What is Kiwanis? It is a service club that was first organized in 1915, to promote business networking among members. However, after several years of delivering Christmas baskets to the poor, the focus of the club changed to community service. Within a year of its founding, Kiwanis went international with its first Canadian club, but it took another 69 years until women were finally accepted as members.

Each week, we open our meetings with this question and answer sequence: “What is Kiwanis? Kiwanis is a global organization, dedicated to improving the world—one child, and one community at a time.” A nice sentiment, but what does that all mean?

We truly are a global organization, with 277,025 members in 8,176 adult clubs in more than 80 countries around the world. And it’s not just adults! There are many youth clubs as well—Key Club (for high school kids), Builders Club for junior high students, and even K-Kids, for ages 6-12. There are far more kids in Kiwanis programs than adults—351,277, in 7,904 clubs around the world. In addition there are also over 12,000 participants in Aktion Club (for adults with disabilities) and another 14,000 college students make up the 433 Circle K Clubs.

We truly are dedicated to improving the world. Kiwanis International’s primary service project is called “Project Eliminate,” which aims to eradicate Maternal/Neonatal Tetanus, a disease that kills millions of mothers and babies every year—about one every 11 minutes. In addition to Project Eliminate, clubs are involved in their local communities, donating more than 18.5 million hours to service each year.

We truly care about the lives of children. In addition to sponsoring the wide variety of Kiwanis youth clubs that teach kids the value of leadership, service, self-esteem, goal-setting, and civic engagement, we also provide college scholarships to kids who are involved in these programs. But we don’t stop there—the Natchez Trace Kiwanis Club also donates money to local charities that benefit children, from the D & J Youth Group to It Takes a Village, from adopting a local family at Christmas to raising funds for Kids Against Hunger. This spring, we also sponsored a mission trip to Honduras to build a home for a needy family.

We truly care about our community. During the annual Kiwanis One-Day Project, Kiwanians all over the world pick a service project in their area that will benefit their community. Our club has picked up trash on the Natchez downtown nature trail, worked on Habitat for Humanity homes, and built a walkway for the nature trail at Historic Jefferson College. We’ve raised funds for the new animal shelter, provided meals for families in need, and assisted with Historic Jefferson College’s annual Ghost Tales and After-Dark Rubber Duck Hunt.

Where do we get the funds to do these projects? Sometimes we will ask members to individually donate, but the majority of our funds come from local events—spring and fall bowling tournaments, the spring Pancake Breakfast, and the fall Spaghetti Lunch. It is that last one that is rapidly approaching! Please put Thursday, Oct. 8 on your calendar, and plan to eat some tasty spaghetti and meatballs for lunch! We will be at Jefferson Street United Methodist Church from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., slinging out Styrofoam plates of pasta goodness as fast as we can, and tickets are available at the door for only $8.00.

Kiwanis—we don’t just give money, we give our time. If you are interested in being a member of this great group of people, please call Robin Person at 601-442-2901. We meetat noon every Thursday at Rolling River Bistro, and we’d love to have you join us.

 

Robin Person is the president of the Natchez Trace Kiwanis Club.