We got off to a great start in the new Rotary Year! The articles in this Newsletter capture our July activities including the excellent July 6 presentation by Outbound Exchange Student Thien Beatty on his upcoming year in the Philippines. I was happy to present Thien with our traditional Rotary mug and a ceramic Rotary Tile that I created for presentations to speakers (lead image). On July 20, President-Elect Ashley Dillingham presided over the meeting and spoke about our Rotary Zone's Summer Leadership Seminar that she attended, and club members participated in brag-a-bucks and a thrilling 50-50 game. On July 27, members enjoyed a relaxing social Night at Obed and Isaac's filled with lively conversations and lots of laughter.
August Opportunities
I am excited to share the Rotary experiences happening in August, and I hope you and a guest will join us. The lineup for August features the following presenters and opportunities.
August 3-Our lunch meetings begin at 11:50 a.m. and we promise to have you out the door by 1:00 p.m. We welcome Adam Gurski (image below) as the presenter for our August 3 club meeting at Maldaners Upstairs. He is an educator and consultant and will share his knowledge of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Some of you might remember him from attending our meetings or have attended his session at the downtown library. How do AI tools work in and affect your own life? He will show you!
August 10-It will be red carpet time! The new District Governor, Dr. Musonda Kapatamoyo (image on left), will be attending our meeting. You will have an opportunity to meet him and also hear his motivational message and goals for the upcoming year. We are honored to welcome him as our featured speaker. Dr. Kapatamoyo is a past president of the Edwardsville Rotary Club. He is currently a professor at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. He is a three-time Paul Harris Fellow. His dedication to Rotary over the years is highlighted by his advocacy to the Rotary Youth Exchange, where he was an officer for 10 years.
Additionally, the evening will offer an opportunity to donate much needed school supplies to the students at Ridgely School (see article on Volunteer Opportunities in this Newsletter). Without Rotary’s annual support for Ridgely School, many students would start school without the needed tools for learning. Because of your generosity, their year will begin on a positive note. Please mark your calendar for this event and bring your school supplies for our adopted school.
August 17-No Rotary meeting, enjoy the Illinois State Fair.
August 24-Hot off the press! We welcome the CEO of the Illinois Times, Kate McKenzie (image below) as our featured speaker. The newspaper, founded in 1975, has a current distribution of 20,000 copies in over 400 locations with a 94% pick-up rate. Go Kate! We are pleased that we were able to reschedule this presentation.
August 31-Our club holds four club assemblies each year. We involve our members in discussions of how to improve our work in the community and how we can better support each other. Assemblies are an upbeat way to share ways to help our club grow and thrive. In addition, the students from RYLA (Rotary Youth Leadership Awards) will be presenting on their experience at the annual RYLA assembly and will be accompanied by their their leader, Jill Friday.
August will be another busy month! There are several sign-up link opportunities I wanted to share with you now to provide you with additional time to register for some or all of the offerings.
To reserve your meal at Maldaners, I am trying a different format this year instead of the Air Table. For each meal, I will send out a separate link for you to use to sign-up. While I know the chef is wonderful to make additional food in case some people forget to sign up, I would like to try has hard as possible for everyone to sign up if they plan to attend a meeting. When I talked to them for the upcoming year, I was told they truly prefer a six day advance notice to make sure adequate accommodations are provided to us.
You can also sign up to stock the Micropantry at Ridgely School:
The Micropanty schedule has been updated with two week volunteer slots. There are openings until November 29. If you or a partner would consider signing up for a two week slot to keep the pantry stocked, you would be doing those families a huge service.
For the past school year, Thien Beatty was Springfield Southeast High School Student and a member of the Community Interact Club. The Springfield Sunrise Rotary Club has sponsored him as an Rotary International Outbound Exchange Student. He will spend his junior year of high school in the Philippines. He will attend the Southgate Institute in the city of Malyar in the Batangas Province of the Philippines. On July 6, he previewed for our club his talk that he will give to his student counterparts in the Philippines. He covered key aspects of his life as a high school student in Springfield. Thien's interests include all things intercultural such as learning new languages, preparing for the exchange, trying new foods, traveling, and meeting new people. He also enjoys playing basketball and chess, being with friends and family, and serving in the Community Interact Club in Springfield. He looks forward to an exciting year of learning Filipino culture and languages while studying and connecting with new friends at the Southgate Institute of Malvar. He also anticipates spending quality time with his Filipino host families and serving with the Rotary Club of Malvar. It was wonderful to get to know Thien better and wish him happy travels. We know he will enjoy his year abroad.
President Gilmore add a little spice to this meeting by having a drawing for free Penzy spices that he picked up on his recent trip to St. Louis. The three happy members of the drawings are shown below.
President-Elect Ashley Dillingham presided over our July 20 Club Meeting and also served as our speaker while President Ken Gilmore was out of town. She provided an excellent overview of her experience at the July 11 Zone 30 Summer Leadership Seminar in Springfield. She noted that it would be beneficial for all Rotarians to participate in the Leadership Seminar. Her number one take away message for the session is that "We are all leaders." That is part of what makes Rotary so special and so effective in promoting its goals.
During this meeting, Club Services Director Randy Erford challenged us with trivia questions. Although some of us thought the question were a little too geared to sports and cars, we all had a great time racking our brains and laughing.
We also enjoyed members paying to brag about the accomplishments of family members during brag-a-bucks and had a particularly thrilling 50-50 game that raised a considerable amount of money for our scholarship program. Once again, our club members failed to draw the winning card even though one of them (i.e. John Loftus) repeatedly succeeded in drawing the same suit as the winning card and thus had the opportunity to draw multiple times. Their fellow Rotarians joyfully called them "losers," but once again. they were all gracious losers because they know their losses go to a good cause. The 50-50 losers included Rod Buffington, Tom O'Brien, Bill Kempiners, and John Loftus (images below).
We had an enjoyable off-site social night at Obed and Issacs on July 27. We had a long table in a side room and solid attendance. The night was so filled with conversations and laughter, that Bonnie forgot to take any photographs. If you took any pictures, please send them to Bonnie (bonstyles@yahoo.com) for the files.
Community Service Director Brandy Zanger issued a Community Services Email to all members on July 10 with the information on a July 30 volunteer opportunity to help the Interact Club with their booth at the second annual community Back-to-School Event for Springfield Public Schools (District 186). This event was held at the Scheels Sports Park at Legacy Pointe. We hope some of you participated, and thank all who did participate.
August Drive for Ridgely School Supplies
Brandy also provided information on our August school supply drive for Ridgely Elementary, our adopted school. Please bring supplies to an upcoming Rotary Club Meeting. Brandy will collect the supplies at our August 10 Club meeting and deliver them to the school. The List of Ridgely School Supplies can be downloaded from our Club Website (Download Documents Section) and was also attached to Brandy's July 10 email. The list provides the supplies need by grade level. School Principal Jennifer Butcher let Brandy know that the supplies in greatest demand are:
Disinfecting wipes
Boxes of Kleenex or other tissues
Hand sanitizer
Colored pencils
Dry erase markers
Fiskar scissors
Spiral bound notebooks (any color, wide ruled)
United Way Fall Day of Action
Mark your calendar. We will be assembling Rotary Volunteers for this Day of Action, which will be held on Friday, October 2, 2026 from 1:00-4:00 p.m.
Please remember that we are including some noon meetings at Maldaners and social night meetings at locations other than Maldaners. Please pay attention to the meeting schedule listed in the Newsletter, on our website home page (www.spirotary.org), and on our Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram pages for the dates and locations of the meetings.
August 3, Rotary Lunch Club Meeting
Maldaners Upstairs, 11:50 a.m.-1:00 p.m.
Adam Gurski (image below): Rotary 101
August 10, 2026Rotary Club Meeting
Maldaners Upstairs, 5:30-6:45 p.m.
District 6460 District Governor Musonda Kapatamoyo will speak about his goals for the coming year (See President's Comments).
August 17, 2026 No Rotary Club Meeting
Visit the Illinois State Fair
August 24, 2026 Rotary Club Meeting
Maldaners Upstairs, 530-5:45 p.m.
Kate McKenzie: the Illinois Times
Join us to meet and hear from Kate McKenzie (image below), the new CEO of the Illinois Times, talk about the plans to sustain this successful, home-grown, non-profit newspaper.
August 31, 2027 Rotary Club Meeting
Maldaners Upstairs, 5:30-6:45 p.m.
Club Assembly and Presentations by RYLA (Rotary Youth Leadership Awards) Students
Club members will discus plans to improve the club and expand membership. RYLA students and their leader, Jill Friday, will speak about RYLA and their experiences at the Rotary Youth Leadership Assembly.
Mark Your Calendar Now for a Special Visit with Past Rotary International President Mark Maloney!
September 14, 2026
The Springfield Rotary Clubs will gather for the event. The location and time will be announced at a later date
Mark Maloney (image on left) was the Rotary International President for the 2019-2020 Rotary Year! He is a long-time Rotary leader from the Decatur Rotary Club in Georgia. Stay tuned for more details on his presentation and this event.
John Webb shared a Facebook post from Word Up of Central Illinois that thanked our Rotary Club for providing free books purchased in part with funding from our District Literacy Grant.
We thank all the club members, family members, and friends who helped us deploy flags for our 2026 Flag Service Project. On Wednesday May 13 we initiated the 2026 Rotary Flag Project deployment. The process was completed by Friday May 22 in time for Memorial Day on May 25!
The task involved being part of two person teams that delivered the flags from our warehouse to our customers. We used routing software to create routes of approximately 25 homes. The flags were dropped into plastic conduits in the customers lawns that have been previously installed by other volunteers. They were topped with a bright red plastic cap. Our hearts burst with joy when, after several minutes crawling on the ground, we spotted that red cap and were able to deploy a flag. We also installed a solar powered light for each flag. Then we moved on to the next address.
One member of the team had to have a vehicle capable of carrying ten foot flags. A route took as much as 4-5 hours to complete.
The flags will remain out until after the September 11 holiday. They will need to be picked up and returned to the warehouse in the week starting Monday September 14. If you did not help with the deployment this year, then please consider helping with flag removal or with another task or helping next year.
We also need volunteers to install the conduits for new customers. This involves physical exertion. First select a spot on the customers property usually five feet from a sidewalk and five feet from a driveway, Then, using a sledge hammer you must drive a one inch diameter lead pipe 16 inches into the ground. After removing the pipe replace it with a 16 inch tube of PVC conduit. Then place a heavy metal washer around the conduit. (Sometimes it is necessary to use a metal detector to find the conduits.) Then place a bright red plastic cap on the conduit.
If you can return as a volunteer or want to be a new participant, please let me know. It can be a lot of fun and we raise $30,000 for our community grants program and other projects from the effort.
You can sign up to volunteer to fill the Ridgely Micropantry by using the Signup Genius App. Just download the app and sign up for a one week or two week timeframe that works best for you or you and a friend. What a great way to make a difference. Thank you!
Ridgely Micro-Pantry: Fall Dates Added to SignUp Genius
Please consider signing up for a two-week commitment to stock the pantry or partner with a friend. The link provided takes you to the sign-up sheet located online using the SignUp Genius program. The Signup Genius link is listed below to sign up and allows you to reserve those dates and to also shows which timeframes are unfilled. The app will also send you a reminder closer to your volunteer date.
It's open season for volunteering by yourself, with your family or by partnering with another Rotarian. Also, if you have friends or acquaintances who would like to volunteer, please share the sign-up link and we will give them lots of praise for making a difference.
You can sign up to stock the Ridgely Micropantry using the new Sign-Up Genius online system featured in the above article by Ken Gilmore.
Please sign up. There are numerous empty slots.
I appreciate your help!
Thank you for signing up for a micropantry volunteer shift. Your time and effort are greatly appreciated by the community we serve.
Members who have supported this program realize the price of food and other products stocked in the pantry have become more expensive. Under a new program, a member may be reimbursed up to $100 when a purchase is made for the food pantry. Funding for this reimbursement was made possible by donations in the amount $1,739, which were received at the Rotary Open House in December 2024 that I hosted at my home
Below are the details including the location of the pantry, and suggestions on items to collect and distribute. If you are unable to complete your shift, please reach out and we'll work on a better period of time to meet your needs. If you have suggestions for future volunteers, please let me know and we'll adapt the program along the way.
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Ridgely Elementary School
2040 North 8th Street
Springfield, IL 62702
Main entrance to the school (look for the yellow and purple pantry by the front doors).
The image below shows the location of the pantry at the entrance to the school.
These suggestions came from people who use food pantries to help feed their families.
1. Everyone donates Kraft Mac and Cheese in the box. They can rarely use it because it needs milk and butter, which is difficult to get from regular food banks. 2. Boxed milk is a treasure, as kids need it for cereal, which they also get a lot of. 3. Everyone donates pasta sauce and spaghetti noodles. 4. They cannot eat all the awesome canned veggies and soup unless you put a can opener in too or buy pop tops.* 5. Oil is a luxury and needed for Rice a-Roni, which they also get a lot of. 6. Spices or salt and pepper would be a real Holiday gift. 7. Tea bags and coffee make them feel like you care. 8. Sugar and flour are treats. 9. They fawn over fresh produce donated by farmers and grocery stores. 10. Seeds are cool in Spring and Summer because growing can be easy for some. 11. They rarely get fresh meat. 12. Tuna and crackers make a good lunch. 13. Hamburger Helper goes nowhere without ground beef. 14. They get lots of peanut butter and jelly but usually not sandwich bread. 15. Butter or margarine is nice too. 16. Eggs are a real commodity. 17. Cake mix and frosting makes it possible to make a child’s birthday cake. 18. Dishwashing detergent is very expensive and is always appreciated. 19. Feminine hygiene products are a luxury and women will cry over that. 20. Everyone loves Stove Top Stuffing.
The image below shows a fully stocked pantry.
The image below shows the empty micropantry before I stocked it in January 2026. This is why you need to sign up! The pantry is almost always empty when we show up to stock it. The need for nutritious food is great in the community surrounding our micropantry. .
Feel free to contact me.
Micro Pantry Coordinator: Allie Montney with assistance from John Webb
Phone 217-494-6901 (for the quickest response, please text)
Things I've noticed that may be helpful: During the school year, stocking the pantry on a weekend or after 4:00PM during the weekdays means fewer people and it's easier to get a parking spot. Ask friends and family to donate unused household items for the pantry that you can collect. If purchasing bags of fresh fruit or veggies, stock them individually so that more in need can take what they need. ALDI grocery stores have prices that cannot be beat. Be sure to stock appropriately for the season so that fresh foods do not spoil.
Do you know or are you someone who has a passion to give back to your community? The Rotarians in this image are helping pack essential items for the Illinois Police Department to give to homeless individuals in our community. As a Rotarian, you adhere to the principles of the 4-way Test., which are:
Is it the Truth?
Is it Fair to all concerned?
Will it build Good Will and Better Friendships?
Will it be Beneficial to all concerned?
If you find value in these ideals and want to be part of a great organization, right click on the attached link to open our online Membership Applicationin a new window. You can also click on this link to download an electronic copy of the Membership Application from our Club's website Home Page (www.spirotary.org) in the Download Files section. You can send the completed application to the Membership Committee at hmitchell11@comcast.net. We look forward to hearing from you!
Please remember to report your service hours and related contributions. You will be able to enter your hours and correctly assign them to the correct Rotary Calendar year. Just follow this link:
Please email images of service activities to Bonnie Styles at bonstyles@yahoo.com. It's easy to take pictures if you have a smartphone, but even an old style camera works just fine. Send me an email (bonstyles@yahoo.com) to let me know when you will be volunteering for a service project, and I will come out and take some images.
Be sure to turn in your hours for any volunteering that you do on behalf of Rotary.
We offer special thanks to Kay Powell and Allie Montney for stocking the food pantry at Ridgely School during July and to Bonnie Styles and Harry Mitchell for stocking during June 2026. Bonnie stocked the pantry every two days (image below) during her two week shift and had some help from food donations from the SPI Micropanty Helpers. They purchased food using monies donated to the group and made food available to members of the group on Thursdays during June. Please sign up to help stock the pantry, it is vitally important in the community surrounding the school. A fully stocked pantry is depleted of food in about two days.
Carolyn Chambers from the SPI Micropantry Helpers group also brought boxes of donated books and made them available to members of the group. Bonnie took three boxes of books and used the children's books to stock the Little Library at Ridgely School during the time she was stocking the pantry (image below) and gave the remainder of the books to Allie Montney for stocking our Club's other Little Libraries.
She transferred the books for older children and adults to Allie Montney for use in the other Little Libraries that our Club stocks. If you are interested in helping stock the little libraries, let Allie know.
August 10-It will be red carpet time! The new District Governor, Dr. Musonda Kapatamoyo (image on left), will be attending our meeting. You will have an opportunity to meet him and also hear his motivational message and goals for the upcoming year. We are honored to welcome him as our featured speaker. Dr. Kapatamoyo is a past president of the Edwardsville Rotary Club. He is currently a professor at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. He is a three-time Paul Harris Fellow. His dedication to Rotary over the years is highlighted by his advocacy to the Rotary Youth Exchange, where he was an officer for 10 years.
To reserve your meal at Maldaners, I am trying a different format this year instead of the Air Table. For each meal, I will send out a separate link for you to use to sign-up. While I know the chef is wonderful to make additional food in case some people forget to sign up, I would like to try has hard as possible for everyone to sign up if they plan to attend a meeting. When I talked to them for the upcoming year, I was told they truly prefer a six day advance notice to make sure adequate accommodations are provided to us.
During this meeting, Club Services Director Randy Erford challenged us with trivia questions. Although some of us thought the question were a little too geared to sports and cars, we all had a great time racking our brains and laughing. 
Mark Maloney (image on left) was the Rotary International President for the 2019-2020 Rotary Year! He is a long-time Rotary leader from the Decatur Rotary Club in Georgia. Stay tuned for more details on his presentation and this event.
We thank all the club members, family members, and friends who helped us deploy flags for our 2026 Flag Service Project. On Wednesday May 13 we initiated the 2026 Rotary Flag Project deployment. The process was completed by Friday May 22 in time for Memorial Day on May 25! 
