Lions Clubs International MD101 SWEDEN

LCIF’s US$30 Million Committment to Gavi is Complete

At the 2013 Lions Clubs International Convention in Hamburg, Germany, LCIF made a commitment to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, to raise US$30 million to help protect tens of millions of children in the world’s poorest countries against measles. If we could accomplish this ambitious goal, these funds would be matched by the Gavi Matching Fund, whose primary contributors are the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the UK Department for International Development.

LCIF is pleased to announce that thanks to the generosity and service of Lions, this goal has been reached, bringing the total amount raised to US$60 million. Thank you, Lions.

Impact With support from LCIF and the Gavi Matching Fund, 87.7 million children have been immunized in communities across the world. 97.8 million doses of the potentially life-saving measles or measles-rubella vaccine has been procured. This means the prevention of 61,000 future deaths.

For the first time in known history, the annual measles death rate has declined to less than 100,000 deaths per year. LCIF applauds this achievement, and is proud to have contributed to this success.

Touchstone Story–Winston Churchill

Sir Winston Churchill, popularly known as “the Last Lion,” was prime minister of the United Kingdom from 1940-45 (and again from 1951-55).  

Known for his masterful turns of phrase (“If you are going through hell—keep going”) almost as much as his wartime leadership, Churchill was also an animal lover. During his lifetime, admirers from around the globe sent him animals as gifts. Churchill, in turn, gave the animals to the London Zoo, where he and the British public could visit them.  

But in 1956, one of Churchill’s favorites—a lion cub—died suddenly in the London Zoo. American Lions decided to honor Churchill, who they called “the greatest lion of them all,” with a new lion, named Rusty.  

Dennis Venning of the Park Forest Lions Club of Illinois, an editor of LION Magazine, was among those who delivered Rusty to the London Zoo. Venning also visited Churchill at his estate, remembering, “Sir Winston remarked it was a good thing we had not brought Rusty along to his home.”  

Rusty the lion lived at the London Zoo before passing away in 1960. Churchill returned the hide of the majestic lion to Lions Clubs International founder Melvin Jones. Today, Rusty proudly resides in Melvin Jones’ office at Lions Clubs International headquarters in Oak Brook, Illinois.  

When recounting the wartime leadership he offered his country, Churchill said, “I had the luck to be called upon to give the roar.” Lions all around the world can relate.

Touchstone Story–Lions Quest

Lions Quest began as one teenager’s passion to find a better way to prepare young people to handle life’s challenges. Today, it is one of the most widely used social and emotional learning programs in the world.

In 1975, 19-year-old Rick Little of Findlay, Ohio, USA, suffered severe back injuries in an auto accident. Immobilized for six months, Little found himself with a lot of time to contemplate why schools were doing so little to help youth develop the life skills and strength of character needed to succeed as adults. When his injuries healed, Little set out on a nationwide pursuit for answers, interviewing teenagers, teachers and experts in child and adolescent development.

After a struggle to find initial funding, Little established Quest International in 1977 with the help of a US$130,000 grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation to design and develop values-based curricula and drug-use prevention programs. Little went to work creating teaching tools easy to adapt across different cultures and educational systems.

The Lions got involved in 1984 when the Lions Clubs International Foundation made its first grant to Quest International, a grant that funded additional program development and expansion. Later that year, Lions Clubs International formed a working partnership with Quest International to launch a major drug prevention initiative called Lions Quest Skills for Adolescence, targeting middle-school grades 6 through 8. Lions clubs partnered with local school systems to implement the program at the community level.

Over the next 18 years, Lion’s partnership with Little’s organization grew in scope and impact. Lions introduced programs to serve students at all grade levels, from kindergarten through high school. Independent researchers gave the programs high marks for promoting positive behaviors and boosting academic performance.

In 2002, LCIF acquired formal ownership of the curriculum materials. Lions Quest soon became Lions’ signature youth development program worldwide. By 2015, Lions Quest had grown to include 36 languages in 85 countries reaching more than 13 million students.

Lions clubs around the world have been key to the success and expansion of Lions Quest, supporting the program through local funding, coordinating teacher training, co-hosting parent meetings, speaking to youth and undertaking joint service projects with students.

Lions Quest goes beyond academics to teach students how to make responsible decisions, set goals, be accountable for their actions, develop healthy relationships, resist peer pressure and engage in community service.

Teaching materials are continually updated to meet new challenges.

In Turkey, for example, public and private school teachers are using Lions Quest to confront bullying. Mine Guven, a professor of early childhood education at Bosphorus University in Istanbul, is conducting an evaluation of the effort.

“I got involved in the program because the training was so impressive to me,” Guven said. “The challenges are the same all around the world. By using Lions Quest we manage to have peaceful classrooms.”

Touchstone Story #41–Encouraging Peace

On July 22, 2011, the calm of a normal day in Norway was shattered by an explosion in Oslo, the nation’s capital, just a few doors from the prime minister’s office. Hours later, as police were investigating the car bomb that killed eight and injured more than 200, the man responsible had already taken a ferry to the nearby island Utøya, killing 69 youth camp attendees, adult supervisors and camp employees.

The gunman was taken into custody by police, but in a country that hadn’t seen this kind of violence since World War II, it was an act of terrorism that most young people could not comprehend. One in four Norwegians knew someone who had been affected by the attack. Michelle Borgli of the Fredrikstad Sorgenfri Lions Club, a participant at a similar youth camp organized by the Lions, said that “the day before the bombings, we were in [Oslo] with the camp. It affected the students more when they realized how young the people were—and they were at a camp just like us.”

The Lions of Norway seized the opportunity to help youth camp participants understand this tragedy and spread peace as well.

Helle Soos, also of the Fredrikstad Sorgenfri Lions Club, said the aftermath of this tragedy “was a golden opportunity to get a new way of doing the camp,” encouraging camp participants to imagine peace.

For more than 60 years, the Lions Club Youth Camp and Exchange Program had attracted young people from all over the world to Norway. The Norway Imagine Peace Camp is one of more than 100 Lions camps around the world held each year. Camp activities include sports, a variety show and visits to locations of cultural interest, but at the Imagine Peace Camp there is a special focus on fostering discussions of peace and building international friendships.

“In my part of the world, I’ve never known peace,” said 2015 camp participant Milad Bisharat of Israel. “We face problems inside Israel and outside… . The traditions here are awesome. Nobody cares who you are or what you are—they’re just friends with you.”

Lions also promote peace across the North Sea in Germany. Since 1967, the Peace Village, a partnership between the Lions Club and Peace Village International, has helped more than 42,000 children heal together. Treating children who have been injured by sickness, accidents or war and who cannot receive adequate treatment in their home countries, Peace Village provides medical treatment, physical therapy and an environment of healing and hope.

Eberhard J. Wirfs of Kelkheim, Germany, who served as international president in 2009-10, said that hope is the most important thing that Peace Village offers. “Without hope, you really can’t exist.”

Hope—and peace—are offered by Lions around the world. Their goal is to help people understand, as an Imagine Peace camp participant said, that “we are different, maybe, but actually—we are all the same.”