Soroptimism also offers a valuable social dimension to its members; many of the Eastbourne Soroptimists have moved into the area from elsewhere and found new friends by joining the Club and taking part in activities and meetings.
Here are some of the things we do:
FUNDRAISING
In 2024-25 our main fundraising activities are focusing on our local Women’s Refuge, finding out what they need and trying to supply it.
Internationally, we’ve been able to send money to support the people of Ukraine (using the Soroptimist network in Eastern Europe), and have been working with our Soroptimist link club in Japan on various projects including improving conditions for children affected by the Japanese tsunami and raising money for work with street children in Kenya.
PRACTICAL ACTIVITIES
We regularly provide gifts to the Women’s Refuge for Mother’s Day, Easter and Christmas, but recently we’ve also donated art materials, books and toys.
Each December we join with the Lewes Soroptimists at the local Foster Carers’ Christmas Party, helping to provide and wrap presents from which children can choose something to give their foster parents.
Some of the Club members meet once a month for craft activities, which started when the local hospital asked us for 
small blankets to cover the knees of elderly patients in the Frailty Ward. The Craft Group have been knitting 15cm squares and sewing them together to make these knee blankets. This is now a contining activity because many of the patients become so attached to their blankets that they take them home with them when they leave hospital!
A continuing project is sewing heart-shaped cushions for the local hospital to give to women recovering from mastectomies – they’re more comfortable to use than conventional cushions.
On a very practical level we’ve adopted a local beach (a length of shingle beach between two groynes) which we try to keep clean, in cooperation with Plastic Free Eastbourne.
The Club’s Writers’ Group, which meets monthly on Zoom, has recently published an anthology of their writings, called Soroptimist Writers (ISBN 9798876526649).
AWARENESS-RAISING & ADVOCACY
From 25 November to 10 December every year, UNiTE (a United Nations campaign) calls on ‘people everywhere to wear the colour orange and take action to end violence against women and girls in communities, at home, in public spaces, in schools and workplaces, during conflict and in times of peace’. Soroptimism fully supports this campaign, and the Eastbourne Club wore orange at our recent meeting.
Several of our members are mentors for The Girls Network, which supports young women in secondary education to develop confidence, challenge stereotypes and discover new opportunities.
We are great petition-signers! We all have different interests and concerns and value the opportunity of bringing these to the notice of other people. Club members have been involved with the WASPI campaign which is fighting for all British women adversely affected by the changes to the State Pension law, and quite a few Club members have taken part in the national Big Plastic Count.