There are many ways you can help out and become more involved with our WI once you’ve become a member – it takes a fair bit of work to make a really successful WI and we’d love everyone to be as involved as possible.
Help at Meetings
There are always chairs and/or tables to set up when we get to the hall, and things to tidy away at the end of the meeting, which we can always use help with. If you’re not sure what needs doing, ask one of the committee who should be able to point you in the right direction!
It’s also really helpful to talk to people! There are often people who come on their own, and many who haven’t been before, and meeting new people is a big part of the WI. Setting up meetings can often be quite rushed so the committee doesn’t always get to welcome people as much as we’d like.
Tell Your Friends
The more the merrier and we are always on the look out for more members! Post on Twitter and Facebook about upcoming events, encourage workmates and friends to come along as a visitor to our meetings (or check out their own local WI!), and come along with friends and family to any events we’re involved with outside of the monthly meetings.
We’re @N1_WI on Twitter, and we have a Facebook page and a Facebook group, and we are now on Instagram.
Send Us Ideas
We’re always looking for ideas for meetings and for ways to fundraise so please email over anything you think of. If you have an idea for a meeting that involves a particular teacher or a speaker, help us out by giving us website addresses or contact details so it’s easier to make the idea happen.
Content for the website is also useful – news articles, events for the calendar, and pictures from meetings or other WI-related activities!
Join/Create a Group
We have several varied groups that you can join to meet up with members outside of the monthly meetings, and if you fancy a group that does something that isn’t listed, you can always create your own! All you need to do is find at least one other member to join you, and let us know details so we can tell others and put the information up on the website.
Fundraise
We are always trying to raise more funds, be it for the charities we support, for particular things like the bench to mark the WI’s centenary, or for going towards our general running costs. We would love to have any and all fundraising ideas, but even better would be organising something to raise funds yourself. This could be anything from a sponsored walk, a la the WI Walks group, to organising a cake or book sale, to getting in touch with companies to get donations for raffle prizes (or giving/making something yourself!), to sorting out some kind of activity to happen at one of the monthly meetings. If you have something you’d like to do, email us with details and we’ll help in any way we can!
Join the Committee
The committee is elected at the Annual Meeting every April, and the president is selected from the elected committee members. The committee meets once a month on the first Tuesday of the month, to discuss the plans for upcoming meetings and what needs to be done for them, fundraising ideas, what’s happening with the subgroups, and a multitude of other aspects that go into making our WI work.