Whilst many of the Club were away enjoying the SIGBI Conference at Harrogate, two of our members volunteered to staff a stall in aid of our Charity, Cementing Futures at The Allendale Centre in Wimborne. As a result nearly £100 was raised and will go directly towards educating children in Bangladesh. Thank you to Jacqui and Maureen for holding the fort so well.
Our Charity, Cementing Futures will gain considerably from an excellent team performance by Soroptimists and friends at this year’s Bournemouth Marathon. The organisers paid us £465 for preparing bottles of water and handing them out to thirsty runners. Our water station was near the Pier and we enjoyed the atmosphere of the event and supporting Henry Hopkins who completed a half marathon in aid of Cementing Futures. His original aim was to raise £1000 to help us educate children in Bangladesh, but to date he has topped £1,760! If you would like to add more to this please go to www.justgiving.com/Henry Hopkins1. We would like to thank SI Poole and SI Southampton for their extra pairs of hands and adding to the fun. Here are a selection of photos showing us enjoying the day and congratulating Henry on his achievement.
The speaker at our meeting on Monday 15th September was Debbie Simpson, The Chief Constable of Dorset. She gave us an update on how the Dorset Police deal with a wide variety of issues that interest Soroptimists. This included trafficking, domestic violence and child protection issues. Diminishing resources are leading to an increase in the sharing of specialists between forces in the Region and an acknowledgement that partnership working with other agencies was the only way to deal with these complex issues. One interesting fact was that although there had been an increase in the number of complaints concerning domestic violence, the number of repeat victims was falling. This was due to a policy of support and seen as a key feature of the long term strategy to deal with this crime. The question session at the end of the talk was enhanced by the
Photos from the Family Fun Day. Our stall was in aid of the charity Cementing Futures. Good weather, lots of customers and a fun event.
The recent Global Summit to end Sexual Violence against Women was attended by some very well known names from both the political and show business worlds. SIGBI had a stall there which attracted much interest about our work and Clubs. Staffing the stall was tiring but rewarding as there were live feeds from the conference to see , workshops, other stalls to visit and contacts to make. The happy group below from our Club clearly had a wonderful day and managed a little celeb watching for some light relief!
The Guide Commissioner for Dorset Catherine Welch, was the speaker at our June meeting. She was aided by Brownie Pack leaders and we were delighted to learn about the fun that local girls had with the Bee Project. Our pack had been adapted and used as a source of inspiration to learn about the role of bees in the environment and their importance to all our lives. Bees became the inspiration for craft work, art, and honey flavoured cakes. A local bee keeper gave a talk and demonstrated the use of a smoker tool. Favourite bee flowers were planted, a bee drive invented -like the more traditional beetle drive- and best of all a “Waggle Dance” devised to imitate the flight of these insects. Our Environment Group who provided the Project Pack, were very pleased that the project had such a positive response from the
Jackie Paling, Assistant Programme Director for Violence and Conflict Resolution gave a talk at Regional Council on 14th June about Afghan Women.The lives of women in Afghanistan were very different from ours in the UK with problems arising from forcible resettlements in the past, the presence of landmines and cultural attitudes which left women’s lives controlled by men. Jackie had been to Afghanistan shortly after 9/11 and related how she had been able to encourage women to extend their craft skills, produce honey, buy fruit trees and farm stock. Violence against women is a crime there but the law is not enforced. The view of the world from behind a bhurka was shared briefly by those who tried some on as shown in this photo.
On 16th May some of our avid readers met for one of our occasional “Book Club ” events. Kirsteen, our President was the host who dazzled us with her delicious cooking. The book under discussion was Me Before You- a novel by Jo Jo Moyes which has a serious theme. The content gave us a lot to talk about.This evening was in aid of our STEM Project. (See elsewhere for further infomation.) £160 was raised at this very enjoyable evening. Thank you Kirsteen for all you did.
A Fun Quiz attracted the “Brains of Bournemouth” and many other teams last month. Held at the University Campus, we were pleased to get our fish and chip supper served before we had to deal with the questions. This event was to raise funds for two of our charities- The Stem Challenge ( encouraging girls to consider science and technology careers) and the Friends of Bournemouth Women’s Refuge. A total of £867 was raised and a lot of fun had during the evening.
