Membership
Membership Report 2019
The Membership Committee has met regularly during 2019. The Committee comprises the WI Advisers and the Officers of the Board of Trustees.
The main aims of the Membership Committee are to encourage the recruitment of new members and to retain the membership of existing WIs. The Committee is effective in doing this by visiting WIs and holding events that are both social and informative.
This year the Membership Committee has discussed the use of memory sticks with relevant documents which will help to support the secretarial aspects of Committee work. We hope this will come to fruition in 2020. Also this year the ‘Make Your WI Inspirational’ booklet was launched and circulated to WIs. There is continuing support for Treasurers with one to one sessions being offered if required.
Unfortunately during the past year the WI Advisers have been under strength due to illness which has meant that the Committee plans have had to be curtailed. However, we hope to make up for this in the coming year.
We held two very successful Cream Tea events in the early part of the year when we encouraged members to look back at our founders and their achievements and to go forward into the 21st century, building on this inspiration to give present day members value for money and embrace the challenges ahead.
As usual the Group Convenors’ Meeting was well attended and enjoyed in spite of the fact that the expected speaker had to be changed at the last minute. due to illness.
WI Day was once again an extremely well supported event with speaker Lieutenant Colonel Julie Symons. The auditions event sadly had to be cancelled due to insufficient support by the closing date.
During the year the WI Advisers and Board of Trustee Members have received a warm welcome when visiting WIs and the overwhelming reports are that the Isle of Ely Federation has a happy, healthy and thriving membership with, on the whole, interesting and entertaining programmes. Our numbers remain steady – currently 847. Sadly, we have lost three WIs this year, Mepal, Emneth and Little Thetford, due to falling membership and reluctance to take on Committee roles. However, many of our remaining WIs are increasing in numbers which is heartening.
My thanks to the Membership Committee and our Federation Secretary, Su Rowbotham, for all their hard work and support during the past year.