Volume 59 Issue 3 October 2015
The Helping Hand A Michigan District of Circle K International Publication In this Issue: Governor’s Update: ………………..……2 Favorite Kiwanis Family Project:…3-4 Fall Rally Update………………………….5 Club Summaries…………….…………….6-9 Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF..……….…10 Upcoming Events:…………………….…11 Welcome to CKI……………………………12 Goals and Accomplishments………..13 Contact Us:………………….………………13
By: Samantha Chupa (District Bulletin Editor)
Governor’s Update Hello Michigan District of Circle K! October has been a whirlwind, but I hope you are energized and ready to rock out to a year filled with service, leadership, and fellowship! MICKI started it's month off with our first district event, Fall Rally! With over 60 participants and plenty of workshops, the weather didn't get anyone down! On Saturday of Fall Rally, Circle K members volunteered, enjoyed some great meals, and ended the night with egging and pieing of the District Board. Through our fundraisers, we raised over $200 for the ELIMINATE project. After Fall Rally, clubs hit the road to visit each other for meetings, socials, and service projects. October had the highest number of interclubs in a month to date! On top of a month with record interclubs, our clubs also broke records for service AND Kiwanis Family events! Way to go!!! During the months of November and December, I would encourage you to continue your hard work! Don't let the holidays get in the way of achieving your goals and having fun along the way! As always, feel free to contact myself or any other district board members if you have any questions or concerns. We'd love to hear from you! Yours in service, Steven McCarty
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What is Your FAVORITE Kiwanis Family Project?
I love Kids Against Hunger because it truly build's teamwork and it has a sense of competition with it which makes it so fun!
ISD parties because we get to dress up and dance with children with special needs. By: Cassondra Kailey (President at Monroe CC)
By: Nathan Wright (President at Oakland)
My favorite K-Fam service project is helping at the Sausage Trucks! Every August, our club helps at the Saline and Chelsea fairs by working in the sausage trucks. We help prepare food and handling money while getting to hang out with the Kiwanians. Each night of the fundraiser, the trucks make thousands of dollars to be donated to various causes. This is a super fun event because of the bustling atmosphere and lively food truck, everyone should check it out next year! By: Nicole Potchen (President at UofM)
ISD party, I love seeing the kids smiling faces. By: Jaclyn Kailey (General member at Monre CC)
One of my favorite Kiwanis-Family service projects is working with our local Aktion Club! Our Circle K works to plan service projects for their club to do and we go to their meetings and facilitate them, such as dog-toy making, card making, and blanket making! It's also awesome getting to be a part of their meetings, they are very welcoming! They are a really fun group of people and its awesome going back every time! By: Kathleen Hurley (Kiwanis Family Relations Chair at UofM)
I love attending the Kiwanis Thrift Sale on Saturday mornings. It is always fun to start my Saturday by eating Washtenaw Dairy Donuts and Coffee with the Ann Arbor Downtown Kiwanians and then assist in bringing in donations on the dock. I get to know many of the Kiwanians from our sponsoring Kiwanis Club this way and participate in raising around $10,000 each week that the Kiwanians in turn donate to charities and nonprofits in Washtenaw County. By: Chiara Kalogjera-Sackellares Page: 3
My favorite Kiwanis-Family service project is Ronald McDonald House because I feel like the small amount of time that I spend at this project to help prepare dinner for the current residents really brightens their day. I also really enjoy having time to hang out with Ann Arbor Western Kiwanians. By: Caroline Soyars (Kiwanis Family Relations Committee Member at UofM)
Kids Against Hunger because it was a fun time packaging food but really knowing that we are going to help feed families is amazing. By: Jaclyn Radziszewski (Vice President at Oakland)
I think it is a lot of fun when other members of the Kiwanis family come to our district events and volunteer at the different service projects with us. It was great last year at dcon when my group went to the horse farm and helped out there.
I love doing anything with children, I really enjoy Kids Against Hunger and anything else we do to help support the ones who need it most! By: Emma Densmore (Social Chair at Oakland)
My favorite K-Fam service project is working the Saline Kiwanis Sausage Wagon! The Kiwanis Club of Saline takes their food wagon to several local fairs and events and sells sausages, popcorn, pretzels, and other things to patrons. It's so much fun working with the Kiwanians at this project because it's such a unique experience. I never thought I would serve food from a Sausage Wagon. I sign up for this project every chance I get! By: Angela Halcisak (general member at UofM)
By: Caitlyn Theis (Secretary at Oakland) Page: 4
Fall Rally Update
This year’s Fall Rally event was Mario Party themed and featured several elements from the original N64 version of the game. Participants competed in life-sized minigames under the leadership of the game’s cast. Poisonous mushrooms were purchased during the games to give to other players in order to raise money for Eliminate. The event was held for the second time at Water’s Edge camp in Howell and participants enjoyed the camp setting and service projects available in the area. We were able to send attendees to three separate off-site projects this year including Recycle Livingston, the Howell Nature Center, and Kensington Metro Park. Participants also took part in four on-site projects including cleaning up the camp, cutting shoes for Sole Hope, letter writing for More Love Letters, and writing letters for Project Gratitude. Several guest speakers were present at the event including Kiwanis Formula Chair Larry Memmer, Kiwanian Sarah Kew, International President Racheile Ricklefs, and International Vice President Jessica Davis. Overall, the event was a huge success and an excellent start to the year’s district events. By: Tiffany Newman
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Club Summaries
Adrian
During the month of October, Adrian College Circle K gained about 5 new members bringing our total to 15 members! We had the opportunity to volunteer around campus and even go to a retirement home and help pass out candy. October was a fun month for everyone! By: Dana Dowd (Adrian President)
Central Michigan University Throughout the month of October, Central Michigan University has been doing many fundraising and unique (for us) service events. Fundraising wise, we raised $50 for the local Crop Walk and got to walk for the event. We also have started our fundraiser for Christmas stockings for teenagers in the area through our local Operation Christmas Outreach. As for service events we got to help out the humane society by making dog beds, delivered dictionaries to local 3rd graders and we scared at Haunted Yard. With our spooky month we are now very excited to see how our November shapes up. Our other main event that occurred this month was our Harvest Half Day of Service (12 hour day of service) At this event, we had 50 participants who actively served the Mt. Pleasant community in a variety of events. Such events included throwing color at the Awareness of Domestic Violence Color Run, Packaging kits for local Social workers, and scaring at our Haunted Yard. It was a great success and we cannot wait until we can host it again! By: Amanda Dembski (CMU President)
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Concordia For the month of September Concordia Circle K worked on recruiting and telling people around campus about who they were and what they do. September was also when Concordia Circle K picked out what they were going to do in October. They picked to do trick-or-can in October. By: Jordan Wesson (President)
Grand Valley Grand Valley’s Circle K was very active during the month of October. We started off the month helping out at the GVSU Family Weekend Carnival, and The Grand Rapid’s Kid’s Marathon. We then had a group of members head out to Uncle John’s Cider Mill to participate in a social event with MSU and a couple other schools. We ended the month supporting Shine On For Shelby at the Blandford Nature Center, and trick or treating for UNICEF. We also had one member, Jordan Phelps our President, attend the Fall Rally weekend. During one of our general assembly meetings we invited our Kiwanis Chapter, Golden K, to come talk and share their insights. We had a great time, and have made future plans to volunteer with them. By: Jordan Phelps (Grand Valley President)
Hillsdale
Hillsdale Circle K had a very successful bake sale fundraiser at Fall Parent's Weekend. We also plated dictionaries and thesauruses with the Hillsdale Kiwanis Club to give to every third grader and seventh grader in Hillsdale County. By: Hannah Nicholson (president)
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Ferris State University Ferris's Circle K spent all of October busy as bees getting ready for our annual Haunted Fish Hatchery! We ended up raising $7635 for our service projects for the rest of the year, and we raised $153.25 for Eliminate. We had 1067 hours of community service, and everyone had a lot of fun! By: Kylie White (President)
Michigan State University
On October 18 we hosted our Uncle Johns Cider Mill Interclub where 4 schools and 23 members attended a fun day of mingling, scavenger hunting and drinking some fresh Apple cider. We also hosted an ice cream social for our members during our general meetings! By: Amanda Escaamilla (MSU President)
Northwood University
This month Northwood CKI had a lot going on! We attended Central Michigan’s 12 hours of service, Ferris’s Haunted House, and the Ties & Tails Gala (a dog show for pups up for adoption) just to name a few. I polled our members on a few of their experiences; they really liked meeting members from other schools and they loved playing with the dogs. We also attended a local elementary school and helped run a carnival. We loved seeing all the kids having fun and winning prizes! By: Justine Arvizu (Northwood President)
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Oakwood University The month of October was really busy for Oakland. We have been writing letters to Santa for the make a wish foundation. We have been really busy planning Snowpia, I know it will turn out great! We also took a road trip across the state to visit 3 other circle k's for their different events. We also worked with our local Jaycee club, who is a partner with Kiwanis! By: Nathan Wright (President)
University of Michigan Our club has been busy incorporating new members into the club and preparing for our largest event of the year, Circle K Service Day. We kicked off October with Committee Lock-In where committee members got to bond with their committee through skits, games and small group discussions. This month, we also hosted a variety of socials and workshops, including one on Erasure in the Media, the Nonprofit Challenge, and one on ELIMINATE. We are currently preparing for Service Day by finding more volunteer projects and getting al the details finalized. By: Nicole Potchen (UofM President)
Wayne State Month of October our club participated in a variety of service projects including a soup kitchen, a children's center, and a 5K color run! We also participated in small service projects like Operation Gratitude. Finally on Halloween some members attended UMich's Trick or Can where we collected hundreds of canned goods for UNICEF! Unfortunately we had to cancel our Erebus social as not enough people signed up to receive the group discount On the bright side, we received great news that Detroit No. 1 is paying our entire dues bill! This is a partnership that we have grown rather well and will make sure it continues to prosper. We have great people in our leadership positions and plans are running smoothly for the most part. Our main goal is to increase membership. By: Raghav Madan (President)
Monroe Community College We volunteered with our Kiwanis club doing the Spirits of the River Raisin event and Halloween Party at the ISD. Individual members raised money for Trick or treat for UNICEF. By: Cassondra Kiley (President)
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Trick-Or-Treat for UNICEF
Though we did not have a set trick or treating event, Central was able to distribute boxes through out our club and have them participate in their own trick-or-treat for UNICEF adventure. So far we have received half of our boxes back and have raised almost $72.00. By allowing those who wanted to participate have free range of when and where they did their trick-or-treating we were able to reach a wider range of individuals than if we went out as one group into the same community together. Central Michigan
Our club participates in Trick or Can each year where we go door to door and ask for donations of non-perishable food items. The event was very successful this year!! U of M
Exceeded goal of $100. The money still needs to be counted but it is close to $140. Individuals were successful asking coworkers and family members. Monroe Community College Our club supported Trick-Or-Treat for UNICEF by sending out a group of members to a couple different neighborhoods nearby. It was a difficult time, because of the terrible weather, but we still had fun and were able to collect spare change as well! Grand Valley University
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Upcoming Events
November 30th 8pm: Central Michigan Inductions November 30th 7:30pm: EMU Inductions December 1: LAST day to apply for the Tomorrow Fund!! December 9th 8pm: Northwood Holiday Party
Important Dates to Keep in Mind!!
Lovepit! February 6th in Grand Rapids MI - $10.00
DCON! March 18-20, 2016 - about $200.00
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WELCOME to Circle K International!!!!! Please welcome our new members
Monroe County Community College AND Concordia University
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Goals and Accomplishments! Goal
Accomplishment
Membership
550
400
Service Hours
17,000
10,035
Kiwanis Family Relations Events
190
138
Interclubs
115
66
Club Building
2 New Clubs
4 New Clubs
District Events
75% of Clubs
83.33% of Clubs
Contact US!
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