Flipping the Model: Innovating to Center Indigenous Wisdom in Guatemala
MEETING FOR THE WEEK OF Mar. 17, 2025
This Meeting at a Glance:
Program: Flipping the Model: Innovating to Center Indigenous Wisdom in Guatemala
Speaker: Elena Wason
Is this your first time to visit us? If so, welcome to our weekly online meeting! To complete our meeting, please continue reading from here to the bottom of this page. Each Monday, our week’s meeting is posted early in the morning, U.S. Pacific Time. These meetings are designed so that you can read and watch what we post anytime during the week. The entire meeting takes about 60 minutes to complete, with the video conference recording of the program being the bulk of the time. Note that you can easily read this meeting with your favorite device, so feel free to take our meeting on the go with you. Please also complete the attendance form at the bottom and leave a comment. Enjoy!
To properly attend this meeting, please:
Read and watch the content below in its entirety.
Complete the attendance survey.
Everyone is encouraged to leave a comment in the Disqus section at the bottom of the page.
Message from our President
Welcome Members, fellow Rotarians, friends, and guests. Thanks for joining our weekly meeting!
WEEKLY FUNNY WITH SHAGS
We believe laughter is an important part of life, and we should all make time to laugh a little. This segment of our meeting is meant to tickle you just enough. These funnies are curated by member Steven "Shags" Shagrin!
Whose Monkey is This?
A man walks into a posh restaurant and orders his meal. While he takes the first bite and is looking around, a monkey swings down and steals his plate from him before he is able to stop it.
The man asks the waiter, "Excuse me sir, who owns the monkey?"
The waiter replies, "It belongs to the piano player."
The man walks over to the piano player and says, "Do you know your monkey stole my food?"
The pianist responds, "No, but if you hum it, I'll play it."
INSPIRATION
Let's bring together David Attenborough, a titanosaur, and 360° video for this week's inspirational view. It's a BBC piece that you should take an active interest in by clicking and holding on the video screen while moving the cursor. If this doesn't get you in touch with your inner 2nd grader fascinated by dinosaurs, I'm not sure what will.
LEARN SOMETHING NEW
How It's Made
Socks!
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PROGRAM: Flipping the Model: Innovating to Center Indigenous Wisdom in Guatemala
SPEAKER: Elena Wason
We bring you a new program every week on innovation, entrepreneurship, and education and how they contribute to service to others.
Natün Guatemala is a majority Maya-led organization passionate about elevating Indigenous leadership, rights and capacity. They equip local change agents and use existing local resources to effectively and sustainably build healthy, vibrant Maya communities.
Natün has been through a period of intense transition in the last few years, moving from a problematic model of external intervention, hand-outs, and short-term thinking, to embody a locally-led, long-term systemic change model which centers Indigenous culture and expertise. Along the way, they have failed, learned, evolved, and ultimately stepped into doing impactful development work.
Our speaker, Elena Wason, has been Natün Guatemala’s Executive Director since 2023, after having worked in leadership in the organization for four years.
Prior to leading Natün, Elena served as Programs Director and Strategy and Operations Director in nonprofits in Guatemala, spent two years working on the ground in Honduras as a Field Facilitator, as well as multiple years in the UK’s non-profit sector and think tanks in roles ranging from fundraising to policy.
Elena holds a Masters’ degree in Governance, Development and Public Policy from the Institute of Development Studies as part of the University of Sussex. She has published a book and numerous articles about the development struggles faced by communities in Central America.
Members and guests, please welcome Elena Wason!
To learn more, go to:
Natün Guatemala post regular updates on their Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn pages, where you can find out how to get involved:
https://www.facebook.com/gtnatun
https://www.instagram.com/natunguatemala/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/natunguatemala
To learn more about the Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley, go to:
http://rotary.cool
Our Three Podcast Series
Our main program speakers are available as podcasts in addition to YouTube videos! Each week, they are available on Spotify and Apple podcasts.
Or you can click below for this week’s speaker:
The Weekly Rotarian
Inspiring Solutions
And our original podcast, featuring some of the best of our previous speakers, is still available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts
Development Success Stories
Our third podcast features success stories about economic development from around the world. It is available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, or you can click below.
UPCOMING PROGRAM RECORDING SCHEDULE
All of our guest speakers and programs are recorded live online over Zoom video conference. We welcome members and guests to join us in one of these upcoming recordings. Recordings are approximately 30 minutes long and are subject to change without notice.
Our online video conference room link for these recordings is always http://zoom.siliconvalleyrotary.com/. You are welcome to join us! Please note the timezone listed for all recordings is US Pacific Time (San Francisco, California, USA).
If you can’t join the live recording, please send your questions for an upcoming speaker to programs@siliconvalleyrotary.com.
THE ATTENDANCE SURVEY
Thanks for reading and watching this week’s meeting. You have two last things to do before you’re done.
We have a very short attendance survey below for you to fill out to record your attendance.
Visiting Rotarians, this is how you can get an email receipt to pass along to your club’s secretary as proof that you’ve attended our meeting if you need it for makeup.
Non-Rotarian Guests, we would love to see who is dropping by our meetings! This part is optional for you. If you think you may want to join our eClub at some point in the future, we would strongly recommend you fill out the attendance form as it will improve your chances of success for your membership application.
For all members and guests — we strongly recommend and ask that you leave a comment in our comments area below. Tell us how you enjoyed the program. Ask this week’s speaker any questions you might have. Or just stop by and say hello and tell us where you’re from!
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