About Us
The Rotaract Club of Ottawa is a vibrant established club in the Ottawa area for university students and young professionals. We are committed to volunteerism, international service, and the development of our members, but we enjoy having a good time as well! If you are interested, you are invited to come to one of our meetings at either Carleton University or the University of Ottawa (see the calendar or contact us for more details).
Rotary International is an international service organization, guided by the motto “Service Above Self.” Well known for its program to eradicate polio, Rotary International’s clubs also work on a wide range of projects all over the world.
Rotaract is a global service club for youth and young professionals aged 18-30. Rotaract has close ties with Rotary, because each Rotaract club is sponsored by a Rotary Club (our sponsor club is the Rotary Club of Ottawa).
We make a difference:
At the Rotaract Club of Ottawa, we organise meaningful projects in both locally and internationally. For example, we raised $2000 last year for women in Panvel Industrial Town in India in our project, “Empowering Women.” This project was so successful that we received a matching grant for a combined total of $10,000 from the Ottawa Rotary Club, our Rotary District, and Rotary International. It was even nominated as a candidate for an outstanding Rotaract project!
But that’s not all. Last year, we raised $1000 for Project Tembo, a micro-credit organization in Tanzania, we volunteered in many organizations in the city through our volunteer blitz “Project Serve,” and we cleaned up the park we adopted in Sandy Hill.
The Rotaract Club has lots of exciting plans this year! See the Rotaract Committees page for more information on what we’re doing.
We develop our members:
The Rotaract Club of Ottawa is committed to making the experience of members and guests at meetings is as valuable as possible. That is why we have a guest speaker at every general meeting. Guest speakers talk about a whole range of topics – last year, we had representatives from organisations like Project Tembo, Right to Play, The Women’s Resource Centre at the University, and a huge range of other community organisations. Oh yeah, and the Swiss Ambassador to Canada came to speak to us as well.
Because we’re affiliated to the Rotary, we also have access to a network of amazing people who are eager to work with us. The Rotary Club of Ottawa regularly invites us to their events, and they attend our events as well. If you’re interested in meeting and learning from these experienced volunteers who are well established in their workplace, then Rotaract is probably a club for you!
We have fun:
Rotaractors always have some time for a little fellowship. That is why Rotaractors and guests are always invited to stay and chat after each meeting, as well as enjoy a few snacks provided by members of the club! We also have a number of social events during the year – last year’s highlight was the annual Chilly Chili Sunday which is a joint Rotaract-Rotary event filled with snowshoeing, snowball fights, and Chili!
Even our international and community service projects are a lot of fun!. Last year, our major spring fundraiser was called “dodging for chickens,” which was a marathon dodgeball tournament for a great cause. We also had an Indian night, which involved great food and entertainment!
Check out our pictures or our year-end reports at the top of this page to see more examples of Rotaract fun!
