Unlike the goals of most leadership training, RLI is interested in relevant and valuable content, and also in creating an environment and opportunity for Rotarians to make connections—with other Rotarians, Clubs, and Districts.  At a recent RLI, participants shared their experiences connected to applying for grant money and shared how they had used the grant money.  How also very rewarding to hear that an area club realized they could contribute to the health of our planet by planting milkweed, creating a habitat for Monarch butterflies which were close to extinction.    

Also dissimilar to most leadership programs, RLI is designed so that Rotarians can use the content they learn and the connections they make in all aspects of their lives—Rotary, career, family, friends, and community.  Again, so rewarding to hear my granddaughter explain her involvement in my club’s washable menstrual pad project to a volunteer at Habitat. 
This RLI Coordinator is glad to share these three benefits with you.  She also suspects that when you attend RLI you will find even more.
 

The Division was able to offer 470 student-sessions during the year. The table below describes the activity that occurred during the 12-month period -  July 1, 2022 through June 30, 2023.
 

Summary of RLI-HOA Activity for 2022-2023
Number of student sessions completed		470
Session Part I completed	276
Session Part II completed	112
Session Part III completed	78
Session for faculty	4
Number of events scheduled (41) and completed		35
In-person events completed	23
Online events completed	11
Hybrid events completed	1
Number of Districts with sessions completed		16
Number of Districts without sessions completed		9

Without doubt, the numbers reflect that the 2022-2023 was a rebuilding year. Efforts continue to be made to renew enthusiasm for RLI within the Division.  Division Leadership continues to monitor the registration, attendance, and graduation numbers within each District.  Leadership has recently discussed strategies to increase the number of RLI attendees. In the next quarter or two, there will be efforts to (1) meet online with District and Regional RLI Coordinators, (2) increase the number of facilitators, and (3) make efforts to conduct one-on-one sessions with District Coordinators that are having trouble with the new information system and/or RLI.  Other actions are being discussed but have not been formalized at this time.

Once I finish that task, I’ll be able to determine where resources and energy need to be applied and we can get more Districts involved and get others to grow. In my District 6780, I know that the reaction after attending especially RLI-I, is ‘that I learned more today than I have in the many years I have been in Rotary’. That’s what I like to hear. I believe the more we can educate our Rotary members about Rotary, the better the chances are that we can retain them and get them more engaged.

The other challenge will be having enough facilitators to facilitate the various RLI programs that we anticipate. If you are interested in facilitating, please contact your District RLI Chair and let them know you want to be part of growing Rotary thru RLI. Thanks.

I look forward to working with all of you in any way I can to make the RLI program as strong as it can be. The stronger RLI gets, the stronger Rotary gets.

Greg Maciolek
RLI-HOA Faculty Trainer and Training Chair

 

- The real advantages of the RLI experiences include more knowledge about many aspects of Rotary that is gained, such as how Rotary works and how you might make something happen that would be very important to others and yourself.  Along with an increased knowledge of Rotary, opportunities exist to further develop your leadership skills in a volunteer organization and to meet new friends.

Recently, I personally learned much from a brief survey about the use of one word "ENGAGEMENT". As a result of the experience, it has become very important to me that I listen intently to, partner with, and remove barriers for others. Interestingly these themes are also accomplished through our facilitation and sharing experiences in RLI. I want to help you in your District!

RLI has the potential to help each of our Districts to move forward, while helping Rotarians reach their full potential of “making a meaningful difference.”  I encourage you to join with RLI-HOA leadership, to help identify the barriers to implementing a successful District RLI program where you live.

In the aftermath of the Covid pandemic, many Rotary Clubs are damaged; your help is needed to increase the momentum forward in strengthening Rotary. 

Call to Action
The leadership of RLI-HOA is asking each RLI District within our division to graduate 1 (one) person from RLI during the 2022-2023 year.  Of course, more would be better, but if you can help one person, your District will begin moving forward. 
 

Position and individual:
Secretary – Linda Thomas, D 6190
Treasurer – Frank Bradshaw, D 6200
Regional Coordinator, serving D-6600/6630/6650/6670/6690  – Bill Shula
Regional Coordinator, serving D-6710/6740/6540/6560/6580  – Dean Hammond

Key budget details included:
Projected breakeven, and registration fees of $15 for virtual sessions without materials, $30 for virtual sessions with materials, and $60 for in-person sessions with materials.

Other action by the Board:
The board approved that under certain conditions, the registration fees could be flexible.  When necessary, primarily due to unusual costs experienced with local venue and meal pricing. District Coordinators can have a discussion with J D Rottero, the RLI-HOA Registrar, and with his approval, change the price of an RLI session. District Coordinators need to be aware that a small financial profit is necessary for each session to provide resources to cover overhead of the RLI-HOA administration.  Otherwise RLI-HOA does not achieve the goal of break-even.

Special Recognition of Bo Porter
The Board also recognized Bo Porter’s accomplishments and involvement in RLI, at the District, Divisional, and International level for his accomplishments and service.  The Board recognized Bo as an emeritus member of the Board, a lifetime honorary position.   
  
 

The success of the program had been based entirely on in-person sessions. Face-to-face interactions with other Rotarians in a classroom setting and during breaks and meals was a great strength of the program and oft cited as a wonderful experience, perhaps the most important portion, by participants. Then, like a lightning strike, valuable face-to-face interactions ceased in early 2020. The risks were too great to continue meeting. The offering of RLI-HOA sessions was dramatically impacted, and a 100% decline in sessions resulted for a short time. 

Prior to the pandemic, from its inception in 2010, RLI-HOA had experienced steady growth in the offering of sessions, with over 900 individuals recorded as participating in RLI courses division-wide in 2019. By contrast, after a relatively abysmal 2020, in the 2021-2022 year approximately 225 individuals, division-wide, attended online sessions. This was our most recent full year.  However, although it was division wide, of the 26 Districts with RLI programs, only a handful of Districts offered online RLI sessions during the 2021-22 year. This served as a double whammy for some clubs.  Not only were their clubs injured, but one of the key methods of developing future leaders was also heavily damaged.   

Reason for Hope and Optimism
With many of the major problems of the pandemic subsiding, there is reason for optimism.  In many of the communities within our division, we can return to offering in-person courses. The RLI-HOA leadership team took advantage of the lull in offering RLI courses to adapt a new and much-needed information and communication system, which is based on the DACdb platform.  Also, Districts were encouraged and supported in their efforts to offer online courses.  A culture appears to be emerging where both online and in-person RLI sessions will be available.  Districts that experienced some of the benefits of conducting online sessions are reluctant to completely abandon the approach, yet it appears that the in-person sessions are preferred. 

Appeal for Assistance
Each Rotarian and RLI enthusiast should be considering these questions in the aftermath of the storm.  How badly is your Rotary Club injured, and what can you do to help repair it?  Since we need continued strong and educated leaders serving in our Rotary Clubs and Districts, how can you help repair your District’s RLI program to continue developing future Rotary leaders?  If your District is offering RLI sessions, how can you help them be stronger or larger?  If your District is not currently offering RLI sessions, how can you help that process to restart?  Do you know your RLI District Coordinator?  Can you reach out to that person and offer to help?  If you have time and energy to spare, now would be a good time to step forward. 
 

This training is designed to teach a subject in depth to prepare a Rotarian for a specific role. Most of the time it is by invitation. One is invited to attend because of their new assignment. I refer to this as role-based training. It is targeted to a specific position such as club officer, member of the club board, or club Foundation or Membership chair.

In contrast, Rotary Leadership (RLI) training is leadership based and provides a broad overview of how Rotary works. This training teaches key insights that will guide participants in future opportunities. The different parts of RLI focus on the interaction among the people in the training. The facilitator’s skills are aimed at helping the students understand that the answers are in the room, within the participants, and not necessarily within the facilitator. Most importantly, the participants choose to participate rather than being asked to attend. This training provides the participant a broader understanding of what Rotary can accomplish and how to collaboratively participate with Rotarians to make a difference through their engagement. Because classes cover fundamental topics, almost anyone can benefit from RLI classes.

RLI training is truly leadership-based and not role-focused. Every Rotarian has the opportunity to participate regardless of their place in the club. RLI will prepare the participant with a broad understanding of leadership and knowledge of Rotary for whatever future opportunity may be presented.  When a Rotarian is invited to take on a specific role, RLI provides a framework to use. You won’t be invited, but you can invite yourself to be a part of RLI and learn from others along the way. Why not invite yourself today? Courses being scheduled can be found at the following website HTTP://WWW.RLIHOA.ORG/CALENDAR  

Tom Greene, Chair, RLI-HOA Division
 

Two other topics were discussed.  RLI-HOA leadership is challenging the Divsion's RLI Districts to continue to ramp up their RLI programs and have set a goal of 500 total division-wide student registrants during the 2023 calendar year.  This goal accompanies an earlier stated goal of each RLI District generating 1 RLI graduate by June 30. In the calendar year prior to the Covid pandemic, approximately 900 registrants completed RLI sessions. This goal is less than the registrations accomplished during the last calendar year before the Covid pandemic struck in 2020 but more than in the period of time post-pandemic.  District Governors and Coordinators are encouraged to identify and overcome any barriers they encounter to accomplishing this goal.  And always remember the RLI-HOA leadership can help with this important work.   

The Board also expressed deep appreciation for Bo Porter's many years of work and support of RLI-HOA during its existence.  Bo will be stepping down as the RLI-HOA Faculty and Training Chair.  Without doubt, RLI-HOA would not be the organization it is today, where approximately 1700 Rotarians have benefited from RLI Sessions, without Bo.  Readers are reminded that Bo received the Michael Rabasca Outstanding Achievement Award at the RLI Annual meeting in September of 2021.  Please see article on the home page and elsewhere in this Bulletin regarding Bo. 

The Board also appointed a replacement to the vacated position as RLI-HOA Faculty and Training Chair.  Greg Maciolek has accepted the position. Greg is highly qualified to assist in RLI training of facilitators.  Readers will find a brief article in this Bulletin and in the RLI-HOA news stories.  Welcome Greg to the organization when you see and talk with him. 

 

“On behalf of the Board of Directors of the International Rotary Leadership Institute, I am pleased to inform you that you are being recognized with the Michael Rabasca Outstanding Achievement Award at the RLI Annual Meeting to be held virtually on 8 September. The award was recently named for Michael Rabasca who was the long-time Executive Director from the beginnings of RLI to this past year, when he retired shortly before his passing. The award was long known as the RLI International Outstanding Achievement Award. There have been 25 recipients of the award since 2010. This year we are providing this recognition to you and three others with two of the awards designated as 2020 awards and two as 2021, since no awards were given last year. This recognition is for your work both assisting the International RLI as well as your service in the Heart of America Division." 
[This brief extraction is from an article originally published in October of 2021, written by Jane Malloy, it is just too good to not bring forward for others to see and know about Bo.]