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“Education empowers women and girls to realise their potential and support themselves” is a well-known phrase in our organisation.

In a single year SIE clubs, unions and federation award more than 1000 scholarships to further education for women and girls throughout the world. An impressive number!

 

On the 27th June at the eGovernors’ meeting 23 scholarship grants were awarded; 21 scholarships from the SIE Education Fund and 2 scholarships from the Dr Suzanne Noël Fund for the academic year 2020-2021.

 

One example is 35-year-old Tamta from Georgia who was awarded € 7000 to complete her PhD in English, which will allow her to apply for a permanent position at the university and get a steady income for herself and her daughters. Another example is 34-year-old Houloud from Togo who was awarded € 6000 to finalize her PhD in biology. Her research will help reduce human and animal contamination and improve food safety in her country.

 

Since the biennium 2015-2017, there has been a special focus on supporting women and girls in STEM disciplines.

 

Funding
Our members contribute to the two funds through their annual membership fee. To this end, we have been able to award grants worth more than €100 000 every year. Unfortunately, we lose members and the size of available funds for the scholarships is shrinking. This year € 90.000 were disbursed from the Education Fund, i.e 10 per cent down from last year and € 10.000 from the Dr. Noël Fund, down from € 15.000 last time.

 

This autumn 1100 Soroptimist sisters from Africa will leave SIE and join the new African Federation. This will also have an impact on the funding available for grants.

 

My hope is that the SIE Board and the Governors will find a way to avoid a further decrease in funding. We need the SIE Scholarships as tools to support women and girls realise their professional dreams.

 

Let’s help educate, enable and empower women through an SIE scholarship!

 

Britt Nordgreen
SIE Scholarship Committee, Chairperson 2019-2021

 

Link to the SIE Scholarship Grants 2020-2021:

http://www.soroptimisteurope.org/sie-scholarship-grants-2020-2021/