Oak Bay Rotary Club meeting – September 16th, 2014 - Sandy Mayzell - Dancing with the Octopus

Reported by Peter Lawrie

Ruby and Janet

To avoid any pretense of neutrality, this reporter humbly advises that we were entertained, inspired and moved by a stunning meeting this week. In the spirit of Youth Services Month, we had guest MC’s – Janet Welham from Oak Bay Parks and Rec (Sports programming and Youth Liaison) + Ruby Tang (this year’s President of Oak Bay High Interact Club). Both did a great job running the meeting and keeping an unruly, appreciative crowd in check. This was a meeting of many standing ovations! President Jim, Bob Schelle, and the Youth Services team are to be commended for their leadership inventing this meeting!

There was an early buzz in the room when the meeting was called to order with the delightful return of Tom Lidkea playing O Canada to a rousing chorus. A spontaneous standing ovation followed.

Lynne provided grace. A fine feast followed. Ron was doing triple duty – set up/ take down; Greeting/Introducing visitors and Celebrations Master.

Visitors included: Bruce Walkey from Courtenay; Kathleen Arnason (prospective member); Ruby Tang; Janet Welham; Margaret Nots; Sandy Mayzell (speaker) and Anne McIntyre (Disaster Aid Canada and prospective member).

Mary’s report on Health of Club advised that Maria, to be honoured at the upcoming PHF evening gala, is recovering nicely and has returned to work part time. Maria is a dental assistant who volunteers her vacation to help John Snively out in Guatemala each year.

Announcements:

President Jim advised:

1) George Pritchard is preparing the Roster for October, November, and December. If anyone is away for extended periods, and/or has a specific request, please let George know by the end of this week.

2) Peter J requested (and the board approved) a leave of absence. 

3) Ted Chambers has regrettably decided not to renew his membership this year. Janna will step in to co-chair Youth Services with Sabrina until Christmas.

4) There is a Rotary Friendship Exchange planned with New Zealand. The Victoria contingent would be in NZ in early March and the NZ crew would be in Victoria in early June. Jim will post more info. Sounds like an amazing good time!!

Jim, Sabrina, and Janet

President Jim and Sabrina jointly presented a well-earned PHF award to Janet Welham. Janet is such a deserving and inspiring example of leadership. She was a member of Oak Bay Interact when in high school and our club sponsored her to RYLA + the International RYLA convention which, she advised, was the beginning of a life-long passion for the objects of Rotary.

Celebrations' Master Ron proved again while the pen may be mightier than the sword, the pen is no match for the microphone! A brutal separation of cash from this intrepid reporter followed!

There were fines for gnomes, crowd sourcing, grovelling, arriving late, not embracing spectacular weather, and much more, levied in a distressingly joyous manner.

Happy/Sad dollars were contributed in honour of the tentative teacher/government agreement; Pablo’s return from exotic  performance venues in Mexico and South America + next week’s concert here in Oak Bay; there was money flowing for wedding and Rotary anniversaries (apparently Margaret Lidkea was also a part of Tom’s anniversary!); Lynne celebrated a very successful ALS walk function with Corey & Lynne leading the charge on the BBQ, and others pitching in; Joan F was contributing what she thought could be her final happy/sad $’s as she is about to leave with a group to do some Grizzly Bear watching (remember Joan you only have to run faster than the slowest member of the group!); finally, Steve Sharlow advised that his wife is on her final farewell tour in her judgeship and will soon be home to Victoria to contribute her talents to our community.

Joan Peggs introduced Sandy Mayzell, our speaker. Sandy is an Arts and Film activist. She is committed to having women participate fully and equally in the political process.  Her website is “dancing with the Octopus” and “dancing backwards”. She has designed a creative 8-week school curriculum to engage  and creatively educate our young people.

Sandy Mayzell gave a captivating presentation interspersed with videos and live performance.  She forcefully made the point that key women leaders, activists and shapers in our national history are not in the curriculum of our schools. Young women see few role models to demonstrate effective women in our history. This is not because there is a shortage of women role models, but because it is not taught or highlighted. Young men likewise don’t see the power of women making a profound contribution to their lives.

Dancing Backwards is an innovative program in schools targeting elementary grades and teens in their classes. The idea is to learn about some high impact women trailblazers and then campaign & vote for whom they will make a 3-minute story - in any medium. It is an 8-week curriculum with support from Sandy and her team to provide technical and coaching advice. The students come out of the course with a creative, self-expressed story presentation. It can be dance, song, video, drama, digital, stop action Lego, and/or all of the above. We saw a live performance from 3 young girls (above) from Sir George Douglas school both singing and dancing an original song; also, we saw a collage of sample snippets of several of the presentations by a range of age groups. Very creative, very moving, very cool! There were several spontaneous ovations throughout!

People who are interested should look at the websites (links are above). Sandy is looking for any financial, creative and/or technical support individuals and groups might be interested in providing.

Heather graciously thanked our speaker. Sandy actually kissed the coveted Rotary mug!!

To finish the meeting, co-emcee Ruby Tang beautifully played a rich classical piece by Debussy on the David Foster Grand Piano. Again, this was greeted by both tears and a standing ovation!