On Wednesday, April 8, 2026, Miss Wisconsin 2025 Willow Newell wowed the crowd with an entertaining and inspiring look into her time representing our state. The 23-year-old self-described Gen Zer spoke about the overwhelming worldwide media attention she received as the first African-American in the role and her experience competing in the Miss USA pageant last Fall. She also shared the positive response she has received when openly discussing her mental health struggles with people of all ages, and the joy she has gotten from singing with residents at senior care facilities.
The 2025 Carthage College Musical Theater graduate currently divides her time as a library assistant at the Racine Public Library, in-game host for the Milwaukee Bucks, and state ambassador at all the various county fairs, Kwik Trip location openings, school speaking engagements, and everything in-between. After she gives up her crown in June, Willow is moving on to graduate school to further her creative writing/filmmaking career at either Howard University or Oxford.
OTHER UPDATES:
DEADLINE THIS WEEK! Shelly is collecting basket raffle items for TriCon's silent auction. Can you provide something great to help? All the proceeds will go toward Elkhorn's Rotary Foundation tally for the year. Please see Shelly with items or questions
Jon is looking for someone to do Meals on Wheels on Tuesday, April 21st. Please CLICK HERE to sign up.
Ted announced that Bryan Iwicki was the winner of this year's Rotary March Madness bracket!!! Congrats, Bryan!
The library renovation is almost complete! Chad announced that the club should be able to renew its weekly meetings in the Community Center starting next month and is hoping for a Rotary information table at their Grand Re-opening/Summer Reading kickoff event on June 6, 2026. More volunteer details coming soon.
Support the United Way for Walworth County for a Spring DISCO NIGHT at the Grand Geneva on Saturday, April 25, 2026. Please CLICK HERE to sign up. Costumes encouraged but not required.
The TreeHouse is inviting all Walworth County residents to take the "Tech-Free Thursdays" pledge for the month of April. It's still not too late: CLICK HERE to sign up!
Submit 4th Quarter Dues By April 30th
Club Invoices for April through June 2026 have been emailed to members. Please CLICK HERE to enter the ClubRunner portal to review your balance and pay your invoice. An up-to-date club is a happy club!
Scan the QR code to get signed up for the American Red Cross at Elkhorn High School this Wednesday, April 15, 2026.
From Socrates to Rotary: A Shared Ethic of Word & Deed
Comparing Socrates’ three filters and Rotary International’s Four-Way Test reveals a surprising ethical continuity between antiquity and the contemporary world.
Socrates already proposed a discipline of speech based on three simple requirements: “Is it true? Is it good? Is it useful?”
Rotary adopts this same logic, extending it to the field of action: “Is it true? Is it fair? Is it a source of goodwill and friendship? Is it equitable and beneficial to everyone?”
The correspondence is striking.
Truth forms the common foundation.
Socratic kindness finds its extension in loyalty and the promotion of goodwill.
As for utility, it becomes the pursuit of a shared benefit.
In both approaches, speech is never neutral: it engages the responsibility of the one who utters it.
Despite a separation of more than twenty-four centuries, Greek philosophy and Rotary ethics converge towards the same ambition: to sustainably improve the quality of human relations.
