We can talk about any distict here.

Our host district, your favorite district, how great districts were when they only had three digits, etc etc.

I'd like to talk about a Cyber District.

Will it happen? Should it? Can eClubs ever come into their own while managed by terra districts?

Trying to get without first giving is as fruitless as trying to reap without having first sown.

It does not do to leap a 20 ft chasm in two ten foot jumps.

One challenge of such a district would be that the global distribution of the constituency would make district projects very dicey. 

The CDG would have to be very conservative and creative in the committment of funds to anything too regional without complete agreement from all clubs.

For instance, a CD project to support Tsunami victims would probably fly, but deciding which region to feed with a hunger program could be more difficult.

On the other hand, if our ability to raise money is representative of what a CD could do, perhaps we could feed people in all regions!  Or at least on every continent during the same program...

Trying to get without first giving is as fruitless as trying to reap without having first sown.

It does not do to leap a 20 ft chasm in two ten foot jumps.

An eDistrict is a must. It will bring the focus of all eClubs into one mission, to serve all of Rotary, but in a unique way. 

 I chartered a club with was given territorial rights to all areas served by the four sponsoring clubs. Hence RC of Lamorinda Sunrise Lafayette Moraga Orinda Rossmoor, CA USA, served all four of those communities. Our projects were either evenly distributed or universal in nature. It worked and continues to work very well.

I would recommend that our board form a committee for the purpose of exploring the eDistrict as a reality in our own eClub and to form relationships with all the other eClubs.

I would also suggest that participation in the established "history of Rotary" project is one such effort of universal appeal.

Jack  Selway, Founder & CEO of RGHF, Rotary Global History, Pueblo, CO, USA

The concept of an eDistrict is the next stage of development of eClubs, working in cooperation with other Rotary organizations that has no boundries and no borders: i.e., ROTI and Fellowships. The place to start is the idea of getting eClubs (that is, virual real clubs) on the agenda for 2008 in Los Angeles for the RI Convention there but we can start with talking to other eClubs about the idea. As Stephen mentioned, we can think of all kinds of problems. What I come back to before we tackle "how" is a concensus of "yes." I agree ("Yes") too!

Joe

President, Rotary Global History Fellowship. 2007-2008, member: RECSWUSA and ROTI, Professor of Art and Art History, Kingwood College, Texas

I Miss the personal interaction   of a terra club

I would like to see  the Eclub  with some  kind of  tie to  conventional Districts

Maybe  an EClub  for each  Rorary district    With  some form  of  structure tieing them together

Or If E Club had it's own District    Commitiees  for  conventional  Districts

I think  the EClub  can be a real complement   to  Terra  Clubs / Districts     formulating  that relationship  would be a great project

Thanks

Arnold

Frankly, I don't miss Terra clubbing at all. The relationships in RGHF, ICUFR, ReC have been more substantial than those I found in "real" clubs.

I see the most important point being that we are in the eWorld and an eDistrict would bring our common needs to one point. Few of us live in the sponsoring Terra District and that will continue to lessen as we get new members from other states.

Part of the eDistrict should be to encourage eMembers to participate in Terry club/district projects. There's the connection you are looking for maybe?

BTW, eClub, eDistrict, and eRotary (small e) seem to be the standard...

Jack  Selway, Founder & CEO of RGHF, Rotary Global History, Pueblo, CO, USA

Like Rotary Mercy-naries?  Available for hire to the local or most conenient  Rotary Clubs.

One challenge is that for a variety of reasons I'm sure it can't be required, so there has to be a viable reason people would choose to participate in non-virtual activities when possible.

 One aspect used to be fellowship.  Fostering a regular occurrence (meaning a couple per year) could require resilience though, trying a couple of club's activities.  I would even go so far as to say creating a recipe for eClub interaction success beyond the obvious of visiting and into being aware of and incorporated into a home-building, clothes drop off, hot dog stand with a TC.

Trying to get without first giving is as fruitless as trying to reap without having first sown.

It does not do to leap a 20 ft chasm in two ten foot jumps.

I suspect - reality check - it will be a while before RI cottons to the idea of an eDistrict somehow on its own. But there are already beginning to be elements - like PETS - where the land-based model no longer meets all our needs or problems and includes items that really don't concern us. And now we have several generations of ePresidents who could put together an element of a PETS designed specificallty for ePresidents.

There is certainly value in being involved with terran clubs, not the least of which is to be able to explain what an eClub is and does. But I think there is as great an opportunity for fellowship here - it takes more effort in reading and writing and contributing, where a terran club, you can just show up.

F

Yes, but I think that the concept of fellowship is not the same in a terran club as it is in an eClub. In my opinion, that is the reason that we have to redefine "fellowship". The terran club demands physical presence while the eClub is more "communications" based. I very much like the communication aspect of an eClub as opposed to the physical presence of a terra club.  I remember that there were times when we all sat together and two guys talked to each other about several mundane things without ever communicating anything pertaining to the club itself. I prefer to talk about things we can do to improve our eClub and  Rotary International , in general.  I believe that an eClub does that more effectively.  However,---and herein lies the problem---Everybody has to make a commitment to that principle.

F

Those of us who chose to live this eLife really must encourage the others. eDistricts, eClubs, eProjects all require eThinking and thinking outside the borders.

Jack  Selway, Founder & CEO of RGHF, Rotary Global History, Pueblo, CO, USA

Well... I think that, initially, we need to make sure that all mentors who mentor a new Rotarian in our club need to pay particular attention to this issue.  I believe that the mentor must make sure to specify that this is a "communications based" club, and that members are required to communicate as often as possible through the different means that we have available.  They need to realize that, if they are unwilling to do just that, they will be failures in our club. Not only that, but they will certainly set the club back because it takes time to recruit and time to train.  Could there be a way that we could link a forum in all of our meetings and make it a requirement to post something immediately after the meeting. That is, a member would not receive credit for attending a meeting until they posted something in a forum linked to that particular meeting. In fact, it might be better to required them to engage in a brief exchange of impressions about the meeting, etc. I know that we have forums, but they are removed from the meeting.  Do we have a record of who has mentored whom in the last few years? If we do, those mentors should contact those members who are not communicating and urge them to do so.

Frank makes a good point about mentoring. It is a way that we can determine who has contacted whom. Is there a list of mentors and their mentees? If so, can it be published on the forum so that we all know that system, and can we have reports on contacts (at least to the membership committee which can then put out a monthly report on the forum)? Of course, I agree with his assessmnet that an eClub is a "communication organization." Any way that we can figure how to communicate and build participation better, I am all for it. It is, for me, the essence of this new creation, the Rotary eClub. Without it, there is no service.

The published list of mentors and their mentees is a first step toward solving one problem that will be looked at closely in 2010 when the eClub initiative is examined by RI very intensely: that problem is communication and participation. Look at the forum now; only a few are using it as the tool that it should be for this eClub. If one looks at the pictures of the Rotarians in our club, there are still blank spaces where a photograph should be and profiles should be there for everyone.

Joe

Great idea Joe! This way we can have a firm idea of who has communicated with whom, and if we need to follow up on it. My feeling is that we need an eDistrict as Joe has recommended because I have a fear that when we are evaluated in 2010, we will be evaluated by the same standards of fellowship as the terra clubs, and we definitely cannot compete at that level on the fellowship requirement. Everytime that I see one of my friends from the terra club, the usual question is: Yes, but how is your fellowship going? I am sure that they are thinking about terra club standards: that is, parties,dinners,face-to-face meetings,etc.. The meaning and significance of fellowship will have to be defined under different terms and by different measures. On another subject: I raised this question somewhere else, but I am interested in knowing what our club is doing concerning this subject. Recently, I visited (on the internet) the eClub of South America, and it was interesting to note that they have the technology to convert braile text into spoken utterances so that they can invite the seeing-impaired to join their club. Do we have anything of the sort, or has it been considered?

Take a look at the new District 5510 website at www.rotary5510.org.  District site is now hosted by ClubRunner and offers more features and makes communication easier.  Training will be offered to the clubs.  It has huge potential for the clubs.  Look for more information to come. 

Linda Wright, member Recswusa