White River Rotary Club, in spite of its comparatively small membership, is a busy and productive club. Our projects include the following:

Camp Quality
Established in White River by current President, Brian Hyson, Camp Quality celebrated its 22nd camp at Uplands Preparatory School, White River last year. Up to 40 children suffering from cancer, often from disadvantaged backgrounds, are invited to White River for a week of fun and adventure.

Books in Homes
Val Morris, a retired teacher, is the founder and driving force of this literacy-promoting initiative, championed by the White River Rotary Club. Booklets in English and the local vernaculars are written, printed and distributed or sold at a nominal cost to teachers and pupils from disadvantaged schools.

Masoyi Special Care Centre
Established about 10 years ago with substantial funding from the WRRC and other donors, this day care facility caters for up to 50 mentally and physically disabled children. Apart from helping with monthly running costs, we liaise with the Department of Health in providing physical therapy and nutritional advice. We help with educational programmes for those children with the capacity to learn and we facilitate weekly visits by the Interact and community service groups of Uplands College.

Millennium Home of Hope
WRRC’s support of this home for babies and young children is ongoing and includes fundraising via matching grants, visits by a medical doctor to monitor the children’s health and co-ordination of weekly visits by the Uplands College Interactors.

Kruger Park Outing for Senior Citizens
This popular annual event to the Kruger Park for up to 60 senior citizens, includes transport in a luxury bus, refreshments and lunch, plus, of course, a full day’s game viewing.

Other Beneficiaries
We support from time to time, in a variety of ways, the Hospice of White River (by representation on their board and fundraising efforts on their behalf), Rustig Old Age Home, Bethlehem House (a temporary foster care facility for children), the Desmond Tutu Centre for Lifelong Learning (fundraising) and the SWEMBE resort at Badplaas for senior citizens. We are also part of the Fill a Bag, Feed a Family initiative that provides food parcels on a monthly basis to many destitute families and child-headed households. The help we provide to several rural schools in the area (Maphakama, Gutjwa and Inkhanyeti primary schools) ranges from afternoon sports coaching sessions by Uplands College pupils to the building of kitchens and the establishment of libraries.

Christmas Parties
In the last few months of every year there is a hive of activity preparing to bring Christmas joy to many children from the rural communities that surround us. In 2009, we distributed more than 750 gifts donated by the children of Uplands Prep School and other well-wishers at seven parties in the rural communities that surround us.

Youth Projects
The WRRC monitors and supports the activities of the Interact clubs of Uplands College and Penryn College. We have established a bursary fund that currently helps needy families to send their children to Flamboyant, a school that offers remedial intervention for children with special educational needs. In addition, we participate in short- and long-term international Youth Exchanges, and the annual RYLA Youth Leadership Camp.

2010 Projects
In addition to all of the above which are on-going activities at the WRRC, this year we will also be tackling a Golf Day (which has become an annual event) and introducing the Duck Race (which we hope will become an annual event). Most importantly, however, we are the host club for the 85th annual conference for District 9250, with the theme of Fun, Fellowship and Inspiration.