Reporter:  Tiffany Bloss

 

February 14^th:

Celebrating President’s Day, Heart Month, and Valentine’s Day

 

COLTIVARE and on Zoom

Join the Zoom meeting

 

President Dale Flinn called the meeting to order at 12:17 PM and asked attendees to stand as able for the Four-Way Test.  He then shared a story about the Corvette factory that he recently visited.  A Rotarian, Herbert Taylor, was charged with reviving the company to avoid bankruptcy and created the Four-Way Test for all employees.  It was then gifted to Rotary in 1932.

 

President Dale Flinn acknowledged our guests from the podium:

 

Mike Brown relayed that 20 years ago, there was an airline crash in Los Angeles where 35 individuals died; a plane had landed on another on the runway.  The Air Traffic Controller took the blame and full ownership of the error.  The point is not what happened, but what happened next.  The Controller was invited to keep her job.  It wasn’t about who was at fault, but discovering where there were system breakdowns and what they could do about it.  There were six factors involved:  ground radar, airline on the runway had a protocol of no lights on until takeoff, and other issues.  After this incident, there was never another collision like this because it wasn’t about who to punish, but how to make things better.  This replicates the focus of the Rotarian Four-Way Test.

 

Aly Evans announced those celebrating February birthdays:  Jim Johnston, Barbara Romano, Cal Walker, Emily Parker, Angela Sullivan, Larry Thayer, Gertrude Noden, Gary Stewart, and Ron Provus.

 

Aly then named those celebrating Rotary anniversaries in February:  Tony Pesco (19 years), Roger Segelken (15 years), Joe O’Leary (11 years), Geoff Dunn (9 years), Heidi Fletcher (8 years), Paul Martin (7 years), Juliet Gibbs (5 years), and Eric Machan Howd (1 year).

 

President Heidi Goldstein announced that March 2^nd is Part 2 of the Rotary Leadership Institute (RLI).  If you would like to attend, please let her know.  In honor of the Exchange Students, all pins have been put on a sash for them to see. Heidi presented to President Dale Flinn a newspaper photo from when he was sworn in as President many years ago (including a visit by a Harley Davidson motorcycle to our meeting room)!

 

Ray Brisson relayed a message from member George Gull—the water has been turned on in San Isidro, Costa Rica!  There are now 81 families, 3 community centers, and 1 school that have water.  Thank you Rotarians for the support in making this happen!

 

Richard Kops gave an update on last fall’s Share the Warmth.  Over 2,200 clothing items were distributed to 335 families, including 531 adults and 306 children.  We do want to increase the number of volunteers and grow the donations!

 

Paul Martin gave a quarterly report on the Youth Exchange Program.  Why do we promote this program?  It promotes peace, develops leaders, and teaches service; a video was shared from rotary.org/youthexchange.  This year we have eight students involved:  our 3 students here and 5 abroad.  Thank you to our counselors:  inbound support from Tina Nilsen-Hodges, Ray Brisson, and Sarah Segal; outbound support from Mary Kane, Frank Towner, Linda Pasto, Joanne Lamoureux, and Marshall McCormick.

Next year we will have 3 inbound students and 4 outbound students traveling to Thailand, Germany, Italy, and Spain; they will visit the club in the future.  Thank you to the school engagement team led by Michelle Nolan and Gary Ferguson; members include Christie Thornton, Claudia Miettunen, Linda Pasto, Tina Nilsen-Hodges, and Mark De Oliviera.

How can you help?  The RYE selection process begins this spring with Richard Kiely organizing.  Scholarship selection is also this spring led by Millie Clark Maynard (James L. Gibbs), Linda Pasto (BOCES), and Geoff Dunn (TC3).  Rotaract at Ithaca College is being chartered as we speak!  Eric Machan Howd is the lead Rotarian, and Duda Formosa is the lead student.  Youth soccer support is organized by Chuck Bartosch and Sherrie Negrea.  Sign Up sheets went around to gage interest in learning more about supporting these programs.  Contact Paul Martin: paulmartinjr0@gmail.com or 607-227-4909.  To conclude this segment, our three Exchange Students traded Rotary banners from their sponsoring clubs with President Dale Flinn:  Margaux from France; Henni from Germany; and Franek from Poland.

 

 

Susan Riley introduced Cornell University President Martha Pollack to present an “Update from the Hill.”  President Pollock’s tenure at Cornell began on April 17, 2017.

 

The school has been focused on the University’s Statement of Values and how to integrate them into daily focus.  These values have been used as a compass to guide the leadership through the pandemic and beyond.  Updates were provided though the lens of these six values:

 

We value the process of discovery through learning, teaching, scholarship, and innovation to advance the University’s mission, in all cases striving with integrity for excellence and purpose.  The search for and the dissemination of knowledge are tightly linked, as co-founder A. D. White noted, “The power of discovering truth and the power of imparting it are almost invariably found together.”

 

Sadaf Sobhani, Assistant Professor in the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, received the 2023 NASA Early Career Award for research in machine learning and novel ionic liquids to develop thermally stable, low viscosity, high performance heat transfer fluids.  These fluids stabilize thermal control systems in spacecrafts.

 

We are a community whose very purpose is the pursuit of knowledge.  We value free and open inquiry and expression—tenets that underlie academic freedom, even of ideas some may consider wrong or offensive.  Inherent in this commitment is the corollary freedom to engage in reasoned opposition to messages to which one objects.

 

Sara Bronin, Associate Member of the Law Faculty and Professor of City & Regional Planning, Cornell College of Architecture Art & Planning, is a leading expert on historic preservation law and land use and serves on a National Advisory Council for Historic Land Preservation.

 

As a university founded to be a place where “…any person can find instruction…,” we value diversity and inclusion, and we strive to be a welcoming, caring, and equitable community where students, faculty, and staff with different backgrounds, perspectives, abilities, and experiences can learn, innovate, and work in an environment of respect, and feel empowered to engage in any community conversation.

 

Alexander “Sasha” Rush, Associate Professor of Computer Science at Cornell Tech in NYC, works to make generative AI systems safer and easier to use.  He has been recognized with an NSF Career award and a Sloan Fellowship.

 

Ezra Cornell embraced a vision that we would be a place to “…find instruction in any study.”  To that end, we value the importance of all academic disciplines and celebrate the power of connections among them.

 

Theme Year:  The indispensable condition of Freedom of Expression at Cornell is focused on goals of deepening active listening, leading controversial discussions, and effective advocacy.  Visit cornell.edu/expression for a calendar of activities throughout the semester.

 

As the land-grant institution of New York, with our main campus within the ancestral homelands of the Cayuga Nation and a long history of national and international connections, we value engagement in our community, our state, and the broader world, learning about their needs and strengths, and applying the knowledge we create for the benefit of society.

 

We strive to be an institute that welcomes anyone.  The Office of First Generation & Low-Income Support has met a goal of increasing the number of students on financial aid by 1,000.  The office provides families with incomes less than $75,000 with zero tuition and no financial aid loan packages.  Cornell was recently named by U.S. News & World Report as America’s #1 Best College for Veterans for 2024.

 

We value our role in advancing solutions for a sustainable future and recognize the close relationship between people and the Earth, acting in ways to live and work sustainably.

 

Our Master of Public Health program takes a one-health approach that recognizes the interconnections between people, animals, plants, and our planet.  Cornell is the only land grant university in the Ivy League and has a goal of carbon neutrality by 2035 with a 110-megawatt solar project in Batavia that will make the campus in Ithaca run from 100% renewable energy.  The University is moving forward with Earth source heat; they are currently collecting data from a 2-mile bore hole drilled into the ground.

 

Higher education has been in the news recently with high tensions.  It is important to remember the role higher education plays in society, openly engaging in what is challenging us.  Why does Cornell exist?  To discover, preserve, and disseminate knowledge.  Cornell’s ninth President Frank Rhodes said, “Cornell is the engine that drives humanity forward.”

 

Cornell founder Ezra Cornell coined this motto in 1865:  "I would found an institution where any person can find instruction in any study."

 

 

Name:  Sophia Darling

Business:  Tompkins Cortland Community College

Position:  Vice President for Finance & Admin/CFO

Sponsor:  Amy Kremenek

 

Name:  Nancy Goldberg (transfer)

Business:  Learning Foundations

Position:  Director/Teacher

Sponsor:  Mary Kane

 

02/14    Celebrating:  Presidents’ Day (nationally & locally), Heart Month, and

             Valentine’s Day

02/21    Amy Kremenek, TC3 President, “Update on Our Community College”

02/28    LaJerne Terry Cornish, Ithaca College President, “Leading Through a Time

             of Change”

 

Newsletter Reporter:  Tiffany Bloss

Photographer:  Mike Brown

Greeter:  Jim Johnston

Newsletter Editor:  Loralyn Light

 

Setup/Teardown:  Richard Kops

Cashier/Kettle Watcher:  Gary Reinbolt

Audio/Visual Setup:  Bez Thomas, Mike Brown

Recording Archive:  Paul Martin; click here

Club Service Facilitator:  June Losurdo