RYLA Reports

“We’re this close” to eradicating polio from the world say students from left, front row (kneeling):  Shannon Sizemore and Katarina Aikens, students at Snow Canyon High School.  Middle row: Stacy Britt, New Generations Committee Chair of St. George Rotary Club; Kaitlin Price and Kayla Greer, both students at Dixie High School, Christian Case from Snow Canyon High School, Brooke Meadows from Dixie Middle School and RYLA facilitator Mindy Case.  Back row:  Hayden Heinz from Desert Hills High School and Richard Isom, RYLA parent and SGR club secretary.  

TODAY IN ROTARY members of SGR, meeting at the Best Western Abbey Inn, were treated to an outstanding program including a Rotary Minute by Durant McArthur reading from his father PDG Eldon McArthur's memoirs about meeting with the LDS First Presidency to discuss polio eradication.  Today members and visitors also saw Jim and Margaret Coleman present two of their children – Julie Coleman Theurer of Redmond, Washington and Dean Coleman of Leesburg, Virginia – with these two Paul Harris Fellows moving the Coleman family "this close" to being a “100% PHF family.”

The remainder of the program was devoted to hearing reports from 6 of 15 students from Washington County who attended RYLA in Heber City on the weekend of September 18-20.  Selected through a rigorous application process for their leadership ability, these young men and women, ages 14-18, called their RYLA weekend, “excitingly cross-cultural, awesome, life-changing and inspiring.” 

Among the fall leaves, students had the opportunity to “Aspire to Something Higher” through leadership activities including public speaking and learning about other cultures through interaction with Rotary exchange students from around the world.  According to one young attendee, “we also learned everyone can be a leader … and everyone can be a follower.”  Another noted, he had learned to be a “better leader and a better person” through the program.

Mindy Case, who attended as a facilitator with her two children, noted, “it was definitely not a vacation.  We were up at 7 a.m. and worked and played hard until 10 p.m.”

Every RYLA program, which is under the direction of the each Rotary district, covers the core topics of fundamentals and ethics of positive leadership, communication skills, problem-solving and conflict management, Rotary’s purpose and service in the world community, building self-confidence and self-esteem and the elements of community and global citizenship.