Rotary Assignments: An Overview
Members of the Lebanon Rotary club are expected to assume certain duties on a weekly basis. The Spoke, a summary of the prior week's meeting, is usually circulated weekly. Accompanying the Spoke is often a list of assignments for the next two weeks, similar to the following:
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Catherine Schneider Invocation
Chuck Monahan Spoke
Dave Skewes Rotary Minute
Ernst M. Oidtmann Program Coordinator
Garlan Hoskin Greeter
James Hurst Asst Sgt at Arms
Steve Usle Song Leader
This document is an explanation of what the duties mean. Note that these assignments are generated by the club's Sergeant at Arms, and rotate through the assignments based on the date that a given person last performed that assignment. The cycle is dictated by the number of members of the club. Thus if we had 52 members of the club, each member would be assigned to any one of these duties once a year. Since at this time a meeting requires seven specific assignments, again based on 52 members in the club, each person would assume each duty once a year. There is actually a slight distortion there, in that certain officer positions are exempt from the assignment rotation, such as the President, Secretary, and Sergeant at Arms, who have meeting duties every weekanyway.
Assistant Sergeant at Arms
The Assistant Sergeant at Arms sits at a table near the entrance, and records the attendance, and the payment, for each person who attends a meeting. This may include Lebanon club members, other Rotarians, guests, and the guest speaker. Details of this duty are in Appendix A to this document.
Invocation
The invocation is part of the opening meeting process: it is a nonsectarian prayer, thoughts, quote, or any other vehicle is aimed at a spiritual message to the membership. The person responsible for the invocation will be called upon by the president following our standard Rotary song, Pledge of Allegiance, and patriotic song.
Greeter
The greeter will stand near to the Sergeant at Arms table, and simply greet each person who is attending the meeting. This is intended to make our members, guests and visiting Rotarians feel welcome to our meeting. Note also that it is an excellent chance to meet our members.
Program Coordinator
The program coordinator is responsible for obtaining a speaker for a future meeting. When the Speaker is on the program, the program coordinator who obtained the speaker will also introduce him at that meeting. More details are available in appendix B.
Rotary Minute
Rotary Minute is a short explanation of some particular facet of Rotary. It is intended as an educational tool, so that members understand more about Rotary in its entirety. Ideas for the Rotary Minute can be obtained from our long-term members Nick Troisi or Ron Cowan. They keep track of subjects which have already been covered recently.
Song Leader
A song leader is responsible for leading the attendees of a meeting in a weekly song. That song has been chosen by our resident piano player, so that all the songwriter needs to do is lead the song. No preparation is necessary, but the Song Leader should meet with the piano player, obtain the sheet music, and distribute to each member sitting at the tables.
Spoke
The Lebanon Rotary club creates a weekly summary of each meeting, and provides that summary to all members. This way members who did not attend the meeting can still get a good idea of what happened. The Spoke responsibility is therefore to write up the Spoke summary for the meeting. The Spoke form is available from the Assistant Sergeant at Arms. It is hoped that the person responsible for the Spoke will type up the Spoke and send it via e-mail to the Sergeant at Arms. The Sergeant at Arms will distribute the Spoke to the entire membership.
Appendix A: Assistant Sergeant at Arms
In the room off the dining room are all of our supplies, specifically two hard briefcase containers, the Rotary Flag, and the President's bell.
Put the bell on the Presidents table, plus the hammer/mallet.
Hang the flag outside the door: use two hooks if possible.
The smaller of the two briefcases contains our badges: open and set out for our members to get at their badges.
The other briefcase contains all of our forms, raffle tickets, Visiting Rotarian forms and a $50 change envelope.
Get out the raffle tickets and tear some up: one half into the "pumpkin", the other laid out on the table for people to pick from.
Get out one blank Spoke form so it is available for the day's Spoke writer.
Put out a few Visiting Rotarian forms.
Find a two-piece Attendance Form in one of the folders: get one out and fill that in for every person who comes: check them off as they pay.
Also note visiting Rotarians and guests.
Guest Speaker usually does not pay for lunch.
Note that the price is technically $1 for the Raffle ticket and $9 for lunch. Nobody has to buy a raffle ticket. In fact, a member does not have to pay for lunch if for some reason they are not going to eat.
The Attendance Sheet needs to be reconciled with the cash received - there is a separate place on the bottom right for the actual deposit.
There are separate totals for members and (paying) guests, and for brags.
There are also totals for deposits: obviously these should balance to each other.
The cash envelope can be used to make change but should always have $50 at the end if possible. If not there should be a note explaining the problem.
If a member is caught short, borrow $10 from the envelope and leave an IOU note in it.
Note that members may write checks at the meeting for both dues and lunch: this needs a note on the Attendance form, as the club Treasurer has to re-allocate when he/she makes the deposit.
A note needs to be left on the inside of the kitchen door with the number of meals paid for.
Yellow copy goes to Secretary for attendance, and so he/she is aware of the guests.
At the end of the meeting, put everything back where it came from.
Appendix B: Program Coordinator
Program Coordinator
A position that rotates weekly, similar to other Rotary assignments.
This person's responsibility is to obtain a speaker for some open date in the following 8-10 weeks, but preferably for the first open spot on the calendar.
Availability of dates will be posted on the web site (soon) and in the weekly Spoke: Sergeant at Arms will always have the up-to-date calendar.
Such speakers, when obtained, will be immediately recorded with the Sergeant at Arms who has the responsibility for keeping the program calendar, and publishing programs, and assignments, for two weeks in advance.
On the meeting day that a Program Coordinator's speaker is scheduled to do the program, the Program Coordinator who obtained the speaker will introduce him/her: the Coordinator is also responsible for ensuring that necessary equipment is present and set up, cleared and returned as necessary.
Sergeant at Arms
Will maintain a calendar with all speakers for programs, the date for each speaker, and the program Coordinator who obtained that speaker.
The calendar will be maintained on the club web site and in the Spoke.
Will publish each week the next two weeks list of assignments, including the program speakers for those two weeks accompanied by the Program Coordinator who obtained those speakers.
Also included in the weekly assignments will be the Program Coordinator who is responsible for obtaining a speaker for a future date.
"Publishing" the list of assignments consists of a stand-alone email to each member of the club, and the same assignment information to be included with each issue of the Spoke. This will also be on the club's web site when that can be accomplished.
** We can use the projector and laptop from APD for speakers. Cindy Cassel (sp?) is usually the person to contact regarding the projector (443-9533). A back up, in same office is Leslie (448-7485) can coordinate the projector use if Cindy is not available. Office is located a short walk inside the main entrance, in Performance Improvement.