By AARON LANDAU

The members of La Mesa Sunrise Rotary and the Helix High School Interact Club are getting ready for another productive year serving the local community. An Interact Club is a volunteer group of students at a high school who work with a local Rotary International Club, which provides an advisor or advisors to work with the students on community service projects. The high school provides a volunteer faculty member who is the liaison with the students and the sponsoring Rotary Club advisors. Helix High School has had a very active Interact Club for many years.

“We are excited to start 2019 with history teacher Brett McKinney as our new interact advisor,” said JoAnn Bergquist, the La Mesa Sunrise Rotary advisor.

Past projects

Some of the projects last year included working with Noah Homes, Sharia’s Closet, Father Joe’s Village, Habitat for Humanity, and many more great local organizations. Interactors also participate in Rotary activities such as the Interact Symposium at SDSU and a water filtration project at UCSD. Several times a year, students visit the La Mesa Rotary Club, which meets at Marie Callender’s on Friday mornings.

Future projects

With the assistance of Bill Pogue, Bergquist meets weekly with the “Interactors” to plan service projects and teach them about the global impact of Rotary International. In addition to supporting the Interact Club, LMSR also sponsors Helix students with scholarships, a speech contest, and a Rotary Youth Leadership weekend conference. Sunrise Rotary looks forward to another great year working with tomorrow’s leaders.

If you’d like to learn more about La Mesa Sunrise Rotary, visit our website at lamesasunriserotary.com.

To learn more about Helix Charter High School, visit helixcharter.net.

— Aaron Landau writes on behalf of La Mesa Sunrise Rotary.