For the third year running Weston Soroptimists donated and presented “Super Reader” awards to children at Windwhistle school. One child in each class was chosen as the most improved reader of the year and was presented with a book to match his/her interests. As well as the book these pupils received a certificate and a chocolate medal. One little girl was heard to say that she had always wanted to read the book she received about Malala.

Melanie has achieved great success with her submissions to the Mercury and we have another article published reporting on the recent visit by our club to the Mayor’s Parlour. Well done Melanie by keeping us in  the public eye yet again.

At a recent meeting Immediate Past President of Soroptimists, Shelagh Jeacocke, was delighted to hand over cheques of £400 each to Rachel Mansfield (on the L) of Weston Hospicecare and Kylie Gallagher (on the R), representing Children’s Hospice South West. This money was raised at the Soroptimist Fashion Show in March.   The Club is looking forward to welcoming any interested women to an event for potential new members on May 24th at the Weston Golf Club at 7.30 p.m. Telephone 07787582047 for more information.

Margaret was unaware but Ronnie M had arranged a surprise celebration at her home for one of our more senior members. Margaret was delighted and thanks everyone who helped make her afternoon tea party so enjoyable.

SI Weston super Mare has been involved in a number of activities to promote awareness and action to prevent violence against women. One of the main objectives    of this awareness-raising campaign has been to  distribute  bookmarks,  which to date have been distributed to branches of Waterstones in Bristol, Weston and Wells and to a bookshop in Burnham-on-Sea . Also they had been received with enthusiasm by Churchill, Redmaids and Sidcot schools.  We are particularly grateful to Sidcot School for a donation which has covered the cost of getting 5,000 bookmarks printed. Soroptimists in Taunton and Bridgwater also distributed them in their towns. Melanie  attended the opening of the Gemini services’ new offices and they too are keen on using the bookmarks in schools.  Weston Foodbank will be receiving some to display for their clients.       On November 25 (UN Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women) a group of Sorops

  It is a sobering thought that illegal activities have been included in estimates of household spending for the first time by the office of national statistics (ONS), and is said to account for £11 billion of Briton’s economy- http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/illegal-drugs-and-prostitution-boost-britains-economy-by-11billion-9764998.html . Human trafficking is part of this deplorable story and Stop the Traffik campaign was launched  at the London Olympics to try and raise awareness of the extent of the problem- see http://www.stopthetraffik.org/campaign/giftbox  . SI Weston super Mare has joined our organisation’s plea to try and take a stance against human trafficking as proposed earlier this year – http://www.soroptimistinternational.org/blog/post/698-remembering-ning-un-world-day-against-trafficking and  supported SI Bristol on College Green where the Gift box was installed to gain public attention.