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Welcome to our Club’s website which provides an indication of the Rotary organisation, specifically within Orkney but within a wider International framework. If you are interested in joining us, please feel free to make contact via the details below.

The Rotary year starts in July with a new team of officers appointed each year: new chairs for each of our 4 main committees (Community Services, International, Youth and Club Services), a Secretary and Treasurer, Junior Vice and Senior Vice President and Club President. It is a great honour for me to take on the role of Club President for the year 2026-2027. I retired from University teaching in 2019 and moved to Orkney soon after. This was not my first visit of course, because I had been a regular visitor as an active archaeologist since the late 1970s! Orkney is my spiritual home, my permanent home and one where I am now able to contribute more widely to the community here, a small thank you if you like, for the many years of warm welcomes I have received over the decades here.

The group of Orkney Rotarians, numbering a little over thirty individuals, represents all walks of life, each bringing their skills and energies to projects undertaken by Rotary, near and far. There are regular signposts in the year – winter is busy, with Santa’s sleigh around Kirkwall, gifts to Care Home Residents at Christmas and the Mud Run, the summer is marked by presence at the County Show, and RYLA placements as well as other fund raising actions. Other activities undertaken include offering mock interviews for students looking to go to College or University, and host children’s art competitions. Throughout the year we respond to world wide disasters and in 2026 the Venezuela earthquake marked the start of my Presidency. I am proud to say that the combination of a street collection and other donations enabled four Shelterbox kits to be contributed – from our safe homes to those without any shelter over their heads – a drop in the ocean maybe, but a genuine outpouring from our small community to those in need across the ocean. Continuing fund raising for Polio Eradication is a world-wide Rotary initiative, and we play our part in that.

The remit is potentially huge, our Club is not large, but we punch above our weight with the support of the people of Orkney, that most generous of communities. I look forward to the year ahead and hope we can continue to make a difference to lives where needed.