Sad that we are already past the summer solstice, our June meeting cheered us up by welcoming three new members to our club! Welcome to Kathryn Furnell, Mandy Ford, and Janet Draper.
We also held a small raffle to raise funds for the President’s Appeal. Each year the President of Soroptimists International chooses projects around the world, one in each federation. This President’s Appeal is called Opening Doors to a Brighter Future and projects are taking place in Cambodia, Uganda, Georgia, Trinidad and Tobago, Paraguay and Malawi. We watched a short video in which Maureen introduced the projects.
In our section getting to know each other, we heard from Peggy Jackson about her life before, as and after being a female clergy in the Church of England.
Women’s Safety initiative update
Club members conducted an Ask Angela test – otherwise could have been called a pub crawl – which covered a number of central drinking venues. It was pleasing to find most had posters in Ladies loos and knew about the scheme, however no one recalled having had to use it.
The hockey club enjoyed some self defence training delivered by Georgina Prior of Living Safely.
We are hoping to offer Active Bystander training to local organisations and encourage members to look at the training available online at the Suzy Lamplugh Trust.
The publication of the UKPAC report on the Special Domestic Abuse Courts was highlighted. The report is available here.
Call for Volunteers for Executive Committee
Jenny appealed once more for volunteers to come forward to be Deputy President and Projects Action Coordinator. It is important that everyone takes a turn at helping organise the club to keep us going.