Festival City Rotary Newsletter March 26, 2013

Posted by Vincent Hill 
on Mar 26, 2013
 

The Rotary Club Of Festival City

President:  Dianne Yundt

Minutes of the meeting of March 26, 2013

Club email:  festivalcityrotary@gmail.com

Club website: www.festivalcityrotary.ca

Guests: Stan Malcolm, Ryan Erb, Tine Buechler and Basil Hurst are from Stratford Rotary. Leticia Figueiredo is our exchange student. Mirjam Schutt is our Youth Exchange Counsellor. Special guests are Sheila and Lorentz Rose accompanied by Linde Fraser. Michael McCourt from D&D Automation with two job-shadowing students,  Natallie Biesinger and Clay Carter.

Door Prize: Kent Chisholm donated the prize won by Bob Shannon.

Announcements:

  1. Festival City Rotary Club 18th Anniversary: The club’s was given official status on March 23 1995 with 28 members. The formation of the club was an initiative of Robert Ritz. The first president was Etienne Leushuis. Other founding members still in the club include Carolyn Dingman, Donna Hinz, Susan Thomson, and Ron Rogers.
  2. Rotary Events: President Dianne reminded the membership to check the ClubRunner and District 6330 websites for upcoming Rotary events.
  3. Youth Exchange Officer: Mirjam Schutt, our Youth Exchange Counsellor, is urging someone in the club to come forward to serve as the next Y.E.O. If we are to host Rotary Exchange students and to send exchange students to other countries we need to have a Youth Exchange Officer.
  4. Block Parent Program: Ryan Erb from the Stratford Rotary Club is encouraging members of our club to participate in the Block Parent Program. The program once run by the Kinettes is now a Stratford Rotary Club project. It is hoped that 2 to 3 homes in each block will participate in the program and place a sign in their front window. He has application forms for those who are interested.
  5. Adult Learner Award. Tine Buechler announced that Sheila Rose is this year’s winner of the Adult Learner Award. President Dianne presented Sheila with the award. Teacher Linde Fraser recounted Sheila’s efforts and determination to obtain a high school diploma.

Guest Speaker: Laura Pogson introduced Michael McCourt from D&D Automation. The company was started by three friends 20 years ago in Stratford and is now located at the corner of Lorne Ave and Erie St. The company’s business is the creation of software to run robotically controlled production lines. The result is that parts are brought together in the correct sequence with a very high degree of precision which man made production could not attain. In one video Michael showed cars being produced at the BMW plant in Greenville South Carolina . Cars are produced at a rate of one car every 78 seconds. Production was organized using software from D&D Automation. Another video showed the sorting of mail at a plant in Sweden. The sorting software was developed at D&D. The company has contracts in many countries to design robotically controlled production systems. At the Stratford plant the company experiments with new ways of doing a job. One job being tested is using vision software so that robots can recognize parts and place them in the correct location on another part and weld them together.

D&D is pleased to be located in beautiful Stratford with its world class entertainment and restaurants which visiting clients can enjoy.

Michael was thanked by Brandi Gillett.