Contest winners best of best

Builders Club, according to Katherine Marshall, is a “small group that has done big and great things and still continues to do good things.” Katherine should know; she is a member of the St. Patrick School Builders Club, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and winner of the Builders Club 2006-07 Essay Contest.

Katherine is one of hundreds of Builders Club members who vied to be among the best speakers, essay writers, scrapbook organizers, and service leaders during the past year’s Builders Club contests. And if your Kiwanis club sponsors a Builders Club, now is the time to get its members fired up to compete in this year’s contests. Themes for the year are:

Speech: As a Builders Club member, what characteristics have you developed that will help lead the way in making a positive difference in your home, school, or community?

Essay: Pick one of the four Builders Club objectives; explain what it means to you and how you were able to use that objective to make an impact on your home, school, or community.

Contest entries must be submitted by April 1 to the Builders Club district administrator, who judges and selects one overall district winner from each category: speech, essay, scrapbook, the Kiwanis International Foundation Leadership Award, and the Club Single Service Award.

When overall winners are identified, the Kiwanis International Builders Club staff begins using the best of the best to promote the Builders Club program. Overall speech contest winners, for example, often are invited to speak at the Kiwanis International, Circle K International, or Key Club International conventions. And essays or essay excerpts often are published in Builders Bloc, posted on the Builders Club Web site, or published in KIWANIS magazine or the KIWANIS Connected e-zine.