June 18 2008

Cathy Hagan, Patsy Towery



Meeting minutes June 18th, 2008

Meeting was called to order by Eddie Robinson with Beetle noted to be at a meeting in Los Angeles this week. The invocation was offered and John Hanson introduced two visiting Rotarians to our club for the morning. Lyman Whitehead provided us with some health, happiness, and humor. Patty Cavanaugh reminded everyone that the 20th Anniversary Year Kickoff would be held at Chestnut Hill Plantation Clubhouse from 6-9p.m. on June 21st. Business casual is the recommended dress and heavy hors d'oeuvres will be served. New officers are to be inducted. No meeting will be held on June 25th because of the social. Eddie Robinson received his new presidential ID badge from Sy Amick for the 2008-09 year.

Patsy Towery, the Director of Special Programs for Midlands Technical College, was introduced by Eddie Robinson. She provided a broad overview of these special programs offered at the college and divided them into three different categories. The first was community education which was comprised of programs ranging from art and writing to first aid for pets, dancing classes and language courses. While some provided career building opportunities like calligraphy and cake decorating, others like piano or ballroom dancing were mostly for fun. She highlighted two travel opportunities, one to Costa Rica and the other to Spain, which provided students with Spanish immersion programs in both language and culture. She noted that in Costa Rica, students would actually live with locals during their stay. We were reminded that there was no long, formal process that had to be completed before taking advantage of these courses. The next tier of programs she discussed was the career programs. These included courses in animal control, certified financial planning (2yr program), pool operator, interior decorating, locksmith, and owning and operating a home child day-care program. She discussed the locksmith program at greater length including the contributions of fellow Rotarian Skey Caskey to development of the course. She also acknowledged the contribution of our own Eddie Robinson in the development of the first aid of for pets course and how both of these courses have been very well received and popular. The final tier of courses mentioned were those provided to businesses by Midlands on a contractual basis. Employees of these businesses could take these courses as a benefit. Examples of programs included real estate, financial, and language programs. “Command Spanish” classes were emphasized because of the growing population of Hispanics/Latinos in our area. This course provides simple instruction on terminology and phrases specific to certain fields of employment (ie law enforcement or medicine) to enable some level of efficient communication. Patsy finished by inviting Rotarians to contact her with any course ideas they might have or willingness to teach in the program. Teachers are allowed to take other courses offered for free if so desired.

At the completion of the presentation, Patsy Towery provided The Rotary with a gift-certificate worth $150.00 towards taking any course at the college mentioned. Skey Caskey adroitly auctioned off the certificate for $80.00. Skey also unveiled the banner that was beautifully refurbished by his wife to hang in the meeting room. As the meeting was not yet over, some happy dollars were offered, including two for Skey Caskey who started “happy dollars” at our club. The meeting was adjourned at 8:30am.

Reported: David C Isbell