rotary club members are volunteers
who work locally, regionally, and internationally to combat hunger,
improve health and sanitation, provide education and job training,
promote peace, and eradicate polio under the motto Service Above Self.