French lessons

French Interactors hold a bake sale for Philippine children.

 

 

V isitors to Rodez, France, a modest city at the base of the Massif Central, find unexpected icons such as 5,000-year-old granite menhir statues, Roman ruins, and medieval alleyways, unscathed by World War II bombings.

In outlying villages like Rignac, cows and sheep clog the roads each morning and evening. Here, at the Lycée de Rignac, a vocational school opened by a nun in 1946, the students are also receiving an education in humanitarian service.

The Rotary Club of Rodez has forged a partnership with the school that is energizing the adults and the teens. For several years, the students have held Saturday-morning bake sales to help villages in Burkina Faso, provide facial reconstruction surgery for children in the Philippines, and support other projects sponsored by the Rodez club. In 2004, the Rotarians organized an Interact club. Principal Anne-Marie Prunet sees its work, which is both local and global, as essential as academics. “I think we live in a society that is very individualistic,” she says. “The Rotary and Interact clubs are raising awareness among the youth on the importance of helping one another and teamwork, which are key tools to succeed in life.”

Armand Plainecassagne, a Rodez Rotarian since 1990, helped organize the Interact Club of Lycée Agricole et Horticole Rignac. Both clubs maintain active schedules and meet frequently. “Discussions get very interesting,” he says. Together they host tea parties at a retirement home, clean up parks, and volunteer at a center for people with disabilities, where the Interactors play wheelchair basketball. They also mentor younger students, bringing them to the school for baking lessons.

Chrystel Alquier, 28, started playing wheelchair basketball four years ago, about two years after an undiagnosed illness paralyzed her from the waist down. She recently won a place on the French national women’s team. Several Rignac Interactors compete with Alquier and other players at a regional center for people with disabilities. The rookies, who struggle to execute the sharp turns and graceful weaves of the veterans, “are now in a much better position to understand the hardships we face,” Alquier says. “They realize we can do any activity, go anywhere, and live on our own,” adds Hervé Pelissier, another wheelchair athlete. “They have a better idea of what it means to be disabled. It’s no longer seen as a defect.”