APEX CLUBS OF AUSTRALIA

The Association of 'Apex Clubs of Australia' is the collective name given to the 330 individual Apex Clubs (service clubs) throughout Australia. An Apex club is a community service club, neither sectarian nor party political, that provides young civic minded people the opportunity to volunteer within the community as well as develop personally^[1] through club run schemes such as public speaking competitions. Club members are volunteers between the ages of 18 and 45.

Contents

History

Membership

Activities

Apex Foundation

Clubs

Notable members

Notes

External

History

The first Apex Club started in Geelong in 1931^[2] when three architects attempted to join the Rotary Club of Geelong. As Rotary has a rule restricting one profession to each club the three architects - Ewan Laird, Langham Proud and John Buchan went on to form the Apex Club of Geelong.
Up until the early 1990s Apex only allowed male members. Since then, clubs have been allowed to choose their own gender mix. Approximately 50% of clubs are now mixed.

Membership

Membership is open to all males and females between the ages of 18 and 45. Apex Youth Clubs are also being introduced that are school based which sees members between the ages of 14 to 18.

Activities

Apex undertakes a range of activities aimed at youth with its major programs including running a Public Speaking competition in all states and holding a national debating final which both happen at the annual National Convention in July. Apex also runs the Teenage Fashion Awards in each state with the top 3 in each section heading to the national final, that is held in October of each year.

Apex Foundation

Apex over the years has raised large amounts of money to put into trust funds which then distribute grants each year, this is the responsibility of the Apex Foundation.

Clubs

There are clubs in every state and territory of Australia and within each state there are several districts which clubs belong to. There are approximately 400 active clubs.

Notable members

★ Donald Mackay disappeared Australian anti-drugs campaigner (1933-1977) ^[3]

★ William Phelan, Queensland businessman and politician (1915-1973) ^[4]

Notes

1. http://www.apex.org.au/ideals.php
2. http://www.apex.org.au/history.php
3. Australian Dictionary of Biography entry for Mackay
4. Australian Dictionary of Biography entry for Phelan

External

★ Apex Australia official website

★ The Apex Foundation