A huge congratulations to our charter President Diane Collins on receiving this year’s Sylvia Whitlock Leadership Award at the Women in Rotary function at the Rotary International Convention in Hamburg.
This award was established in 2017 and was first presented at a Women in Rotary event at the Atlanta Convention. The award recognizes individuals (men or women) who have contributed to the success of women in Rotary.
The Award is named after Dr. Sylvia Whitlock, who joined the Ex-Rotary Club of Duarte, California, in 1982. At that time, women were not allowed to join Rotary, and Duarte had been removed as an official Rotary club because it had admitted women as members.
The US Supreme Court ruled that the Duarte club be reinstated in 1987, and Dr. Whitlock became the club’s president that year, thus making her the first female club president in Rotary history. She later served as District 5330’s District Governor in 2012-2013.
She has participated in Rotary’s National Immunization Days and established an AIDS clinic in Jamaica. She has supported an orphanage in Mexico, sank wells in Nigeria and raised almost $90,000 to educate girls in India.
