The Shaftesbury Rotary Caldwell Award for 2024 was awarded to Open House for the great work they and their volunteers do supporting the local community. Open House has a great team that offers benefit advice, housing advice, emergency food parcels, a store of second-hand furniture to help people who cannot afford furniture or white goods, and support services to help people with CV writing and budget management.
The Caldwell Award was started by the Shaftesbury Civic Society in honour of Rachel Caldwell, a founder of the society. Shaftesbury Rotary took it over in 2021.
Nikki Hall Project Manager of Open House and Genette Gale (Rotary)
Circus Skills workshop – As a big thank you to Shaftesbury Primary School for their participation in our Rotary RotaKids project! We put on a circus workshop, together with a performance of slapstick comedy, magic and great circus skills. Everyone including the teachers were in hysterics. Unfortunately, one lucky teacher with a birthday (no names mentioned) was called up to the stage, ending up tangled up with the jugglers, beeping horns and blowing a whistle. Luckily their accuracy was true!
Circus Berzercus, commonly described as ‘A Mismatch Made in Devon’ are a hilarious, highly skilled circus show for all the family. They regularly carry out circus skills workshops in schools from Key Stage 1 upwards. Shaftesbury Rotary have been partnering with Circus Berzercus for over 8 years holding events at the schools. A Special thanks to SteveEldridge and Ben Cornish of Circus Berzercus, for yet another excellent show. We hope to see you again soon!
The year closed with a festive meeting at Le Fleur De Lys. Some 30 of us, including close friends, met for a three course Christmas Meal on Monday 9th December. We enjoyed three courses of excellent food and superb service in convivial surroundings, delivered in the inimitable style offered by David, Mary and their team. We all agreed that this had been an exceptional evening. Many thanks to Mike Farrow for organising the evening.
