The Memory Project - Creating a Kinder World Through Art
Meeting for the week of September 5, 2022 - September 11, 2022
This Meeting at a Glance:
Program: The Memory Project - Creating a Kinder World Through Art
Speaker: Ben Schumaker
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 make sure to complete the attendance form at the bottom and leave a comment. Enjoy!
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Everyone is also encouraged to leave a comment in the Disqus section at the bottom of the page.
Welcome to the Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley!
Here’s a message from our Club President
Hello members!
As you know, September is Basic Education and Literacy Month for Rotary. This is one of Rotary's six priority areas. Promoting Basic Education and Literacy is critical for fighting poverty, improving health, boosting community and economic growth, and supporting peace.
So, what can we do?
As Rotarians, our job is to encourage initiatives, such as teacher training, student mentorship, and literacy support; however, it is equally important to remember that education has a broad range of applications. We may find education opportunities through various avenues, and we should constantly strive for continuous development and learning.
An example? You!
We can learn a lot from our members' guidance, leadership, passion, and friendship. We are the greatest learning opportunities we can give each other because of the common bond we share, but also because of the variety of our individual professions, vocations, and experiences. Starting this month, consider how you can serve through education and become a mentor to our members and communities. Focus on empowering others by using your unique skills and expertise to address community needs and help others discover new professional opportunities and interests. You can also share this value with friends and professionals in your life - by inviting them to attend our programs and social or service events to learn more about what we do and the difference we can make working together.
Finally, many thanks to those who have worked hard to make these initial months of transition easier. It is your ideas, help, thoughts, and feedback that are essential to our success.
Yours in service,
Angelica Marotta, PhD
President 2022-2023 Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley, Rotary International District 5170
Guests, we are happy to have you join us this week!
As we see it, our flexibility as an online, asynchronous club allows a special type of service to Rotarians around the world: we make it easier for anyone to strive for and maintain 100% attendance. That keeps you engaged with Rotary's events and ideas, and provides a moment of inspiration for devoting your creativity, talents, and resources to good causes.
You are certainly not required to pay anything in order to attend our meetings. However, if you would like to make a small contribution to our service efforts, you are welcome to do so in our secure Happy Dollars section down the page. This could be what you normally pay at your own club's meetings for lunch, for example. Any amount is welcome, but first and foremost, we're happy you've joined us, and hope you will share with others who we are and what we do to help inspire Service Above Self.
And don't forget to fill out our attendance form so you get an email you can pass on to your club's secretary!
The Four Way Test
The Four-Way Test is a nonpartisan and nonsectarian ethical guide for Rotarians to use for their personal and professional relationships.
Of the things we think, say or do
Is it the TRUTH?
Is it FAIR to all concerned?
Will it build GOODWILL and BETTER FRIENDSHIPS?
Will it be BENEFICIAL to all concerned?
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 !
My Camping List
My friends asked me to go camping, so I made a list of the things I would need: “1. New friends.”
Weekly Inspiration
Every week we share a short video highlighting innovation, education, entrepreneurship, or whatever we think might inspire you to see the world in new ways.
Cruz Foam is a company in Santa Cruz creating an alternative to single-use plastics from chitin, a natural biopolymer. What questions come to mind for you regarding what you learn about the business?
Through a Rotarian's Lens
Sometimes a photo can capture an amazing moment. In this section Member Keith Marsh shares his incredible photography!
If you'd like to submit a photo for this section please contact Keith.
The "Super" Full moon in August (11th) is called the Sturgeon Moon by the natives of North America because the sturgeon is the largest fresh water fish. I took this photo from the Headlands of the Golden Gate. I used the cables of the bridge to provide a foreground reference and to provide framing for several icons of San Francisco. From the left are the Bay Bridge, Coit Tower, St Peter and Pauls Cathedral, Transamerica Pyramid, and Sales Force Tower. Because the moon is so bright, most people over-expose it relative to the surroundings. I set my camera at manual at f8 for 1/5 second. The RAW camera file allowed me to tweek the exposure of the moon and nightscape in Photoshop.
Learn Something New
From WIRED: Bill Nye Breaks Down Webb Telescope Space Images
"The James Webb Space Telescope has dazzled us with its first batch of images. WIRED got in touch with the one and only Bill Nye to break down some of these astonishing photos, explaining what we're really looking at. Bill analyzes some images of the Carina Nebula, Southern Ring Nebula, Stephan's Quintet and more."
Connect with ReCSV on Facebook
Service Report
Tell us about service you’ve done recently in your community.
Click here to fill out The Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley Service Survey
Our Events & Projects
We hold our meetings online, but we do regular service projects and social events in the Silicon Valley! The section is updated every week with our upcoming events. We welcome guests to all of the events and service projects listed here.
Upcoming Events:
All times are Pacific Time! (San Francisco time)
District 5170 Events
All times are Pacific Time! (San Francisco time)
More events coming soon! All events are open to guests, unless otherwise mentioned. Feel free to join us! If you ever have questions, please email inquiries@siliconvalleyrotary.com
Happy Dollars: Do Good by Sharing Something Good
Each week we ask our members to share stories with the club and toss in a few dollars to support our efforts. The primary goal of this section is to provide a fun way of getting to know each fellow members and guests, while giving back to a good cause.
Happy dollars is an opportunity to share something positive that has happened in your life whether it is personal or business. Think of it as your opportunity to brag a little, but also put a little bit into a karma jar. The money donated through happy dollars is put to charitable use, and the message that you leave for happy dollars will be posted in our online meeting the following week for the entire week for folks to see! (Pending that it’s appropriate!)
Here are the happy dollars contributions from last week!
This section is usually updated in the early hours of Saturday, so contributions made over the weekend may not be listed here.
Program: The Memory Project - Creating a Kinder World Through Art
Speaker: Ben Schumaker
Every week we bring to you a new program on innovation, entrepreneurship, and education, and how those contribute to service to others.
The Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley seeks to explore perspectives on service from across the world. The views of the speakers in our programs are their own, and unless stated otherwise, are not necessarily reflective of the views of our eClub nor Rotary International.
If you have an idea for a cool speaker, please feel free to reach out to them directly or submit THIS FORM so our Program Committee can contact them!
The Memory Project is a unique initiative in which US high school students create handmade portraits as special gifts for children facing challenges around the world. The portraits serve as beautiful and meaningful memories for the children, though the deepest purpose of the project is to connect youth around the world in a supportive and positive way. By carefully capturing the soft expression of each child's eyes and the playfulness in their smiles, and then sending the finished artwork to them as a gift, participating high school students promote feelings of friendship between countries and cultures.
Today Ben Schumaker will tell us how the Memory Project began in 2004 and also share stories of his efforts in Afghanistan, where he aimed to help youth feel interconnected despite religious and cultural differences.
Ben started the Memory Project (memoryproject.org) as a graduate student at UW-Madison in 2004. Ben's aim is to help build understanding and kindness between youth from disparate cultures, and to date the program has involved 300,000 youth from 56 different countries.
Members and guests, please welcome Ben Schumaker!
To learn more, check out the Memory Project website:
You can also see the video of our last delivery of art to Afghanistan:
https://vimeo.com/memoryproject/afghanistan21
NY Times story about our coordinator's escape from the Taliban:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/24/us/afghan-workers-evacuation-nonprofits.htm
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.
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