Conroe Noon Lions celebrated friendly competition, academics and public speaking excellence at our November 19th meeting. President Tracey Irvine called the meeting to order, and we all joined in our pledges and an A’capella rendition of “God Bless America” and the “Smile” song. She reminded us that there is NO MEETING next week (the day before Thanksgiving) but when we return, our Christmas and Holiday Spirit will be in full force as we start to gather items for our Christmas Baskets for some less fortunate people in our community. Equally exciting is the impending Lucky Derby – Car Raffle and the chance for a ticket holder to win wonderful, valuable prizes and up to a $30K toward a vehicle donated by Gullo Auto Group. There are still tickets available for sale so everyone can participate if they act quickly. She recognized two “Lions of the Month” – Sina Razavi for his great work at the Clay Shoot and Junette Mihelich for her great service at the Pre-school Vision Screenings.
Our Fall membership drive divided the membership by alphabetical groups and “lovingly” anointed each team as either “Texas Longhorns” or “Texas Aggies”. Each week we had “pep rallies/team yells” and encouraged everyone to bring guests, recruit new member prospects and collect images and clips of our members doing their great outreach of service. With much suspense and fanfare Past President Steve Wohlschlaeger announced that the “Texas Aggies” team seized the lead at the finish line. They celebrated the victory with two “Aggie Yell Leaders” leading us in their energizing “yells”. Past President Rich Sproba was the victorious team leader and accepted the Tannery Trophy and congratulations from the loosing team represented by Past President Donnie Buckalew. The Club celebrated our reunification and welcoming celebration for new members and candidates with a “Conroe Noon at Night” event at GuadalaHarry’s Bar and Grill that evening after work.
Lion Byron Stewart introduced our featured event of the day. Our annual Outstanding Youth Contest, from all the contestants the judges selected three finalists from Conroe High School to attend the club meeting for their final judging. These future leaders gave their speeches on Artificial Intelligence in education and beyond. Their fascinating insights as well as their public speaking skill and poise all contributed to the Lions’ membership votes to select the winner and the two runners up. These exemplary students were awarded scholarships from Conroe Noon Lions, and the winner will have the opportunity to compete at the District and possibly State level for even higher scholarship awards. Our community can be proud of the fine young adults we heard and met that day. The winners were Ranudi Sabaweerage – 1st place, Ameli Valle – 2nd place and Max Wolf – 3rd place. Committee members Lion Maddie Perry, Lion Ruth Smith, Lion Debbie Hooker and 3rd VP Andrew Perry worked extensively with students and staff to make this day such a wonderful experience and motivation for future scholarship candidates.
President Tracey wished everyone a wonderful and safe Thanksgiving and adjourned the meeting at 1:00 PM.