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Welcome to our club's web site! Please come visit us when
you're in Alaska. We usually meet on Thursday evenings at 7 P.M. at the Alyeska
Hotel. Check the "banner" above for the latest information on the
location and schedule for the evening. October 4th - Rotary's annual Girdwood Health Fair at the new Community Center next to the Fire Station on Hightower Road Ron Burson, 2008-2009 Girdwood Rotary Club president |
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July 17th Meeting Chair John Hickox
introduced Barb Jacobs, program
manager of the Language Interpretation Service
called The Alaska
Immigration Justice Project, who spoke of her program and it’s great
need in Alaska. It is a work force development service training
interpreters in the seven languages spoken in Alaska (five are foreign
and two are local languages). Before the program was started there were
no “certified” interpreters servicing the legal system in Alaska. In
order to asses need they surveyed 1000 people and various businesses as
well as discussing the topic in great depth at summits. What they found
was that people were spending on upwards of $1,000,000.00 on
interpreters, yearly, in the state of Alaska. Mainly the translators
were relatives, acting as third party, often having poor English skills
as well. Their goal is to provide quality translators and interpreters
to government business and service organizations. A high standard of
skills to the interpreters are necessary to ensure that the limited
English proficient Alaskans are treated fairly and equally in our
judicial system. They are also looking to provide a statewide registry
for ease in finding a translator. Currently they are have trained 26
people with 185 applicants in waiting. A Federal court interpreter,
Holly Mikkelson, is in charge of training the applicants. On average it
takes an adult 5-7 years to learn a language to proficiency. A complete
report of this meeting may be found in the minutes section to the left.
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On July 10th, Claude Mabudu who is married to Kayissan Avajon told us of his and his family's exodus from Togo to Mali and finally to Anchorage. They have 5 children, 2 boys, 3 girls ranging in age from 2 to 18 years old. They were forced to leave their families and their jobs behind and flee from their native land when they were threatened with death by government supporters. Claude worked for 20 years as a high school librarian and 10 years as a French teacher in Togo. He organized and led a small political opposition party which eventually led to the death threats. He and his family left Togo in 2001 for Mali. In Mali he published a school newspaper (covering world news drawn from TV, radio & the internet) and broadcast a radio program on literature. He started an NGO in Mali for education. Earlier this year they were granted political refugee status, enabling them to come to the United States where they were asked to locate in Anchorage. Claude has completed high school and has two additional years training in library science. He and his family are currently furthering their education at Nine Star Enterprises. They live in Mountain View and are looking for employment, hoping to some day buy their own home in a safer area.
 On
July 3rd, Girdwood Rotary Club welcomed District Governor Clyde
Boyer and wife Vivian Finlay
to Girdwood. Their day started with a noon visit to the Palmer Rotary
Club followed by a drive to Girdwood arriving about 4:30 pm - just in
time for a 5:15 pm "Welcome to Girdwood" introduction party at Jody Liddicoat's home - this was followed by our regular meeting beginning at
7 pm - a very busy regular meeting!Jody Liddicoat followed the pledge of allegiance with "Thank You Awards" presented to her 2007-2008 Rotary-year officers. Jody narrated and DG Clyde made the presentations. After a swift hand off of the gavel to incoming President Ron Burson, consisting of a soft tap on the forehead with the gavel, Ron introduced the 2008-2009 officers, board and committee chairs. This was followed by an induction and welcoming ceremony for our four newest members: Jen and Frans Weits, Mike Wilson and George Stewart. Following the awards, introductions and other chatter, DG Clyde told us about Rotary International's new President, D. K. Lee, his theme for the year, Make Dreams Real, and his goals of adequate food, safe drinking water and the cure of diseases killing children around the world. He hopes to accomplish these goals by increasing member contributions to the Rotary Foundation to match the 100 million dollars recently contributed by the the Gates Foundation to completely eliminate polio. Further information can be found on the district 5010 and Rotary International web sites (Links to those web sites are near the top of this page). For more pictures of Clyde and Vivian's visit to Girdwood, please check out our Photo Album link to the left. |