On this warm summer Monday afternoon, about 35 Rotarians and guests gathered at The Grey Eagle Hotel for our weekly club meeting.
President Don Edie called the meeting to order at 12:00 pm. We had five guests.Lunch comprised of fried Chicken, mashed potato, salads, vegetables and desert pastries. There was good fellowship, and it was great to see a large turn out of members looking well and cheerful in anticipation of another great program.
Today’s program speaker introduced by Sa’adat Keshavjee was Melissa Netsko, an educator, who is passionate about youth that have a stutter. She has helped launch in Calgary, Camp Dream, Speak, Live, a program that encourages and enables youth with a stutter to flourish. Our Club has been involved with her program and contributed to this initiative.
Highlights of her presentation:
She started this program out of a need which she had when her 3-year-old son Oliver was stuttering. She realized there was speech therapy, but she needed more and started researching further.
Oliver who also attended is 11 years old and has been to Austin TX four times and to the camp in Austin three times. He is very confident and seems to be progressing well.
The University of Alberta has a program that addresses this issue from a research-based viewpoint.
Dr Courtney Byrd wrote a book entitled “life on delay” about Stuttering, which encouraged Melissa to reach out to the author, who then connected her with a camp in Austin Texas at the A M Bank Centre for stuttering youth. This camp is called “Camp dream, speak live”
Melissa realized that they had chapters in Nigeria and Korea as well as the US, but none in Canada, so she single-handedly started this initiative and camp in Calgary to assist her son and others.
Stuttering is a neuro psychological condition and can even occur later in life. It can also self correct with age
The camp has been most successful and is in its infancy. They are seeking funding to continue, and have not got a charitable status yet, and may be seeking to expand with the right help. They base their work on research and treatment. Treatment is based on allowing the candidates to speak openly freely and confidently. They do group work and improv speaking where they learn to speak freely rather than fluently. The outcome has been positive, and the need seems to be necessary. Sadly, this is an area that has not received much attention.
They learn resiliency, perseverance, and gain confidence towards better self-expression. This even helps them combat schoolyard bullying and other related issues of growing up.
The candidates get to feel more confident and empowered and in turn are advocating and educating small groups of people about this affliction and how to address people with a stutter.
Not enough people understand how to deal with stuttering people, and Oliver tells us that 1% of the world’s people stutter.
Oliver tells us he does not stutter when he sings but stutters when he talks. This was connected to a question and comment from Des DeFreitas.
Melissa hopes this program, which Rotary has embraced, will help people speak more confidently and live a fuller life
The presentation was eloquently and passionately presented, and well received, with many animated questions and comments. This was a truly enlightening and informative program that touched the heart. Grateful to members of the program committee for harnessing such thoughtful programs!
President Don thanked Melissa and Oliver and presented them both with a Shelter Box donation certificate in gratitude for their time and information.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Rod McMahon asks all members that have not participated in the recent short survey if they would please do so, in order that this better informs the committee and helps direct where our community service projects and funds can be directed.
Gord Cox reminds and encourages all members to support the Fruit fundraiser. Deadline this Saturday. See Club runner for more details. Also see our Club’s LinkedIn page for more information.
Chris Ritter invites those who wish to meet for Coffee on Friday mornings at the Blue Flame café
NOTE: no meeting next Monday as that is holiday Monday. We continue to meet at the Grey Eagle into August with a possible exception of August 17th. Check the Club Events Calendar for more details.
Adjournment: President Don thanked all the volunteers that set up this session by name, and adjourned the meeting at about 1 pm.
The entertainer and philanthropist Dolly Parton died 25 August 2026. This Q&A was originally published in the March 2010 issue of The Rotarian (now Rotary) magazine. Later that year, she spoke at the Rotary International Convention in Montreal, Canada.
