TORRINGTON – The weekly meeting of the Torrington Rotary Club was called to order shortly after the noon hour on Monday, November 4. Club president, Michele Ogburn welcomed club members. Ogburn led the club in the Pledge of Allegiance, Rotarian Four-Way Test and other Rotarian formalities. Guests in attendance at the club meeting were introduced along with Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon, who was introduced as the speaker for Monday’s meeting. 

“At this time, I did want to say we would like to welcome our fellow Rotarian, Governor Gordan and say Rotary is a service club and we are committed to improving our community and governor, to show our appreciation to you and Wyoming’s First Lady, Jennie, the Torrington Rotary Club will be making a contribution to WyoHelp Food Bank in your honor today,” Ogburn said. “Thank you for everything you do for Wyoming.”

Ogburn continued with the Rotarian formalities such as their fundraising efforts with the Queen of Hearts drawing and the “Happy Basket” which collect donations for the club’s scholarships. Ogburn also had the governor introduce his guests to the club. Continuing on, Ogburn played “Guess the Rotarian,” and read the Rotarian did you know quote. 

“’Occasionally, there is a temptation to criticize the laws, customs and traditions of another country which may seem strange or contrary to our own. In some instances, illegal practices or customs of one nation are completely lawful and acceptable in another,’” Ogburn read. “’As members of an international organization dedicated to world understanding and peace, it behooves Rotarians to exercise restraint in judging our Rotary friends and citizens from other countries when their behavior seems unusual to us. A Rotary policy has existed for more than half a century relating to this dilemma of international relationships.’”

Under old business, Todd Peterson introduced Dave Bartlett who spoke on the International WASH Project. Peterson spoke to the club, providing a brief introduction of Bartlett.  

“I was here about a month ago and this WASH project, in case you’re new to Rotary, WASH is an acronym, and it stands for water, hygiene and sanitation and it is one of the ten head-turners for Rotary,” Bartlett said. “When you have a project like this, a lot of times you get international funds for it so that’s our project here. It’s a $60,000 project. Rotary International, we expect, will put $30,000 in and we will raise $30,000 so your contribution is really appreciated.” 

Peterson presented Bartlett with a check for $3,000 for the International WASH Project efforts. 

Ogburn then introduced the guest speaker of the meeting, Governor Gordon. 

“I would like to introduce our governor, Mark Gordon, who was elected in 2018. He is our 33rd governor. He is in his second term. Prior to being elected as governor, he was our state treasurer for two years. He grew up in Kaycee. He is married to Jennie, our First Lady of Wyoming. He has four grown children, four grandchildren and he is an active Rotarian in Buffalo,” Ogburn said.

After a round of applause, Gordon spoke to the group.

“As always, it’s wonderful to be here. It’s really an honor. This room has a lot of memories for me,” Gordon said. 

Gordon spoke to the club about his staff and what they were working on within his department and he also took a moment to recognize Judge Edward Buchanan, District Court Judge for the Eighth Judicial District.

“It is so nice to have you with us. I think there is a very small group of people, Judge [Buchanan], that have served in the legislature and in executive and as a judge,” Gordon explained. 

Gordon continued around the room speaking with community members he had known over the years. 

“But this room also means a lot because my dad was a steer roper and they have the circuit finals here every year,” Gordon recalled. “Two years ago, it was also my wife’s birthday and the town of Torrington and the circuit final crew came up with this enormous birthday cake that was the size of one of these tables for Jennie. So, your hospitality, your generosity is really remarkable.”

“Today, I thought I would talk a little bit about what we are trying to do in education,” Gordon explained. “I grew up in Kaycee and when I ended up on the school board, kind of following my dad’s footsteps, one of the things that caught my attention regarding the third and fourth graders and one of the challenges was what are we going to do with science standards? At the time, there was a lot of talk about accountability and a number of other aspects that we had in that general conversation going on about our education. What was missing, to my thinking because growing up, dad had this project that we had to do twice a summer, every summer and that was to butcher about 140 chickens so to so, twice,” Gordon said.

Over time, Gordon explained he became good at his summer job of chicken processing and he noticed the children on his ranch were always interested in process.

“As I got older, the kids on the ranch were always interested in all the stuff that you would do with chickens when you’re butchering them,” Gordon explained. “The feather, that’s kind of not so great but all the other stuff inside of the chicken was pretty remarkable and these were all kids from first, second, third, fourth, fifth grade. What I noticed is that kids in that grouping is everything is ‘Gross’ and everything is ‘Really cool,’ and when I brought that up, I was saying so ‘Why aren’t we doing more science at the third and fourth-grade level?’  and the comment was made, ‘Well, we don’t have standards for that so we can’t teach that.’”

“Curiosity is something that you want to encourage not measure,” Gordon explained. “I think curiosity is one of those things that we really need to double down on in particularly with our kids. One of the things that I noticed about seniors, was in that last year there’s just a lot of kind of sitting around. You know, they’re not engaged as often as they might be. There may be some things we can do a little bit differently to kind of encourage that.”

Gordon stated the legislature has been really dedicated of the last few years to get different types of learning programs, mentorships and apprenticeships to keep students engaged. 

“I can tell you, to this cowboy, math never meant anything until it was about cows or something like that and that’s what made a difference for me,” Gordon explained. “Education has been this battleground for so long and it’s really all been adults trying to push something on schools. Kaycee, Torrington, Cheyenne, Jackson; they are all very different communities. They all have a lot of different things going on. Why don’t we start by going into the communities, by talking to the parents, by talking to the schools, why don’t we figure out a way we can, from the ground up, try to educate, but find out what education is missing and find out where we can adjust that? We call this the reimagining and innovating the delivery of education,” Gordon expressed. 

The meeting continued on before concluding with the announcement of no meeting for November 11 due to Veterans Day.