FUTURE VISION'S FIRST YEAR

One hundred Rotary districts and their member clubs set a brisk pace in the first year of the Future Vision pilot, recording many milestones along the way. 

The Rotary Foundation awarded 208 global grants, totaling almost US$12 million, in 2010-11. These grants supported large-scale, sustainable activities aligned with Rotary’s areas of focus in 46 countries. (click below to read more)

The first global grant project, completed in July, proved highly effective in preventing the spread of dengue fever in a community in Surakarta, Central Java, Indonesia. Other global grant efforts helped provide thousands of people in Sierra Leone with access to clean water, boosted malaria prevention and treatment in Mali, improved sanitation in India, and expanded literacy in Kenya, to name a few. The grants also funded vocational training teams and equipped scholars to work in sustainable development, health care, peace and conflict resolution, and other fields related to the areas of focus. 

More than $6 million in Rotary Foundation District Grants supported local and international service projects. District 2650 (Japan) distributed funds from a $271,000 grant to 42 club projects, which included providing computers, sewing machines, and other vocational training equipment to a village in the Philippines, and restoring an elementary school in China’s Shaanxi Province. 

The Foundation also formed strategic partnerships with Aga Khan University, a private, nonsectarian university with campuses worldwide, and Oikocredit International, a Netherlands-based cooperative financial institution. Through the partnership with Aga Khan University, Rotary clubs can establish vocational training teams and nursing scholarships with support from packaged global grants. Through the partnership with Oikocredit, clubs can work with microfinance institutions in Oikocredit’s network, also with support from packaged global grants, and help reduce poverty by identifying local needs, developing effective approaches, and structuring training programs to improve entrepreneurs’ business skills. 

Pilot feedback

Pilot clubs and districts are helping to verify what works in the Foundation’s new grant model under the Future Vision Plan. Based on feedback from Rotarians, the Foundation is also making operational improvements during the pilot. Those implemented in 2010-11 include: 

• Making the temporary online system easier to use
• Expanding the definition of disease prevention and treatment to include injuries that, left untreated, would lead to disease
• Allowing a contingency fund of up to 20 percent in district grant spending plans
• Eliminating the requirement that scholars provide proof of language testing to the Foundation
• Eliminating the requirement that scholars be hosted by the district where their study institution is located, provided that scholars live in their host district
• Eliminating the requirement that, for a proposed exchange of vocational training teams, members of the second team be identified at the time of application for a global grant
• Allowing pilot districts to participate in the Ambassadorial Scholarships program during the first year of the pilot to ease the transition 

“We are making changes to make the model easier for pilot districts. But any changes to the fundamental structure of Future Vision, we are holding for the full world launch [1 July 2013] so we may determine whether there truly is Rotarian demand for the changes that are suggested,” says Foundation Trustee Chair Bill Boyd.

The areas of focus under Future Vision, which are also included in the RI Strategic Plan, allow Rotarians to carry out projects with a common purpose, in a way that benefits as many people as possible, Boyd says.

“All of us should work to build those six areas of focus into the culture and thinking of every Rotary club,” he says. “We should seek opportunities to build partnerships between clubs and districts, our Rotary Foundation, and other organizations that can join us in our mission to advance world understanding, goodwill, and peace through the improvement of health, the support of education, and the alleviation of poverty.”