Speakers

Steve Fine, founder and president of the Melanoma Education Foundation, attended colleges in the Boston area, receiving a doctorate in chemistry from Northeastern University. He then moved to Pennsylvania, completing a year of postdoctoral research at Lehigh University. After 5 years as Assistant Professor of Organic Chemistry at Lafayette College in Pennsylvania, he moved back to New England where he served in technical and management positions in high tech chemical companies. In 1989 he started a consulting practice in the technology of high purity chemical manufacturing, concurrently serving for 3 years as Vice President of Technology for ACSI, a West Coast manufacturer of semiconductor chemicals. Shortly after his son, Dan, died of melanoma in 1998 at the age of 26, he founded the non-profit Melanoma Education Foundation and, since 2000, has devoted full time to the Foundation. The primary activity of the Foundation has been educating high school and middle school wellness teachers about melanoma and providing them with free online lessons to educate their students about self-detecting melanoma while it is curable. Prior to the Covid 19 pandemic over 1700 schools in all 50 U.S. states and Canada were using the lessons, resulting in saved lives of students, teachers and their loved ones.

Hello from the Rotary Club of Ipswich/Rowley, Mass., where I’m a member. They’ve urged me to visit and speak to other Rotaries because the work of my humanitarian group (online at www.NewThing.net) lines up so well with Rotary’s values: providing humanitarian aid to people in need in Belarus, in the former Soviet Union. (Things have gotten way more “interesting” due to the Ukraine conflict.) I’ve spoken to 125 Rotary Clubs in 10 states, and feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. My presentation will be brief, humorous, uplifting — and I’ll bring a fun gift for each member attending. (Also, I never ask for money from a Rotary Club.)

New Thing is a 501c3 non-profit organization established by Doug and Kristina Brendel in 2002 to help people in need in the Republic of Belarus, in the former USSR.

The passion of New Thing began in 1992 when Kristina Brendel visited Belarus, in the former Soviet Union, as a volunteer photographer.

She was documenting the West’s response to the medical needs of children in the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

Kristina fell in love with the people there and kept going back!

Eventually, Kristina and her husband Doug established New Thing to help all kinds of children and adults in need in Belarus.

Current Owner and CEO of an Amesbury, MA marketing agency. Responsible for the overall direction and performance of the agency, including strategic planning, client acquisition and management, team leadership, financial oversight, business development, industry development, market strategy development, operational management, and brand representation.

Michelle is passionate about helping others. She continues to serve on boards is a member and sponsor of many organizations that focus on helping the community, families and children around the world. Some of these organizations are Anna Jacques Hospital Board of Trustee Quality Committee-Member, Anna Jacques Hospital Aid Association-VP & Board Member, The Firehouse Center for the Arts, Executive Committee Board Member, The Wish Project, the Firehouse Center for the Arts, Haiti Global Youth Partnership-Board Member, Member of the BNI Newburyport, NEBA, North Shore She’s Local organization, Amesbury Chamber of Commerce, and The Rotary of Amesbury. A Sponsor for Reach for Uganda, Opportunity Works, the Amesbury Educational Foundation Inc.

“Be the change you want to see in the world” ~ Gandhi

Currently I work for the Community College System of New Hampshire coordinating their Allied Health training programs.  I work part time at Great Bay Community College in Portsmouth, NH. I enjoy this part time role, and that I am able to once again devote time to be a Rotarian