Peace Pole planted – Corby Phoenix-UNITED KINGDOM

Hi to you all,

I just wanted to share our Peace Pole Planting ceremony with you all.

On Thursday February 23rd, the children of Studfall Primary School, Corby , Northants  in conjunction with Corby Phoenix Rotary Club planted a Peace Pole at the entrance of their school.

One of the main focus areas of Rotary International is Peace and Conflict Resolution … Rotary as an organisation offers peace projects/initiatives at every level of education  from Primary School to sponsoring 50 peace scholars every year to study Peace and  Conflict resolution at six university centres throughout the world.

We believe very strongly that the younger we start to install the message of peace the better. Corby Phoenix working with Studfall Primary School supported the school to visit a centre which interactively made young people realise violence is not always the answer to problems.  Many issues were raised including cyber bulling.  From this we went on to encourage the children to think about alternatives to violence and what peace means.  They started for taking the letters PEACE and explained what these meant in relation to peace.  They then went on to develop thoughts of peace and several very insightful poems were written.  Copies of which  I can send.

On the 23rd of February,  they held a Mufti day at school where the children all dressed up in purple. Purple is the colour of Rotary’s Campaign  along with Bill Gates of Microsoft to eradicate the crippling disease polio from the world. They also saw the links where there is peace there is less chance of polio outbreaks.  An assembly was held with children reading their peace poems and culminating in planting their Peace Pole.  Eight languages were included and a time capsule was planted which contained a couple of the poems and a dove badge representing peace.

I attach pictures…pictures include the children, teacher Angie Alloway , who was foremost in leading the project at the school, Rotarians from two Corby Clubs  and the  1070 Rotary District Governor John Dehnel.

I think it is best summed up in the words of the teacher…

“Please can you pass on a huge thank you to you and your fellow Rotarians for all their support today.

The children were really engaged in the assembly and the Peace Pole looks amazing and will be a wonderful welcome to all who visit our school; thank you so much for making this happen for us.

With the kindest of regards,
Angie”

As a Rotarian in the UK I am trying t promote the planting of Peace Poles.  This is a project very few UK Rotarians know about, it will take some time but progress is being made.

very best wishes,
Rtn Margaret Morley.
RC of Corby Phoenix.
District 1070 UK