Service in Action

By Rotary Service and Engagement

Today we join the global community in celebrating International Literacy Day: a day uniting governments, civil society organizations, communities, teachers and key stakeholders to highlight our achievements in basic education and literacy while looking ahead on ways to address remaining challenges.

This year’s theme, Literacy and skills development, focuses on skills required for employment, careers, and livelihoods, particularly technical and vocational skills, along with transferable skills and digital skills. Vocational service, Rotary’s underpinning, is the foundation from which we serve our communities around the world. Vocational service calls on us to empower others by using our unique skills and expertise to address community needs and help others discover new professional opportunities and interests.

Students at Ak’Tenamit study before attending an entrepreneurial business class taught by Carlos Frum, past district governor and a member of the Rotary Club of Northbrook, Illinois, USA. Ak’Tenamit is a Rotarian-supported community development project along the Rio Dulce in eastern Guatemala.

Rotary members are working towards addressing this year’s International Literacy Day theme through their basic education and literacy vocational service projects:

• The Rotary Club of Muthaiga in Kenya organized a career and mentorship day at their local all-girls secondary school. The event brought together 600 students, 18 Rotarians, 12 guests, 30 teachers and parents. Rotarians and other volunteers spent the day sharing their stories, skills and knowledge across various fields with students and their parents.
• District 3800, through the Rotary Club of Marikina North in the Philippines, conducted a training seminar on public speaking and Rotary leadership. The seminar aimed to enhance Rotarians’  leadership skills to maintain an efficient, effective, and motivated club and improve public speaking skills. The event brought together 182 participants representing 68 clubs in the district.
• The Rotaract Club of Dharan Ghopa in Nepal started an adult literacy project with the goal to help participants learn necessary literacy skills. Rotaractors taught basic skills of reading, writing and arithmetic to help make those that were illiterate self-reliant in day to day life, and to broaden their knowledge about health by providing education on common health topics like environmental sanitation, hand washing, family planning, and more.

Students study at Randombe Kanishta Vidyalaya in Ambalangoda, Sri Lanka. This school was built through the Schools Reawaken project after the 2004 tsunami. District 3220 (Sri Lanka) raised funds for the project and received support from The Rotary Foundation, Standard Chartered Bank, and other contributors.

Take action today, by supporting these projects on Rotary Ideas:

• The Rotary Club of Welland is looking for partners to support their project that aims to prevent crime and anti-social behaviors as well as improve educational and social engagement for children in Pikangikum, Ontario, Canada. Help them reach their goals.
• The Link Literacy Project in Johannesburg, South Africa works with children identified by their schools as struggling to learn literacy and numeracy skills, often because their parents are illiterate and unable to help them or because there are too many students in their classes to give them individual attention. The Rotary Club of Johannesburg New Dawn hopes to create a sustainable partnership between Rotary and the Link Literacy Project to extend their reach to more schools and provide literacy support for more students. Support the project by volunteering to be a mentor or donating funds.
• The Rotary Club of Rudramati Kathmandu aims to improve the socio-economic condition of people living with Dwarfism in Nepal by providing educational support to 20 children. Day-to-day living is harder for people with dwarfism and Nepal does not have a friendly infrastructure for them. Due to limited job opportunities, people with dwarfism have trouble affording basic essentials such as electricity, medicine, education, and more. Partner with the club to empower these children.

Add your club’s completed literacy projects to Rotary Showcase and share them on social media using the hashtag #LiteracyDay. Looking to start a project and need support? Post it to Rotary Ideas!