We had 28 members in attendance along with 3 guests. The guests were former member Clyde Willian, who now resides in Florida; John Howard from the Northbrook Club; and 6 year old Scott Birkenstein, aspiring future Rotarian and Club President from Glencoe! Greg Skirving’s Thought of the Day dealt with “hustle being more important than talent”, (thus, the Bears have a chance this season!)
Announcements: The North Shore Chamber of Commerce is having a benefit September 21 at Evanston Golf Club for the Northfield Township Food Pantry. There is a 7 mile run/3 mile walk in Glencoe on September 19 sponsored by the Korean Rotary Club to support the Rotary’s polio project. Rich Lalley announced that his “Operation Warm” project is gearing up for the winter season. In the meantime he needs volunteers to work the Rotary tent at the Conway Farms golf tournament on September 18 and 19, which will benefit Rotary fund raising efforts.
Happy Bucks: Marie Kuipers contributed in celebration of her upcoming marriage to Dr. Alan Zablocki, which is scheduled in two weeks. Eric Birkenstein contributed because his son Scott can now tie his own shoes (can you imagine how happy Eric will be when Scott gets his first job!!). Patty Van Cleave showed a picture of a Rotary dinner in the 1940’s when Matz Hall was filled with Rotarians, which should inspire all of us to concentrate on building our current membership.
Dig ‘N Grin: Peter Skalski demonstrated his acting abilities by telling stories about “dumb blond guys”, baloney sandwiches and prostitutes.
Speaker of the day: John Butler-Ludwig, Director of Corporate and Foundation Relations from Northeastern Illinois University, introduced our speaker, Ms. Jade Stanley, Chair and Professor of NEIU’s Social Work Program. NEIU is a state school located at 5500 North Saint Louis Avenue in Chicago. It is primarily a commuting school with about 10,000 students, most of whom perform jobs while attending school. Our Rotary Club recently donated $2500 to help Dirk Tussing and Tony Kambich raise a total of $20,000 for student scholarships at NEIU. This year’s recipient was Jasmine Ramirez.
NEIU has had a Bachelor’s Degree in Social Work since 1985, one of only 3 public BASW programs in Illinois. This program has, and will continue to have, accreditation from the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE). The program has a very diverse student body (bilingual, ethnicity, age, etc.) and actually has more males than most BASW programs in the State. In the past, 75% of NEIU’s BASW grads have gone into other MSW programs such as Loyola (Clinical), UIC (School social work and community), Dominican (International) and University of Chicago (Administration and policy). NEIU will now have its own MSW program starting with 15 full time and 10 part time students and growing to as many as 60 students by 2018. Its MSW program will have special emphasis on Child Welfare and Urban leadership type activities. Most MSW programs are charging around $40,000 a year in tuition, whereas NEIU will be roughly half of this cost. Undergraduate programs at NEIU cost around $11,500 a year since it is part of the State educational system.
The group discussed the different type of jobs available to those with Bachelor and Master degrees in social work. The bottom line is that most jobs are requiring a Master’s degree. NEIU is confident that graduates of its Master’s program will have success in securing meaningful work in the profession.
