The rules of the Shaftesbury Rodeo Academy are simple: no school, no rodeo. It’s a message that teenagers who attend school at Bisley Farm, most of whom have never attended any school regularly, take seriously. Because come Friday night, these aspiring rodeo heroes want to join their friends to ride bulls for a heart-stopping eight seconds, if they last that long.

The school in rural Queensland, Australia, also teaches the boys, who are of the Wakka Wakka Aboriginal people, basic academics and farming skills, including how to care for crops and livestock. It’s a fairly common form of schooling in Australia, an alternative education for students with troubled backgrounds. For many of them, Bisley Farm is the best chance for them to improve their lives.

But rules are rules. In order to participate in the school’s weekly Friday night rodeo, students must attend class Monday through Thursday and do all their work, including helping to manage a herd of beef cattle. Perhaps not surprisingly, student attendance and performance have shot up.

“These are really tough kids,” says Kristian Wale, director of the Shaftesbury Centre, which sponsors Bisley Farm, and a member of the Rotary Club of New Farm, Brisbane. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, Indigenous peoples make up 3 percent of the country’s population. But they make up 50 percent of the juvenile detention and 27 percent of the adult prison populations.  

“A majority of the kids [who come to us] can’t read, even if they have been to school,” says Wale. “We teach basic education and social skills and prepare our students for jobs.”

And none of it would exist without Rotary.

Powerful grants

George Grant wanted to do something for the Aboriginal teenagers after attending a Rotary grants seminar in 2010. He was president of the Rotary Club of Bribie Island when he met Wale at the conference. The two began to formulate an idea for a cattle operation near Cherbourg, sponsored by the Shaftesbury Centre.

“When I first took the idea to the club, it seemed too far out in left field. Some members came along easily but others were very noisy in opposition,” says Grant. “They couldn’t see how a club with fewer than 30 members could raise the money required to get something like that off the ground.”

At first, the naysayers seemed right, Grant says, particularly when the scope of the problem began being mapped out. They would have to buy cattle, trailers, fencing, and a school building. Then what would they do with the beef? If the operation was to be sustainable, they would have to figure out a way to get the beef to market. 

So they started small: six head of cattle, a trailer, and some fencing. They soon started applying for money through Rotary, more than US$120,000.

Supported by fundraisers from surrounding clubs, the Bribie Island club managed to donate thousands of dollars toward the project.

Undoubtedly, though, many of potential supporters and new club members are drawn to Grant’s enthusiasm for the school his club built from the ground up. “I just love to skite (brag) about it.”

Today marks one year since Nigeria last reported a polio case caused by wild poliovirus, putting the country on the brink of eradicating the paralyzing disease.

The last case was reported on 24 July 2014 in the northern state of Kano. If no cases are reported in the coming weeks, the World Health Organization is expected to remove Nigeria from the list of countries where polio is endemic, leaving just two: Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Nigeria is the last polio-endemic country in Africa. The continent is poised to reach its own first full year without any illness from the virus on 11 August.

“Every Rotarian in the world should be proud of this achievement,” says Rotary International President K.R. Ravindran. “We made history. We have set Africa on course for a polio-free future. But we have not yet reached our goal of a polio-free world. Raising funds and awareness and advocating with your government are more crucial than ever.”

Progress in Nigeria has come from many measures, including strong domestic and international financing, the commitment of thousands of health workers, and new strategies that reached children who had not been immunized earlier because of a lack of security in the northern states.

“Rotary’s commitment has been the number one reason for the recent success in Nigeria,” says Dr. Tunji Funsho, chair of Rotary’s Nigeria PolioPlus Committee. “We have infected political leaders with this commitment. The government has demonstrated this with political support and financial and human resources. And that went down the line from the federal level, to the state, to the local governments.”

Nigeria has increased its domestic funding for polio eradication almost every year since 2012 and has allocated $80 million for the effort this year.

Funsho also applauds religious leaders who championed the vaccination efforts to families in their communities.

Despite the historic gains in Nigeria, health experts are cautious about declaring victory. Funsho says the Global Polio Eradication Initative partners must strengthen routine immunization especially in hard-to-reach areas, in addition to boosting sensitive surveillance to prevent resurgence of the disease. If no new cases are reported in the next two years, Nigeria, along with the entire Africa region, will be certified polio-free.

“The virus can be introduced from anywhere where it is still endemic, particularly now in Afghanistan and Pakistan, into areas that haven’t had polio in years,” Funsho says. “It is important we keep the immunity level in Nigeria to at least 90 percent.”

For instance, Syria experienced a sudden outbreak of the disease when 35 cases were reported in December 2013. None had been reported there since 1999. “Immunizations become imperative for history not to repeat itself in Nigeria,” says Funsho.

In June, Rotary announced $19 million in grants for continued polio eradication activities in Africa, including almost $10 million for Nigeria. Since 1985, when Rotary launched PolioPlus, the program that supports the organization’s polio eradication efforts, its worldwide monetary contributions to the cause have exceeded $1.4 billion.

“We’ve come a long way and have never been so close to eradicating polio in Nigeria and around the world, but it’s not a time to fully celebrate,” says Funsho. “We have some grueling years ahead of us before WHO can certify Nigeria and Africa polio-free.”

Contribute to End Polio Now
Help Rotary advocate for a polio-free world
Watch RI President K.R. Ravindran’s message to Rotary members
Read a blog post from International PolioPlus Committee Chair Michael McGovern