What is expected of Rotaract Clubs - the point of view of the DRC

Contributed by PP Arthur Yeong
District Rotaract Chairman

I humbly lay these several strict injunctions on anyone reading this. Please do not quote any part of this blog out of context and please do not misconstrue anything herein as excusing mediocrity or disrespect for the letter of the law where such exists in Rotary & Rotaract.

A useful canon of construction would be to take whatever is said here against the backdrop of the Criteria for Chartering a New Rotaract Club and my own belief that a great number of Rotaract Clubs in the District is not necessarily a good thing. It is more important to have fewer but strong and vibrant Clubs. Conversely it is important to build up the membership of your Rotaract Club in terms of numbers.

Whatever is said here can only be beneficial if the reader applies them to himself or herself. It would be harmful if the reader thinks, “Hmm that reminds me of so-and-so”. Hence if the chapeau fits, wear it but please do not try to fit it on someone else’s head. Especially not mine.



1. Revisit your motivation for joining Rotaract.

The purpose and goals of Rotaract are contained in Rotary’s Policy Statement on Rotaract and I quote (the emphases are my own) :

A Rotaract club is a Rotary club-sponsored organization of young men and women between the ages of 18 and 30* whose purpose is to provide an opportunity for young men and women to enhance the knowledge and skills that will assist them in personal development, to address the physical and social needs of their communities, and to promote better relations between all people worldwide through a framework of friendship and service, and whose goals are:

a) To develop professional and leadership skills;

b) To emphasize respect for the rights of others, based on recognition of the worth of each individual;

c) To recognize the dignity and value of all useful occupations as opportunities to serve;

d) To recognize, practice, and promote ethical standards as leadership qualities and vocational responsibilities;

e) To develop knowledge and understanding of the needs, problems, and opportunities in the community and worldwide;

f) To provide opportunities for personal and group activities to serve the community and promote international understanding and goodwill toward all people.


Revisit your motivation regularly and bear in mind that motivation of yours.

Nobody joins Rotaract to make enemies or to make life unpleasant for oneself or for others. By the same token, nobody joins Rotary for those misguided reasons. If you find yourself embarking a course of action that is foreseeably likely to have these results, remind yourself that you could not possibly have joined Rotaract to do that.

If after this self-examination you cannot find any motivation but that which leads to destruction, either of yourself, your Club, some other Rotaractor or a Rotarian, then find the nearest exit and put one foot in front of the other until you are on the other side and then close the door gently but firmly behind you. And don’t come back until you have rid yourself of such poisons.

The definition of resentment = you take poison hoping the other guy will die
Proactive resentment = while waiting to take revenge you continue to take poison



2. Impress With Your Good Deeds and Nature



Usually a good and successful Rotaract Club needs to do nothing by way of promoting or advertising its strengths or achievements.

Although submission of projects for and winning of awards are integral to the Movement and is encouraged, the winning of an award is not necessarily a certification of the strength or vitality of that Rotaract Club. Neither does the absence of an award evidence the opposite.

If your Club is really good or strong or capable, others will do the trumpeting for you. And that I think is the sweetest victory – to have someone repeat to you the compliments they have heard about your Club from others.

The same may be said of you as an individual Rotaractor. Let your good deeds speak for you. Let your good manners advertise you. Let your good nature network for you. Let your willingness to go out of your way to lend a hand win you many influential people who will be indebted to you. Let your readiness to forgive heal all those who have hurt you or have had bad intentions against you. If you return evil for evil, where will it all end ? We will all just get entangled in a web of evil thoughts and deeds.



3. Work With and Not Against Your Sponsoring Rotary Club



The most important and most influential potential ally that any Rotaract Club can have is its sponsoring Rotary Club. That Rotary Club is represented by, and given a human face in the person of, your Rotarian Advisor.

I find that Rotaractors are not hostile to Rotarians in general and to their Advisors in particular. On the contrary it has been repeatedly impressed upon me by Rotaractors that they welcome and appreciate the presence of their Rotarians. It seems that most Rotaractors value the time they have with their Rotarians more highly than whatever other, even monetary, resources that the Rotarian may bring to his job.

If that is the case, what is the problem ?

Rotaractors here and there who are exceptional only in their Machiavellian manoeuvres in exploiting the structure and system for their own ends. We may need to go back to items 1 and 2 above.

However in this area, Rotaract Clubs are disadvantaged more by apathetic sponsoring Rotary Clubs and equally apathetic Rotarian Advisors, than by their own misdeeds or designs. A vigilant Rotarian Advisor doing his job properly would have discerned that something is amiss in the Rotaract Club and should have taken proactive steps to remedy the situation.

However your Rotarian Advisor can only advise, caution and admonish. He cannot and should not control your Club except to save your Rotaract Club from error. Most of the time Rotaractors do not commit a wrong or plan to commit a wrong serious enough for the intervention of the sponsoring Rotary Club. Usually they may disregard (to their own peril only) advice on the feasibility or profitability of a certain project. Or they may try to pull the wool over their Rotarian Advisor’s eyes. Nothing terribly serious or diabolical, just youthful exuberance expressed wrongly.

Although your Rotarian Advisor can veto any of your projects or activities which in his opinion is illegal or immoral or contrary to the spirit and principles of Rotary and of your sponsoring Rotary Club, it is an unenlightened Rotarian who actually does that on a regular basis. He should only advise, caution and admonish and leave you to learn from your own mistakes should you disregard the same.

However if you or your Board of Directors decide on a course of action that is objectively misconceived or wrong or defies the advice of higher authorities like the District Governor or District Trainer, your Rotarian Advisor would be derelict in his duty if he were to allow that to be perpetrated.

An example would be holding your Annual General Meeting on a date that clashes with the District Rotaract Conference.

What to do if your Rotarian Advisor is from hell ? Akan datang.



4. Understand Not Only the Letter but the Spirit of Rotaract and Rotary



The Standard Rotaract Constitution, the By-Laws, the Handbook, RI Statement of Policy on Rotaract, the DRR’s Training Manual, the Manual of Procedure (for Rotary) are all important documents that guide and regulate certain procedures, functions and training in these two movements. They may be said to be the letter or the framework of the Organisation. They are by no means the “be all and end all” of Rotaract and Rotary.

There is the other but no less important facet namely the spirit of Rotaract and Rotary. It is this spirit which fleshes out the framework and gives it life. Others include the Four Way Test, motto’s like “Every Rotarian An Example to Youth”, “Service Above Self”, “He Benefits Most Who Serves Best” et al.

Something need not be carved in stone for it to be instructive, enlightening, inspirational and worthy of imitation or striving for.

Ultimately it is the spirit and not the letter which matters more. Sometimes following the law to the letter may very well cause an injustice.

Unfortunately it is not always easy to discern the spirit of something. Almost definitely it cannot be learned or imbibed in six months or so. Depending on how sensitive and observant one is, it may take a number of years to come to any real appreciation of it. Some may join Rotaract at 18 and leave at 30 without having come within a light year of the spirit of Rotaract. The same may apply to Rotarians and the spirit of Rotary.

It is incumbent therefore for Rotaractors who may feel that they know everything about Rotaract and Rotary to ask themselves if they have also understood the Spirit of Rotaract and Rotary. If they are not sure, then I suggest they should humble themselves and bow to those who do for ultimately it is the latter who matter.

I would prefer Rotaractors who have Rotaract in their hearts, not in their heads. I would prefer Rotaractors who have a soul and who genuinely care and who struggle to maintain the ideals of Rotaract while trying to keep their Clubs alive rather than a pack of cold and efficient but heartless Rotaractors who can and do carry out super hyper mega projects. This second group may look like Rotaractors, they may act like Rotaractors but to me they are merely hollow shells resembling Rotaractors.



5. Learn to Enjoy Giving



Nobody who does not genuinely enjoy giving should join a Rotaract Club. It matters little whether you give your money, your worldly goods, your time and talents, your connections, your prayers and good wishes or most importantly, yourself. You must give and enjoy it. Genuinely.

Young adults are encouraged to join Rotaract for what they can get out of it ie Personal Development and I give it to you in the strongest possible terms that you can never develop as a person and as a Rotaractor without giving. I include those who may be tempted to think that they are developing personally simply because they contribute to EREY or are Paul Harris Fellows or Paul Harris Society members.

If I may, I would suggest a simple litmus test. If a Rotaractor contributes to one or more of Rotary’s many foundations and funds and yet looks out for free lunches and cheap thrills and is overly calculating is his/her dealings with others, then I suggest that personal development is probably not taking place yet.

I have no intention of detracting from Rotary’s eminently worthy and life-changing programmes which require the donation of money and neither do I discourage giving to those funds. Quite the contrary. I am talking of worthwhile giving as a means of personal development.

Let your giving be its own reward and pleasure. Let it end there. Let us not keep an eye open for real or potential recognitions and awards.

There are myriad ways of giving which will probably never gain you any medallions or ribands or certificates, maybe not even a mention. Some examples (whether in Rotaract or elsewhere) would be :

giving up your seat to someone else
giving way even when it is your right of way
giving up revenge
giving face even when the recipient does not deserve it
giving away something you need to someone whose need is greater
giving someone the benefit of the doubt
giving someone a second chance
giving credit when and where it is due
giving more than you take

As the adage goes, “Never forget what others have done for you. Always forget what you have done for others”.



6. Understand the Meaning and Cost of Commitment, Duty and Responsibility



Some say that Rotaract like Rotary is a voluntary organization and to that extent no one can tell you what to do. That may be true. It would be sad indeed if decent right-thinking human beings feel that they are not obliged to do anything unless there is a law written somewhere that compels them to do it and threatens them with a sanction if they disobey.

Rotaractors are expected not to be such sad specimens.

Rotaract ceases to be voluntary as soon as you join. The same is true even when you volunteer to hold any office or get anything done.

Thus if you accept a job, whether it be DRR or President or to arrange the chairs for your Meeting, you give up the option of not discharging your duty to the best of your skill and ability. If it is an unwritten rule that your position requires you to support another position, you must do so unflinchingly and without compromise. Or if you join a Rotaract Club, you must support your Club in as many ways as possible whether by attending its Meetings and projects, paying your dues or doing whatever needs to be done.

That means :

you have to get the job done without any excuses like you did not have enough time, your assistant director did not come through for you, your avenue member resigned, your pet fish went belly up etc;
if you say you will attend some event, then you turn up at the appointed time and place, again without any excuses unless there has been a death or serious illness in the family;
if you receive an email or a message to return call, you reply immediately if possible, if not then within 24 hours or if it is a Friday evening, then by Monday morning. If you need time to reply, say so and inform the sender how long you will require. The same applies to short messages and telephone calls;
you do not deliberately give anyone missed calls (unless the other party is your mum or someone who has given you permission to do so);
you must know your place in the Club and movement and not overstep the boundaries;
you sacrifice whatever other things that stand in the way of your delivering on your promise ie if the deadline is first thing tomorrow morning, you must sacrifice that hot date you have tonight; and
you subjugate your own wishes, ambitions and designs and make them coincide with those of the majority, (or if you are the Vice- President) with those of the President whom you are duty bound to support. You must also hold your tongue at Board Meetings and not contradict your President in such a way as to cause him/her to lose credibility.

Being responsible for something simply means you make that thing happen no matter what. Give no excuses, take no prisoners, blame no one else.

The sacrifices you make by way of missed lunches, aborted dates, zipping your lips when you are dying to blurt something out, suppressed emotions are what it cost you to be committed, dutiful and responsible.

Why are such high and seemingly superhuman standards demanded of someone who joins what he/she thinks is a voluntary organisation ?

To aim for anything lower would be an injustice to your own potential as a human being and a Rotaractor. To demand anything less would be to rob you of the satisfaction of knowing that you have honoured your commitment, paid the price, done your duty and discharged your responsibility both to your Rotaract Club and to yourself.



7. Leave the Place a Little Better than When You Found It



A simple request made by my former school principal and yet, a powerful and sobering reminder.

I will not define where “the place” is, or how much is “a little”, or how good is “better”. That must be left to the imagination and creativity and judgment of each individual Rotaractor.

Is the community where your Rotaract Club takes its name from, a better place than before your Club existed ?

Is the venue of your Meeting a better place after your Meeting than before ?

Is the venue of your project a better place after your project than before ?

Is the venue of the District Rotaract Assembly or District Rotaract Conference a better place than before ?

Are the toilets cleaner after Rotaractors use them ?

Is your Rotaract Club a better Club after you joined ? Or after your Presidency ?

Are your fellow Rotaractors better people or better developed personally than before they met you ?

What about fellowship ?

What is your legacy to your Club ? Your fellow Rotaractors ? Your community ?

You only need answer your own self-convincing conscience and nobody else.

I must admit that I never thought that I would enjoy being DRC so much, my forte and favourite people in Rotary having previously been Interactors. I think Rotaractors are more challenging. By and large they are nice people with the usual bad apples in each barrel as dictated by the law of averages.

The reason I had not resigned from Rotary in the past 7 years was a Rotaract Club.

The fact that I did not decline immediately when DGN Dr Rajindar offered me the same post in his Year says something. By then I would be better prepared but I am sure the Rotaractors would have mutated at roughly the same rate as to remain just as exasperating as ever.

Rtn Arthur Yeong
(RC Kinta)
District Rotaract Chairman