SI Bebington Projects

Each Soroptimist International club identifies the needs of its community, then establishes specific projects to address these needs. All our projects relate to one or more of the six Programme Focus Areas: Economic and Social Development, Education, Environment, Health, Human Rights and the Status of Women, and International Goodwill and Understanding.

More information is available in the Our Work pages, where you can read more about the current Programme Focus aims and the Quadrennial Project, supported by all clubs in the Federation.

The projects listed below include some of the local and international issues we research and support in SI Bebington:

Water Aid

World Water Day 22nd March 2008 World Water Day The international observance of World Water Day is an initiative that grew out of the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro.

The UN Water group has decided that the World Water Day theme for 2008 will be "sanitation", supporting the International Year of Sanitation.

Arrowe Park Hospital Garden

A small area of Arrowe Park Hospital is tended by staff and members of SI Bebington aiming to bring colour to the daily round of hospital life.

Updates

10/04/07: Members of SI Bebington have assisted Dr Rosemary Morgan to develop and maintain a garden at Arrowe Park Hospital. The garden is within the hospital, a rectangular area, surrounded by walls on all four sides and containing part of the boiler plant. The area was waste ground and something of an eyesore for those passing along the corridors which form two ends of the garden before the project started. After many hours spent planting and mulching, we have an attractive area which brings pleasure to patients, visitors and hospital workers alike, especially in the spring when the hundreds of bulbs planted are in flower. The project is ongoing with Soroptimist working parties spending several Saturday mornings each year weeding, dead-heading, pruning, planting and mulching the garden to keep it attractive year round. As we walk through the hospital with our gardening equipment and plants we feel like a Soroptimist Ground Force team in our blue Soroptimist tee-shirts and sweatshirts. Due to the enclosed nature of the site, we have no problems with the gardeners No 1 enemy, slugs and snails, and most of the plants have thrived in the warm and sheltered conditions, despite the very poor ground.

24/11/07: Dr. Rosemary Morgan, Consultant (D.M.E) at Arrowe Hospital was hoping to hold a tombola stand in the hospital foyer to raise funds to provide a television set for Ward M20 - a ward for men. She needed help within ten days and, as she knew Bebington Soroptimists helped with her garden at the hospital throughout the year, she contacted
Valerie Dodson. Some years ago Valerie and her late husband Tom had spotted the garden needed attention and initiated the link.

In no time Valerie had sufficient volunteers to cover the stand from 9am. until 3pm. Those who took part found the task not only fairly easy but most enjoyable. At the drop of a hat we had raised Ł379.00 (enough to cover the purchase of the TV) and the club profile, as we wore our blue sweatshirts. Rosemary
was so impressed by our enthusiastic response she is now considering becoming a club member.

Wirral a Fairtrade Borough

FAIRTRADE FORTNIGHT 25 Feb to 9 March 2008

In April 2006 two members of SI Bebington reported to the club the successful outcome of a project with the announcement that Fair Trade Status was being awarded to the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral the next day.

Following our involvement with Local Agenda 21, members Pam Cheesley-Hollinshead and Barbara Griffiths volunteered to be 2 of the 10 strong Fair World Steering Group set up by the LA21 Community Forum in November 2003. The Steering Group researched the current levels of Fair Trade products being sold or used by local businesses and then began the work to encourage more local shops, catering outlets and other businesses across the Wirral to become involved in order to meet the criteria set by the Fair Trade Foundation for accreditation as a FairTrade Borough.
During Fairtrade Fortnight each year, other SI Bebington members assisted in manning displays set up the main library and distributing leaflets and samples to highlight the issues and encourage people to try and buy products with the distinctive Fairtrade Mark on them.

Target TB 2008

Support for this charity was suggested by President Kathy, fitting in with her theme of Health and the Community; the eradication of TB also being one of the objectives of the 2007-2011 Programme Focus.

We contacted the charity (www.targettb.org.uk) and were provided with a shopping list specially created for Soroptimist Clubs which lists a number of items and what they cost. Included in this is an estimate that it costs Ł40 to cure one patient of TB but this prevents another 15 people from becoming infected - Ł1,000 cures 25 and prevents 375 more from becoming sick. As TB particularly affects people in the economically active years, this can mean that 375 families are saved from the poverty which comes when the main breadwinner is too sick to work.

Increasing members awareness and understanding of TB was addressed by the speaker at our November dinner meeting, Dr Bertie Squire from the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. Dr Squire is involved in both research and the practical aspects of dealing with TB in the field, being part of the EQUI-TB (Malawi) project whose aim is to promote implementation of pro - poor strategies, which enhance care and support for TB among the poorest. His biography notes general interests in clinical tropical medicine and provision of health care in resource-poor settings. Specific research interests are tuberculosis and its interaction with HIV infection, ethics of research in developing countries and the interaction between gender and infectious disease.

His talk was both factually informative and full of details of how the local people in Malawi deal with the incidence, identification and treatment of TB. We learnt that practical suggestions from women who then take action and implement fairly simple routines have had a dramatic effect on the levels of TB and how quite small sums of money (by western standards) can make a significant difference to the number of people who can be treated and cured.

We identified a number of events to raise funds and awareness:-
- members were asked to collect change in 35mm film containers (an update on collecting in smartie tubes which only take 20p pieces - the film containers will take Ł2 coins and when full the value will be Ł34)
- the proceeds of the Chinese auction at our Christmas dinner to which family and friends are invited will be donated to Target TB
- a Grand National race afternoon at a members home
- running a Tombola and raffle at the charity shop of our local hospital when we will also raise awareness of TB and how it can be cured.