Our Club Projects

All of Austin University Area Rotary Club’s projects serve either humanitarian needs in Austin area, promote fellowship among club members and their families, promote high vocational ethics, or promote international goodwill.

Community Service

Ron Lantz and Austin University Area Rotary Golf Tournament

Our club’s largest project is a community service project to feed the hungry in Central Texas in collaboration with Meals on Wheels and Capital Area Food Bank.  The Annual University Rotary/ Ron Lantz Invitational Golf Tournament over the last few years has been a huge success with almost $120,000 raised to fight hunger in Central Texas.  In addition to raising funds for Meals on Wheels and Capital Area Food Bank, Ron Lantz and Austin University Area Annual Golf Tournament provides funds for other club projects and promotes fellowship among the club members, their families and Austin community in general. Ron Lantz and other club members provide and/or solicit contributions for the tournament. The tournament is an example of partnership with a local non-government organization (NGO) to meet the needs of the local community.

Rotarian Ron Lantz and MOW Executive Director Dan Pruitt with equipment purchased under a Rotary Foundation Matching Grant

A Meals on Wheels client receiving her meal from Meals on Wheels volunteers

Fresh food distribution by Rotarian Ron Lantz and other club members at East Austin Neighborhood Center

Our club, Rotaract members and City of Austin Park Department’s Rene Berrera

Our Rotary Club members have participated in improving City parks working with volunteers from other organizations and the City of Austin Park Department.

Recently, other community service projects have been supporting BookSpring (formerly Reach Out and Read) by providing books and volunteers, collecting blankets and other supplies for Austin SafePlace, providing capital improvement funds for Hosteling International and a park clean-up project with City of Austin Parks Department at Blunn Creek Nature Preserve. Other projects in the past include Any Baby Can, Sunshine camps, Gonzalo Garza School, Candlelighters, Challenger baseball.

Club Rotarians and other volunteers clearing brush and building hiking trails at Convict Hill Quarry Park

Rotarians labeling and delivering books at a BookSpring clinic

One of our recent community service project consisted of buying books and related supplies for BookSpring clinics in Austin and the surrounding areas, funded partly by a District Simplified Grant.  Long-term benefits of early reading and better preparation for schools are significant. The objectives are to reduce school drop-out rates, early pregnancy, drug and alcohol use, and criminal activity.  Studies show that children from low-income families hear fewer words and learn fewer words, they are at great social and educational risk due to their limited vocabularies. This project provided books tothe pediatric clinics, where volunteers read them aloud to the children, or have the children read them aloud.

Rotarian Katherine Cheng labeling a geometric model for ALC

Another recent community project consisted of providing instructional aides to teachers at Alternate Learning Center (ALC) of Austin Independent School District. Demographics of the student body at ALC weigh heavily towards low-income families, typically about 90% are Hispanics, 8% Black and 2% from other racial/ethnic backgrounds.  About half of the students have drug/alcohol issues, significant fraction of them have violence issues.  It is important to help the teachers and the administrators in their mission to try to change the students at ALC. Cost of not doing so is enormous to the society.  If the teachers are successful in changing the lives of the students then the benefits to the community, particularly lower income neighborhoods, can be enormous.

The club sponsors high school students to RYLA camps on a regular basis.

Our planned community service projects for the current Rotary year are:

• Raising funds for food donations and distributions in the Austin area for Meals on Wheels and Capital Area Food Bank,
• Develop and implement a project to support SafePlace,
• Providing books and reading support for children at BookSpring,

Vocational Service

Our vocational service project has been joining other Rotary clubs in Austin for public service awards.

Four New Vocational Nursing Scholarships for $400 each were given to needy student nurses from AustinCommunity College. Candice Clark, the Vocational Chair, and Dr. Betty Richardson drove this effort for the club.  The nurses were selected and voted on by other committee members as well.

Six New Young Heroes from Austin Boys and Girls Clubs were given certificates and $100 each at another club meeting.

Fellowship

Our club meetings and community projects are structured to promote fellowship among club members and their families. Our weekly meetings are evening meetings at the University of Texas Club where the club members and the visitors meet in a relaxed atmosphere. There is time for cocktails and mingling with other members prior to start of each meeting. Our fundraising projects, the golf tournament and the theater nights are also our fellowship events.

Young Rotaract members with Sally Spann-Sullivan around Jerry Galbraith’s swimming pool

We generally have a minimum of three events that are dedicated fellowship activities.  Our planned fellowship events for the current year are:

• A Rotaract social during the Fall,
• A Christmas party during December,
• A theater event at Austin Playhouse,
• A golf tournament during April,
• A social during Spring.

International Service

GSE Team Member Caron Sharp on her return from Australia

Our recent international service projects have been developed in partnership with our brother club in  Laredo, Mexico, the Reforma Rotary Club, and our sister club in Monterrey, the Monterrey Cumbres Rotary Club.  Last year, our club provided a heart monitor to a Red Cross clinic in Laredo, Mexico.  Prior to that, we sponsored a Rotary Foundation matching grant in partnership with the Reforma Club for kitchen equipment and beds and bedding in Case Migrante for migrant workers who are stranded in Laredo from their homes in Southern Mexico and other Latin American countries to/from the United States. 

Our club members have recently hosted Group Study Exchange (GSE) team members from India, Mexico and Norway.  Our club has sponsored GSE team members to India, Mexico, and Australia.