Committee Notes, 13th November

The Committee met on November 13th. at Richard Lander School. We discussed the bequests from Len Skade and Barbara Scammell.  The third Len Skade piano recital at Truro School will be later in November.  We expect that over half of Len's £1,000 bequest will still be available when we have met the expenses of the three recitals, and it will be up to the Committee to decide next year whether to have another recital then.  The results of the Barbara Scammell Poetry, Prose and Photographic competitions will be declared at the Truro Meeting on December 16th.   Dave Neale offered to publish the Poetry and Prose entries in a commemorative booklet.

The Treasurer reported that the cost of accommodation, speakers and postage are all rising, and the Third Age Trust membership fee will be going up next year. Our expenditure is beginning to exceed our income from subscriptions, and it may be necessary to consider an increase of the subscription next year.

Dave Neale said that he would be giving up as Membership Secretary next April. With over 700 members in U3A Carrick, the Membership Secretary's job is very time-consuming, and Dave put in extra work last year re-organising the payments so that all renewal payments could be collected together in May. He feels that the job should be split into two halves, Mailing Secretary and Membership Secretary. An appeal is going into the newsletter in the hope of finding two volunteers for these posts. The Committee thanked Dave for all the hard work that he had put in.

Various Group news was discussed. A new Woodcraft Group is starting. Table Tennis has organised a second session at Richard Lander School on Monday afternoons at 4pm. The Truro Art Group and the Photographic Group are both moving to new premises.  There have been some problems with our use of the Community Lounge at Richard Lander School as the school is now very crowded and sometimes has to use that room for classes and exams, but we continue to have a lot of meetings there.

The next Committee meeting will be on January 8th.

Tony Herring, 14th November

The Barbara Scammell Bequest & Photographic Competition

The response to the Barbara Scammell Creative Writing Competition has been quite good. Fifteen poets have sent in 29 poems, and twelve prose writers have sent in 16 prose entries. These have gone off to two retired teachers in the Hayle U3A Creative Writing Group and they have agreed to adjudicate. The committee has decided to separate the competition into two halves, and award a cup and prize for the best poetry entry and another cup and prize for the best prose entry.

Gilbert Rimes has received twenty entries for the Barbara Scammell Photographic Competition and there will be a further cup for the winner of this, together with prizes for the winner and runner-up.

Since our November meetings are already booked up with speakers, it has been decided to wait until our Truro Town Hall meeting  on Tuesday December 16th, at 2.00pm, rather than cram the award ceremony into these meetings, 

This will give us time to read out the winning poetry and prose entries, and Gilbert Rimes has promised to put together a video, showing the photographic entries. This should provide an entertaining afternoon, probably culminating in tea and mince pies!

Tony Herring, 5th October