From the Desk of the District Governor:
Many local Ruritan Clubs are interested in increasing their membership numbers. Consider reaching out to local Home-School families.
There are over a million Home-School children in the United States. There are a lot of websites that have statistics about how many there are in each state. One such website that we have looked at, a2zhomeschooling dot com, has a chart, broken down by state, that shows how many children are home-schooled in the United States. Here is a copy of that chart:
Home Schoolers are going to need Community Service credits to get into college. Their parents will want to be involved, too, and (if we play our cards right) the parents are likely to stay members of the Ruritan Clubs after their kids leave for college! In today’s society, the young generation that is going off to college now (referred to as the “millennial or boomerang generation”) are expected to come back home to live with their parents for a significant number of years before moving out on their own. According to Forbes magazine, a full 24% of 25 to 34 year-olds now live with their parents!
One benefit of reaching out to the Home-Schoolers is that they can stop what they are doing in the middle of the day and come help you with your middle of the school day events without worrying about missing school! There are thousands of potential members to be found in the Home-School community, and they are not hard to find. You can find them by Googling “Homeschool (town name) VA.” You will be surprised how many Home schooling groups you will find! You will find contact names and emails and telephone numbers!
One online resource to find Home School Support Groups sorted by Counties in Virginia can be found on the Home Educators Association of Virginia’s website here: Home Educators Association of Virginia’s Support Group Directory
One online resource to help find Home School Support Groups and Resources anywhere in the USA can be found here: Local Homeschool Dot Com’s Website
Reach out to these groups, offer to come visit their groups to talk about the Ruritan Clubs, or invite them to come to a Ruritan meeting!
When you recruit these youths, don’t just assign them to stacking chairs and tables, or cleaning up trash. Ask them what their passion is, and let them choose (or create) a project about their passion! Kids are passionate about something – maybe animals (a project about humane society,) the environment (recycling and road-side clean-up,) homeless people (homeless shelter,) hunger (food drive for local food pantry,) or elderly (care packages for nursing homes, or busy aprons for alzheimer’s patients) are just a few ideas that the kids can spear-head. Or make them the webmaster of your new website! Get them (and their parents) involved in something the kids are passionate about, and their parents are likely to stay on as club members to continue those projects after the kids have left for college because it will help the parents feel connected to their kids after they have left home (helping the parents cope with empty nest syndrome and it will give the parents something to talk about with their kids when the kids call home!)
There are literally thousands of potential Ruritan members in the Home-Schooling community. We just need to reach out to them and invite them to join with us!
In March I had the opportunity to attend the Rapidan District Cabinet meeting. This meeting inspired me as I listened to District Governor Linda run the meeting with enthusiasm and full of ideas. She put home schooling out on the table as a possibility of attracting young membership to our clubs. Well, I am here to tell you that she hit the nail on the head. I am here to tell you that the West Shenandoah Ruritan Club in the Rockingham District has brought in an entire family of 6 ( parents plus 4 children. And now the grandparents will be joining the club in May. How great is this!! Please consider home schooled families for your club membership.