Last Week's Meeting(Editor’s note: Many thanks to Peter Herman for summarizing the April 26 meeting for the newsletter. The Clatter staff appreciates you, Pete!)
Being National Administrative Professionals Day, RCY asked its members to invite administrative support staff, receptionists etc. to join us at our weekly lunch to celebrate their contributions in various industries and organizations throughout the Mahoning Valley. We had a great turnout with 17 guests present.
The meeting was held at St John’s Episcopal Church on Wick Ave. President Sharon Letson announced that while repairs are continuing at Wick Park Pavilion, we will continue to meet at St. John’s through the month of May. Thank you, Rev. Gayle Catinella, for your hospitality!
Our club has three more months to reach our plastic bag-recycling goal. We are about halfway there, so please, if you have not done so yet, start bringing plastic bags to regular meetings to get us over the top sooner rather than later.
President Sharon Letson presented new member Brendan Considine with a square badge. Welcome, Brendan!
Our guest speaker and honoree, Jason Hess, is an exceptional Mechanical Engineering student in his junior year at Youngstown State and YSU’s first recipient of the prestigious Harry S. Truman National Scholarship. On the road to winning his award, he met with the U.S. Secretary of Energy discussing his ideas for cleaning up space junk in the atmosphere. His Truman interview, which was supposed to be 20 minutes, ran 2 hours long.
Jason also received Rotary’s prestigious Paul Harris Fellow award. As presenter Scott Schulick explained, Rotarians designate a Paul Harris Fellow when someone’s life demonstrates a shared purpose with the objective and mission of the Rotary foundation to build world understanding and peace. Other notable recipients are Presidents Jimmy Carter, former Russian President Boris Yeltsin, U.S. astronaut James Lovell and U.S. virologist Jonas Salk.
YSU Professor Dr. Ron Shaklee was on hand to introduce Jason, as he had been a confidant and advisor of Jason’s.
Jason spoke of his upbringing and his determination to succeed. He was born here at St. Elizabeth Hospital as a premature triplet and doctors had said that he and his siblings had intellectual disabilities that would hamper them from succeeding in higher education. The response to that prognosis was a determination to prove them wrong. His siblings are also attending YSU.
Jason started proving the doctors wrong early on. Factors that Jason attributes to shaping him include an inspiring science teacher, excelling in science fairs, doing well in school, participating in sports and coaching, and capturing that underdog Mahoning Valley and Shenango Valley community pride. A refreshing takeaway from listening to him speak is that he is extremely humble and gracious to those who have helped him along the way.
One quote that has stuck with Jason is President John F. Kennedy’s speech at Rice University on Sept. 12, 1962: “We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard…”
We wish Jason Hess all the best in his future endeavors.    |
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