Saturday Auditorium
Hustings for the post of Soroptimist International President 2013-2015 were held in the Auditorium. Dawn-Marie Lemonds Chaired the session with questions provided by Clubs to each of the candidates – Marguerite Woodstock-Riley, Ann Dawson, Ann Garvie and Joan Smyth (see first 5 pictures above). For members of SIGBI there are videos of each of the candidates available to view in the Members area of the website www.sigbi.org/members (http://sigbi NULL.org/members/)
Saturday began with the slickest General Meeting ever – all resolutions were passed and the electronic voting worked a treat! See picture 6 above.
Sue Biggs, Programme Director, introduced a new way of dealing with Programme Resolutions (there is more information for Soroptimists in the Members area of the website). The Programme Resolution on ovarian cancer was passed. Sue introduced the new Programme Team with the 5 Assistant Programme Directors see – www.sigbi.org/who-we-are/programme-team/ (http://sigbi NULL.org/who-we-are/programme-team/) See picture 7 above.
Picture 8 above left to right is Kathy Kaaf President of SI Europe, Liz Morgan-Lewis President of SIGBI, Alice Wells SI President and Pat Donohue President of SI Americas. Pat and Kathy spoke about the work in their Federations that transforms the lives of women and girls - demonstrating the “global/local” power of the organisation.
The rest of the morning’s programme was a speech of gratitude from a recipient of the Diamond Education Grant, Denise Staplehurst Director of Membership introducing members who had travelled to conference from overseas for the first time as recipients of the Memorial Fund (one of the lucky recipients is in picture 10 above) , and Jane Slatter Director of Communications (picture 9 above) introducing the new SIGBI Website www.sigbi.org (http://www NULL.sigbi NULL.org)
The change of insignia began with President Liz Morgan-Lewis awarding Honorary life membership to (see picture 11 left to right) Past International President Hilary Page, Past International President Thelma de Leeuw and Past International Assistant Programme Director Margaret Cook. Next Liz installed Maureen Maguire as the new President of Soroptimist International Great Britain and Ireland (SIGBI). See picture 12 above. All of the Clubs, Regions, National Association and Network Presidents came up on stage for Maureen to thank the outgoing President and install the incoming President. While this was happening a brief history of each regalia was given.
After the change of insignia Maureen Maguire addressed the audience as the new President of SIGBI – for Maureen’s inaugural speech please see www.sigbi.org/brighton2011/speech-incoming-president-maureen/