Regional Meeting Blog – 13th February 2021 Many thanks to President Louise for hosting another exciting and innovative regional meeting.   Four guests joined the meeting Federation President Elect Cathy Cottridge, Dishi Attwood our speaker and visitors Tara Ramanayake from SI Columbo, Sri Lanka and Chris Knight from SI Moreton, Australia. I want to focus on just a couple of parts of the meeting. The fantastic official trailer for “100 years of Soroptimist Heroines” started the morning.   The trailer consisted of photos of individual members and clubs around the world and photos of members in costume assuming the persona of the “Heroines” they were representing in the play that followed. Looking Back Sue Challoner has written a play detailing important Soroptimists and events from the inception of Soroptimist International to the present day.   Our “heroines” played their parts well and were very convincing with their different

Wow!   63 members joined the  Change of Insignia virtual Meeting and Project Glass House presentation via Zoom on 14th November 2020.  The meeting opened at 9.30 allowing 30 minutes for networking and chatting before the Project Glass House presentation started at 10am.   What a clever idea this 30 minutes networking is. Thanks go to Pam, Louise and the regional team for brilliantly delivering the Change of Insignia – a great start to Louise’s year as President. I’ve been doing a lot of reminiscing recently, as no doubt have you, and Louise’s theme “Looking Back, Moving Forward” should be an aspiration to all clubs to look at their past successes and to celebrate them and use them to achieve even more. Who would have thought that 9 months ago we would have had to embrace this technology?    If we’re lucky we have an IT savvy son

Soroptimist International, Cheshire, North Wales & Wirral Region invitation to the Region Council Meeting and AGM on Saturday 19th September 2020 Our speaker this morning is Kevin Hyland, OBE the United Kingdom’s first Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner until May 2018; who now continues to lead efforts on the global stage to tackle slavery and human trafficking. The meeting opens at 10am and Kevin Hyland OBE will be speaking at 10.10am. This will be followed at 11.10am by the Annual General Meeting 2020. – finishing at 12pm Please click on the link for  AGM Agenda for Region Council meeting on 19th September 2020 Please let your club Rep know if you are able to attend the meeting and links to join the meeting will be sent out

Soroptimist Region Cheshire, North Wales & Wirral Connect Region Soroptimists in action, and working in many different ways during these difficult times of Lockdown. Some of our members are working on the frontline -#SoroptimistFrontlineWork - Please click here for stories Many of our members are in action at home making useful items to support the NHS and also making craft items to raise funds - read #SoroptimistsWorkAtHome - Please click here for stories All Region clubs are working in different ways to support their members, and thinking up ways to communicate with each other read #SoroptimistSupportInLockdown - Please click here for stories Clubs have conducted AGM Meetings and Chats virtually - Please click here for stories REGION SOROPTIMISTS CONNECT

Saturday February 15th, a windy and stormy day in Llandudno, almost 100 Soroptimists gathered together at the Imperial Hotel for the Cheshire North Wales and Wirral Region Meeting. It was an interesting and inspirational day which we all enjoyed and are still talking about. The meeting began with sales tables and raffles and plenty of time to network over coffee. Almost £200 was raised for the Empowering Girls in Nepal Federation Project, a wonderful project that has engaged with all clubs in our Region. An efficiently run and informative Region council meeting took us nicely up to the lunch break. In the afternoon we were privileged to be given a presentation on Specialist Domestic Violence Courts by Dame Vera Baird. Members will find her presentation in Region communications Dropbox and is available for all clubs to use. As part of her presentation Dame Vera described

Over seventy members from across the Region met today to welcome our new joint Region Presidents, say thank you to the Region Officers who are stepping down and welcome the members who are replacing them. Plenty of time was allowed for networking, browsing stalls and catching up with friends from across the Region,  we also enjoyed an early festive lunch. Presidents Pam and Louise introduced their theme for the year ‘ Stop Exploitation Crimes Against Women and Girls. They  described their programme for Region meetings which will each have a theme and they challenged clubs to participate with them on each theme.  In February Domestic Violence,  in June Modern Day Slavery and in September Prison Reform. Members then listened to a very interesting and at times moving report from SI South Caernarfonshire about their Amethyst Project -  this is the name of a Sexual Abuse

The Meeting opened with President Pam inviting Pearl Roberts (SI Rhyl) to light the Peace candle. The theme for this year’s Peace Day – Climate Action for Peace was then linked in a short presentation to the Region project to re-cycle plastic’ This was followed by the Region AGM The following members were elected to Region roles for the coming year: Region President (shared role) – Pam CH and Louise Parry Region Secretary – Pat Kerfoot Region Treasurer – Diane Bennett Region Membership Officer – Penny Clarke Region Benevolent Officer – Iris Bateman Region Ambassador for the Federation Project – Susan Heywood Co-opted to the Region Finance Committee – Wendy Thompson. Region Communications Team - Sue Challoner, Helen Owen, Doreen Jones Caroline Marsh   After the AGM Region Federation Councillor Hilary went through the Resolutions to be debated at Conference and encouraged members to look

Each year Soroptimists from Clubs throughout the Region enjoy running the Friendship and Information Centre at the prestigious Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod. Soroptimists Cheshire North Wales & Wirral welcomed visitors from around the world. We had a very successful week this year, the sun shone brightly and we had lots of visitors to our tent.       There was an excellent stand showcasing "Our Work" as Soroptimists and a super display to promote SI Rhyl & SI Llandudno. Campaign - "The Bee Project" Region President Pam Cheesley-Hollinshead and members from clubs in the Region attended each day and welcomed visitors to the tent. Each year we sponsor a girls choir - this year "Alla Pollaca" from Warsaw, Poland, who came 3rd in their Folk Singing Competition. The girls visited the Soroptimist Tent and sang for all our embers and visitors.