WHAT IS LEOISM ?
Leo Club is a youth organisation of Lions Club International. The acronym L.E.O stands for Leadership, Experience, Opportunity.
The Leo Club objective is, to provide the youth of the world with an opportunity for development and contribution, individually and collectively, as responsible members of the local, national and international community.
Leo Club encourages the youth to develop leadership qualities by participating in social service activities. They are dependent on a Lions club to sponsor and initiate a Leo club. Leo Club members are addressed as Leos. They conduct various projects in the fields of health care, elders, children, differently abled, literacy and education, and self-development.
LEO Club is the largest youth club of voluntary character in the world , present in 140 countries with over 160,000 members.
WHAT IS THE MOTTO OF LEOISM?
To promote service activities among the youth of the community which will develop the individual qualities of Leadership, Experience and Opportunity. To unite its members in friendship, fellowship and mutual understanding.
HOW DID IT ALL START?
The first Leo Club was founded in 1957 by Jim Graver, the coach of the AbingtonHigh School, Pennsylvania baseball team. He was an active member of the Glenside Lions Club. The club was founded with the help of William Ernst, another local Lion. It adopted the high schools colours of maroon and gold. The club also created the acronym Leadership, Equality, Opportunity for the word Leo. The word equality was later changed to Experience.
In 1964 the Leo Club Program became a sponsored program of the Lions District. It grew beyond Pennsylvania and the United States of America. By 1967 the program had grown to over 200 clubs in 18 countries and had become an official youth program of Lions Clubs International. In the following year, the Leo Club Program spread rapidly, more than quadrupling in size, to 918 clubs in 48 countries by the end of 1968.
HOW DOES IT FUNCTION ?
Leo clubs make local communities better places to live through a diverse array of community service projects and fellowship events which are conducted on a regular basis. It believes in getting people under one banner to help the society as a whole.
The basic structure of a Leo Club is as follows:
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Several Districts comprising of their own Leo Clubs form a Multiple District.The highest position a Leo can get is the position of International Panelist and that is higher than Multiple District presidency.
e.g.Leo Multiple District 306 Sri Lanka.
The Multiple District
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Several Leo Clubs in an area make up a District, headed by the District President.
e.g. Leo Club of University of Moratuwa is part of District A2 within Multiple District 306. Cumulatively we refer to the club being a part of District 306-A2.
The District
- This is the fundamental level of Leoism. A club, headed by its own President reports to the District which further reports to the Multiple District. e.g. : Leo Club of University of Moratuwa.
The Club
LIONS SERVE. WHAT DO LEOS DO ?
Leos essentially is a service project of the Lions to build responsible future leaders, but that in no way means that we don't serve rather Leo club of Juhu is known for its service legacy.
Leoism is focussed on fellowship. Fellowship refers to socialisation or precisely secondary socialisation. We believe that the process of learning what is the appropriate behaviour as a member of a smaller group within the larger society is an essential part of shaping ones personality.
WHAT AGE GROUP CAN JOIN A LEO CLUB ?
There are two tracks of the Leo Club Program. Alpha Leo clubs are those that consist of members between 12 and 18 years of age. Omega Leo clubs are those that consist of members between 18 and 30 years of age.
The Leo Club Programs maximum age of membership is 30 years of age, though it is at the discretion of the Lions district to enforce younger upper-age limits for Omega clubs. There are no major differences in the operations or logistics of Alpha and Omega Leo Clubs.
In addition to the Alpha and Omega tracks, Leo clubs should also designate whether they are school based or community based.
Youth interested in joining a Leo club can use the Club Locator tool to find a Leo club in their community.