If you’re not familiar with the MoonCatcher Project, you will be after joining us next Thursday for our ZOOM meeting. That’s when Lon Penna of the Niskayuna Rotary Club and his co-presenter Alice Marcus  will provide a look at the project being nominated for a Rotary Global Grant.

Says Lon, “Like most Rotarians, my wife Helen and I are dismayed by hunger, thirst, extreme poverty, illness, fistula, slavery, injustice, etc. We have completed multiple Rotary Grants on five continents. Our current thinking is instead of giving fish (man eats for a day) or giving a fishing pole (man eats for a lifetime) that we want to give the fishing poles to the village women (her family and community are uplifted for generations.).”

He explains that the symbolic “Fishing Pole” has three components:

1. A MoonCatcher Kit so schoolgirls can handle their menstruation, and are better able to stay in school.
2. K-12 education, vocational education, and vocational ideas.
3. Micro-loans

The MoonCatchers are $5. The education provided electronically is $7.

“My co-presenter, ‘Awesome Alice,’ was born in extreme poverty, was once homeless, and lives frugally (Alice doesn’t own a washing machine; she still uses a bucket.) Yet, when she heard these ideas she immediately put up $25,000, a substantial portion of her life savings.

“So, Niskayuna Rotary drafted a Global Grant to obtain TRF match money and we are hoping Southern Rensselaer might like to chip in. Every $10 pays for three MoonCatchers after The Rotary Foundation’s 50% match, and earns Paul Harris credits.”

NOTE: We will, as usual, be sending a ZOOM link to all SRC members for access to the meeting.