The District Conference will take place from May 13-15. Registration forms are available from Carol or on the District website.

RYLA. The RYLA event will be held at Juniata College this ummer. Nominations for attendees are being taken now. LeAnne Martin is the contact person in our club. Students that are juniors in highschool now are eligible.

Jim Eberly reported about Rotary's Central Parklet Project sponsored by the two SC clubs. The new "Children's Play Space" will be lot of fun for kids. The total costs of the project are $50,000. 50% needs to be raised by the two SC clubs as part of Rotary's 100th anniversary in 2005. Bricks are on sale ($100 for first kid name, $50 for each subsequent). The bricks will be used for the walkway. A pamphlet was distributed. Please be selling bricks!

Previous Week's Speaker: Classification talks from Laurel Sanders and Ted Staats

Laurel went first and opened her talk by playing a musical instrument from another culture, and she announced that while sopranos get attention when they sing, they are often poorly heard when they speak. She had our attention and proceeded to tell us of quite an interesting life so far that brought her to State College.
Laurel is a native of York, PA and was raised on a farmette there by her father and mother. Her father was a Realtor and a member of the York Rotary Club, and founded the North York Rotary Club in York. Laurel went off to study at Ithaca College, where she studied voice. Then she traveled to London and Switzerland to complete her studies. Laurel met her husband, who is an opera singer, in London during her undergraduate studies.
She ended up in Cincinnati to complete a graduate degree in arts administration, after which she served as the Director of Development for Dayton Opera and Executive Director of The Muse Machine (an arts education organization). Following her husband, she moved to Germany, where she was performing, arranging, directing, and teaching music and English. After Laurel and her husband had lived in Germany for eleven years they decided to move back to the United States and her family. Laurel looked for jobs and narrowed the location to Ithaca or State College. The club lucked out with a great new member and she took a job as director of marketing of Optical Image Technology here. Laurel has two children in school here.

Ted Staats was our other speaker. Ted let us know that Rotary runs in his family. Ted's father and grandfather were Rotarians. His grandfather was a district governor in Pittsburgh.
Ted was born at Ft. Benning, Georgia while his father was serving in the US Army. He later moved like Laurel to Germany. Ted's father was fortunate to be stationed in Germany during the Vietnam War. Otherwise Ted grew up in Pittsburgh and attended Penn State earning a degree in biology. He was a pharmaceutical rep for 9 years and then fell in his fathers footsteps as a financial advisor. In April 1999 he began his career in financial sales. When his father retired (last year) Ted took over many of his father's accounts. Ted's advice is providing excellent service while referring to experts for tax matters or legal matters.

Recently Ted relocated back to State College because his wife wanted to live nearer to home for personal reasons. With modern technology Ted is able to handle accounts from his office in Pittsburgh or his office in State College. He works in each during the week.

He has been married 13 years and has a daughter age 10 that is very involved in sports and is quite good and a son who is 7 that is having to live up to an older sister that is a star but does well in his own right. Ted plays basketball and anything athletically minded to keep his mind going right.

To keep Ted in line is his neighbor and Rotarian PDG Carol Walsh.