Minutes of the
President Lloyd called the
meeting to order at
Members present: Marty Miller,
Allen,
Welcome guests:
Wives:
Jeanne Lloyd, Judy Copeland, Emily Brown
Other
guests: Charles Klug, a prospective member and 7
cadets and their families (it was a packed dinning room!)
The President introduced the
guests.
The minutes of the March
meeting were approved.
The secretary asked the
membership for help in presenting our ROTC awards to a few schools not already
covered.
Chuck Copeland, our
treasurer, reported a balance of $2,953.34.
Registrar Alan Bell reported
on his activities. He’ll have 3 supplemental applications heading to national
today.
President Lloyd asked the
color guard to present the colors at a Wounded Warrior ceremony to be held at
Following up on a topic from
the last meeting President Lloyd announced that John Skillman agreed to track
awards for the chapter. John also bought a set of small revolutionary war era
flags which he donated to the chapter.
In our efforts to hold some
sort of joint event with the
The president won’t be in
attendance at the May meeting but encourage the membership to attend and enjoy
the presentation by Jim Schnur on
Prior to our lunch
dismissal, the president took a few moments to introduce the SAR and its goals
to the guests.
The meeting recessed for
lunch.
Following lunch President
Lloyd introduced Kevin Yarnell who spoke on “Thinking Big Thoughts: How
Enduring Concepts Can Provide Direction in Changing Times”. Kevin first looked
at the term ‘concept’ and explained that a concept is a general idea derived or
inferred from specific instances or occurrences. We learn best when the
material is presented and arranged in a hierarchy. So, rather than learn just a
bunch of facts, we put these facts together in an order that allows us greater
understanding.
This is the real purpose of
a liberal arts education. Many people thing it is a broad education but it is,
instead, a high education and teaches the student that knowledge must be
understood in a hierarchy. Some questions are more important than others or
must be answered first.
With this background in
place the speaker pointed out that we learn concepts by starting at discrete
events and working up. But planning and decisions need to be made in reverse.
We must start with principles and concepts and work down to the details.
Several examples of this were offered including an explanation of how the idea
for this JROTC luncheon starts from the mission of the SAR.
The question then must be
asked, do we see this type of thinking in our leaders today? Do they start with
big thoughts or principles and use these to guide their thinking down into the
details? Unfortunately, the answer to these questions is too often, no. To
illustrate Kevin, to the amusement of the audience referenced the recent
healthcare debate. Not taking a side, he simply asked the listeners to recall
what was debated and noted that it was all details. No one discussed the big
question, “What is the role of government is the area of health care?” He
pointed out that answering this question first settles a large part of the
subsequent questions.
Following two more examples
where big thoughts and principles have not been employed at the outset by our
leaders, Kevin offered two examples where the principles did come first. The
Monroe Doctrine was his first example. The Homestead Act of 1862 was the
second. In both instances general principles were used to as a guide for
working out the details. In the case of the Homestead Act the fact that the
land was offered to anyone willing to work it follows directly from the
statement of equality in our Declaration of Independence.
In concluding the speaker
urged the audience to four actions:
-
Strive for a
‘higher’ education
-
Tackle the big
questions ourselves
-
Encourage our
friends to think bigger as we discuss issues of our day
-
Vote on the big
thoughts not on sound bites
President Lloyd then
presented the Bronze JROTC award to the cadets.
Kevin won the 50/50 and donated his portion to
the chapter. The treasury was thus enriched by $7.00.
The President led the recessional,
Jack Bolen gave the benediction, and the meeting adjourned at
Respectfully submitted,
Kevin Yarnell
Chapter Secretary