I.
Background:
If the society is to develop, its population, especially
youth has to be competent, dymanic, and well-informed. Taking
into account of this above matter, Rotaract Club of Phnom
Penh was created in late 2000 by Rotarian Ben Bentonio to
gather volunteering youth together to development the capacity
of them, to promote leadership, and to help changing the
quality of life in the community. At the beginning, there
was only a small number of young men and women who lunteer
thier time in the club. Its first elected president, now
pursing Master degree at Northern Illinois University, was
Rtr. Soveacha Ros, who generously contributed a plot of
his family's land in Koh Krobey (45mn drive suburb of Phnom
Penh) to build a clasroom which can accommodates 40 young
students. In addition, with kind contribution from Norton
University, the club managed to locate its office on the
fifth floor of Norton University.
Rotaract Club is organized for men and women from 18 to
30 year-old to serve the physical and social needs of their
communities, widen their friendship and professional contacts,
and augment their understanding of the world. It has 3 core
programs: Service project development, Professional Development,
and Leadership Development.
II. Member:
In its third year of existence, Rotaract Club of Phnom Penh
has a total number of 39 members, both in active and associate
status. Members are from different universities in Phnom
Penh, namely Norton University, Royal University of Phnom
Penh, , Institute Foreign Language, Natioanl Institute of
Management, Build Bright University, and others.
In the last quarter of this year, the number of member was
20. But this number has increased gradually due to a number
of reasons. One among those was the club public appearance
through interviewing on one leading television station,
TV3. In late July, this first president and current president
of Rotaract Club were invited to sit in a half hour interview
about youth model. Taking that occasion, the two had a chance
to share experience to other youth and to speak out to more
audiences which leading to the promotion of club in public.
All 39 rotaractors volunteer in different committee and
committee to help with the work of the committee they are
in. Every other week, director of each committee and committee
members meet together to discuss their plan and activity
for their committee. This type of committee meeting was
initiated and put into practice in early September by Professional
Development Director, Ly Monirith, who
foresees the lack of time in which committee director and
members meet together.
III. Activities completed:
In this 3rd quarter of 2003, Rotaract Club of Phnom Penh
has completed a numver of activities ranging from building
new table and chair for students to organizating a lecture
presentation. All of these activities were done with the
volunteer contribition from our members and external help.
Those activities include:
- Film club was introduced for the first time in the club
in this quarter. Rotaractors come together once a month
to watch a selected movie or documentary for the purpose
of both entertainment and discussion. After having watched
each film, each participant is invited to share any their
idea with others on the concept, meaning as well as the
moral of the movie.
- 26th-29th June: Current president and 3 other Rotaractors
took part in Youth Camping for peace at Kirirom Hillside
Resort, under the theme "Ringing the Bell to stop rape
on Women and Children". The activities during the 3-nights-2-days
camp included group discussion, presentation from resource
speaker, role play, and bonfire performance at night. All
of these activities were aimed to enable youth to be more
aware of rape, its consequences, and its causes. In conjunction
to this camp, there was a public speaking contest on 7th
July under the topic "Who
play the role model for young generation".
Once Rotaractor participated in the contest with 20 other
contestances. Even though our fellow Rotaractor did not
win the contest, his result received a lot of appreciation
from other Rotaractors.
- 6th September: Taking into account the need for professioanl
development of its member and other youth. RCPP with collaboration
with Norton University organised a lecture session on the
topic "Anthropolpgy
and Khmer Civilization Formation".
This lecture was made possible with the kind contribution
from resource speaker Mr. Kim Sedara, a
researcher at Cambodian Develpement Resource Institute and
former fulbright scholarship recipient. Rotaractors and
othe participants gained a lot of knowledge from the lecture,
especially regarding Anthropology which is a new field in
Cambodia. At the same time, organising committee of the
event faced certain problem due to shortage of experience
unavailability from many members.
IV. Activities planned:
Even though the club is pretty active recently, there are
many more activities that the club needs to implement. At
this moment, the management committee of the club is focusing
its attention on strengthening internal rule and bylaw.
At the same time, the club is also preparing some activities
to raise fund its already planned projects.
- Another lecture is going to be organised in the next quarter.
Rotaract Club of Phnom Penh(RCPP) is in the process of turning
this activity into regular activity of the club. We are
also seeking fund from various donors to execute this activity.
- Having seen the lack of first hand experience among poor
students in Koh Krobey to get expose to their cultural heritage,
RCPP is planning to conduct a study tour for those students
to have a chance to visit the Royal Palace, Wat Phnom and
the Natioanl Museum. RCPP is seeking fund to support this
project as well.
- Human trafficking is a very hot issue in the society these
days. For the purpose of increase awareness of the Koh Krobey
community, RCPP is planning to organise a half-day workshop
to disseminate information of this issue to villagers in
Koh Krobey.
- Register club in MoI (next quarter or next one) and Rotary
International (long tern).
V. Other matters:
@ With the increase of number of member, the Rotaract office
room in the fifth floor of Norton University can no longer
fit in all members during general meeting. Therefore, new
room was in a very urgent need to conduct proper meeting.
Rotaractors would like to pay a genuine gratitude to the
Director Norton University, who gave us permission to use
the bigger room on the ground floor to conduct our meeting.
@ With the unavailability of our present administrator,
the club now is seeking for volunteer member to fill in
the position of administrator. Current administrator is
planning to persue this graduate degree, but promising to
help as advisor to new volunteer member who is going to
fill in his position.
@ Re-elect vice president.
@ Change in regulation
@ News
VI. Conclusion:
This first quarter of its third year of existence can be
characterised as the reansition period in which some of
the old generation Rotaractors moved out and new one moved
in. The some new directors in the office are not well accustomed
to being the member of the club management committee, while
some others come into the office with proper working experience
from outside. This quarter has seen both improvement and
problem. Meeting of the management committee is done more
often and with longer duration, which enables the president
and all officers to discuss more on the well operation of
the club. This can be seen as an improvement. At the same
time, having almost no ex-officers in the management committee
can be categorised as one of the difficulties. However,
with the spirit of understanding and helping each other,
the newly elected officers will continue to advance forward
for the benefit of the society. Reaching consensus between
all members and offices has been a major focus for the current
president to pay attention to. As time pass by, the new
officers will get more matured with their work and will
be able to serve the club better. But without the active
participation from all members, the club will never continue
to strive. Therefore, all member participation will be much
appreciated for the purpose of serving the community, improving
professional, and leadership skill. Top
| Report
writor by Mr. Ly Sokunthearith, Public Relations Director |
