News About Sydney Convention, and Extended Deadline January 15  

There have been some problems registering for the Convention online.  Therefore, RI has extended the "early bird" registration price of $315 until JANUARY 15th.   Instructions on how to register are in the newsletter to be seen by clicking here.  It's a fun, short, 2-page letter; you may want to take a look even if you aren't registering.

Contact our District On-to-Sydney Chair, Stan Sherman, 847-736-6513, for assistance in registering or for info on our Zone party, "Saturday Night Live in Sydney".  There's also help via the newsletter.  

Arlington Heights Sunset Rotary has service project with the Wheeling Township Food Pantry -- A Grant Project Refrigerator.  A member of the club said, "we will be taking the official photos of the refrigerator our club purchased as part of the Rotary District 6440 grant on 1/8 at the Wheeling Township Food Pantry...We'll be adding our Rotary decals to the refrigerator, stocking it with the perishable foods for the photo ops, and then moving on to our regular work coding the non-perishable food items and stocking the shelves.

"Julie Villareal who manages the Pantry will join us for the photo ops.  ...When we first started this service project, she worked with us, but now she trusts our club to carry on without her since we've all become experts at what to do in the pantry...."  

The following is the official link of the video of the Maine East Rotary Interact Club delivering the toys to the WGN Bradley Center.  Click on it or paste:   

http://wgntv.com/2013/12/20/maine-east-high-school-solstice-mobile-toy-drive-2013 

To see more of the drive and the fun of involved students, click on the following link and read the commentary within it by Patrick Zajak: http://tinyurl.com/interactmetoydrive   

Your Club can Apply for "Excellence in Literacy" Annual Award, & Share with Others

Plan now to share your successful literacy project with other District 6440 clubs. Fill out and submit the short application for the "Excellence in Literacy" award by March 3, 2014.  For information, click here. All submitted projects will be shared with other clubs for ideas and suggested literacy projects.  Share your success with other Rotary clubs. 

An award is given to a small club (30and under) and a large club (31 and over) each April. The Literacy Committee looks for projects that are innovative and can be replicated by other clubs; guidelines are included with the application.  All applicants' projects are listed in an annual summary of projects listed on the Literacy web page.

• January is Rotary Awareness Month -- Our organization involves 34,000 Rotary clubs across the world, working together in service and sharing ideals of Rotary with thousands of additional family members in Rotaract, Rotary Interact, Rotary Youth Exchange, RYLA and Rotary Community Corps.  

• New Dates for April Rotary Youth Leadership (RYLA) Session --The April RYLA session at Camp Edwards now will take place April 17-20, later in the month than announced originally.  Website information and brochures have been updated to reflect this change.  

• Conference on Rotary in Russia -- Currently there are 53 Rotary clubs in Western Russia (District 2220) and 27 Rotary clubs in Eastern Russia (District 2225). The Russian Rotary clubs are small in numbers of members, but many of them are enthusiastic about Rotary and want to develop relationships with Rotary clubs in the United States. To find out more about how we can get involved, click here.  To register for the Intercountry Committee meeting in Houston, March 1, 2014, click here.