Welcome to the website of the Rotary Club of Northampton West
The Rotary Club of Northampton West was founded in 1969 and for over 40 years has continued to be a source of enjoyment to its members and service to the local community.
We currently have 50 members with a wide mix of social and vocational interests.
Members largely come from senior level professional and management backgrounds in private and public organisations.
We welcome both men and women as members of the club. They use their professional and organisational skills to help people of all ages with local community projects and charities in Northampton and help with international Rotary projects such as world wide eradication of polio.
We meet every Friday for lunch in Northampton. We enjoy a meal and share lively good humoured conversation. We often have a guest speaker and occasionally we hold debates and discussions. Sometimes our Friday meetings are devoted to planning and preparing for our community support and fund raising projects.
In addition to our weekly meeting we hold many social events and fundraising activities, as well as helping the local community. We work together with the other four Rotary clubs in Northampton and with the Inner Wheel club of Northampton West. We have a number of Friends of Rotary who support our work.
The club welcomes new members who support our service ethos of Service above Self.
The local round of the Youth Speaks competition
The local round of the Youth Speaks competition took place on Thursday 8th December with three teams representing the Northampton High School and Caroline Chisholm School, all competing at the senior level.
4: NHS winning team: Shefali Kotecha, Fiona Percival and Nina-Nevart Minassian with mentor Clare Cadwallander and President Tom Green.
The winning team now goes onto the district competition to be held at Northampton High School on Thursday 25th January 2012.
All are welcome to come and support all of the contestants.
(See more pictures go to the Photo Galleries.)
Rotary Dragon Boat Festival
The Rotary Dragon Boat Festival this year again raised over £30,000, mostly from sponsorship collected by the members of the 36 Teams that took part. £10,000 of this money was presented to Captain Richard Craske (left) of the Warwickshire and Northampton Air Ambulance on Monday evening at the Four Pears Restaurant Lt. Houghton. The balance of the money raised is donated to other local charities by the 5 Rotary Clubs of Northampton.
Captain Richard thanked Rotary , saying that this donation will help to save more lives.
The cheque was presented by Colin Caldicott Committee Chairman, and many representatives of the Teams also attended. Colin thanked the all the Teams for taking part, and particularly the 5 Teams that raised the most sponsorship.
The Top Teams were: 1st Barclaycard, 2nd Horts, 3rd University of Northampton, 4th IPSL, 5th River Nene Regional Park, 6th Nationwide Commercial, ad 7th British Military Fitness.
This was the 8th year that the event has been held, and over £240,000 has been raised, benefiting many local charities.
Next year's event will be on Sunday 15th July 2012, and entries are now being accepted.
Sixfields roundabout
" On Sunday 27th of November the team of rotarians under the leadership of Jane Forsyth set to clean and tidy up the roundabout which the Northampton West Rotary club has taken responsibility for. This is adjacent to the Cobblers Stadium and welcomes visitors to the football and athletic stadiums as well as the Sixfields entertainment district. As a gateway to Northampton this reflects on both the town and Rotary.
With many willing hands the work was soon completed and in traditional British style was celebrated with a cup of tea and biscuits."
Young Photographer competition
Prepare to point, shoot and enter the club photography competition being run by the club New Generations team alongside the national Young Photographer competition. Winning shots will be exhibited with the winners from the club Young Photographer competition.
Please see the attached poster: Young Photographer
RACE FOR GOLD AT BRIXWORTH RESERVOIR
This is the name of the Event rather than any likelihood your intrepid Northampton West competitors would achieve the Gold.
On Saturday 3rd September the Sailability Race for Gold was held at Brixworth Reservoir. The weather was grey to start off with but improved and the sun came out once the racing started.
Terry Sewell had mentioned that he was entering the competition but in an Access and would get a penalty unless he had a crew. On the basis there would be no complaints about my sailing inability and as this year's Chairman of ComVoc I offered to be his crew.
It was a very gusty day and we both got wetter than anticipated. We came 17th in the first two races (last) but improved in the last race to come 16th! Bearing in mind my lack of experience Terry coped admirably.
Richard Strange was supporting by manning the Sailability rescue boat.
The races were all won by the Sailability users as it should be and at the prize giving Towcester Rotary Club presented a cheque for £200 which is an annual donation.
After the racing Terry and Mary and his cousin and Richard Strange and Allan and Sue Wilson and I all had a very good barbecue type meal looking out over the reservoir in the evening sunshine admiring the water birds and two of us at least relishing the joy of dry clothes!
Jane Forsyth (See more pictures go to the Photo Galleries.)
In the next 30 days..
10/02/2012 Club Weekly Meeting - Speaker.17/02/2012 Club Weekly Meeting - Business Meeting.
24/02/2012 Club Weekly Meeting - Speaker. Chris Pallot, Director of Strategy, Northampton General Hospital, will be addressing our meeting.
29/02/2012 Youth Speaks Competition, District Finals. (Both Categories). District Finals (both categories): 29/2-12 at Kimbolton School
02/03/2012 Club Weekly Meeting - Speaker.
04/03/2012 Youth Concert. Once again we will be supporting a musical concert to be given by the youth orchestras of Northamptonshire. Full details of this event, which will be held at Spinney Hall,will follow.
