- President's Message
- Our November Meeting
- Our Fabulous Seasonal Celebration
- Our October Meeting
- Advocacy
- Scholarship
- Interest Groups
- CFUW National
- Ontario Council
- Extra! Extra!
- Contact Information
| | President's Message
I hope everyone is enjoying the last of the fall colour and looking forward to the holiday season.
There are so many things going on this fall, we have a packed newsletter!
Of note:
Keep Marg and Hélène Off the Streets! CFUW Stratford has granted scholarships to young women for almost 70 years. Our fabulous Scholarship presentation in September underscored the importance of ongoing fundraising. To that end, we are launching a new fundraising campaign we are calling “Keep Marg and Hélène Off the Streets”, which pays tongue-in-cheek homage to our fundraising champions, Marg Thompson and Hélène Crabbe and their epic
walking tour in 2023. Please see below for donation details, and remember that a contribution now will generate a tax receipt for this year.
Our Violence against Women (VAW) Advocacy group is once more supporting the Emily Murphy Centre for donations and Christmas gift cards. The list of food, clothing and other essentials is below, and donations can be brought to the November meeting. The gift cards can be brought (along with books!) to our Christmas Lunch and Book Sale in December.
Our Program committee have been trying to book Dr. Kim Anderson for several years, and are so pleased to finally have her as our November 25 th speaker. Her topic is fascinating, and I can’t wait to learn more about indigenous matriarchal society and her work at Nokom’s House.
Please note that, for this one meeting only, we will be at The Falstalf Centre, 35 Waterloo Street North. Parking is available at lots off of either William St. or Elizabeth St. (accessible). Finally, our 2025/26 Membership list is available on the Members Only section of our website. Please check that your information is accurate – we will keep updating and adding our new members on a monthly basis.
See you on November 25th at The Falstaff Centre,
Cambria Ravenhill,
President 2025/26
| COMING UP: Our November Meeting
Tuesday, Nov 25, 2025 - 7pm | | | Dr. Kim Anderson Kim Anderson is a Metis writer and Professor in the Department of Family Relations and Applied Nutrition at the University of Guelph where she holds a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Relationality and Storied Practice. | | Nokom’s House: Grandmother-Led Research in the Academy In this presentation, Dr. Kim Anderson will talk about how she came to build a research centre in the University of Guelph Arboretum styled after an Indigenous grandmother’s house. She will touch on themes of Indigenous women’s leadership as they are being applied to the development of the Nokom’s House Research Centre. | | | | | Our Fabulous Seasonal Celebration! | Lunch will include a full buffet including salads, turkey with all the trimmings, dessert and coffee/tea. The cost will be $44.11 including tax and gratuity. Meals will be paid by members at the luncheon. Please comb your book shelves for used book offerings for that day's book sale. Please no large reference books, encyclopedias etc. Proceeds from the book sale will go to our scholarship fund. Last year members were invited to share their reasons for continued membership in CFUW. This year you are being invited to share a brief anecdote about the most memorable Christmas gift you ever gave or received. Don't forget to bring the gift certificates for the Emily Murphy Centre - outlined below. Please send your RSVP by DECEMBER 2nd to Marg Thompson | Mary E. Hofstetter C.M. The Evolution of Leadership in the Not-for-Profit Realm. | Mary shared her current experience as Chair of the Board of Govenors of Sheridan College. The Board is nearing the end of a search for a new President which led to a discussion of the dramatic changes in requisite skills and experience necessary for leadership in Not-for-Profit organizations. Where do we find the leaders of tomorrow and what do they need to lead and succeed? One very interesting observation is not for mature people to mentor the young but rather for older generations to seek mentorship for themselves amongst the younger generations. | | A Member of the Order of Canada, Mary's career highlights include service as Vice-President, Academic, Mohawk College; President & CEO, Sheridan College; General Manager, Stratford Festival; President & CEO, the Banff Centre. She currently consults part time in the arts and culture not-for profit sector, with a focus on Board governance and best practices. | Advocacy General Advocacy Group In addition to our two active Advocacy Groups, there is sufficient interest in the club to once again support a General Advocacy Group. This group is intended to deal with single issue situations to which the club would like to respond. If you are interested in participating, please email our Advocacy chair: Sue Bailey Issues that have been brought forward so far are water protection, inclusivity, and homelessness. We are fortunate that CFUW national and provincial have numerous advocacy resources to help us. Water protection - The issue of water bottling in Wellington County has once again come to the fore. The company now trying to bottle and sell our water is no longer Nestlé, it is Ice River. The Ford government has relaxed the rules that protected our land and water. Our first action within the General Advocacy Group will likely be a letter from CFUW Stratford to our MPP.
Climate Change Action Committee | The CCAC had their first meeting. It's true that climate covers almost everything - we had a wide-ranging discussion! We reviewed the meeting with the mayor and are hopeful that he will follow through with Idling by-law signs at every school! We all supported working to engage young folk in ways to address climate change. We also agreed to promote the resources we have developed in CFUW Stratford that would help the climate, including Native Plants, Holding a Green Event, the Sustainable Shopping Cart, and the Alternatives to Plastic Project - among others! | Other interests that emerged in conversation were - Air Pollution
- Microplastics
- Commercial nurseries that promote exotic plants
- Connecting with other clubs and the national advocacy CFUW body to share a Community of Practice over common interests
- Contacting local nurseries with wholesale options for native plants
New members always welcome. Contact Sheila Clarke | | Violence Against Women Following last year's successful poster and referral campaign which directed women at risk to Straford's Optimism Place, this year's project will be directed at increasing the awareness of men regarding this issue and enlisting their support. Full update next month.
| Support for the Emily Murphy Centre A Second Stage Housing Facility for women and their children | | Food Drive at monthly meetings we will again be collecting food items most needed: coffee and tea, ketchup and mustard, school snacks, Kraft dinner, Mr. Noodles, shampoo and conditioner, body wash, toilet paper, soup ( except tomato), tinned meat (tuna, salmon, ham and chicken) fruit and fruit cocktail, laundry soap, bleach and dryer sheets. | Christmas Gift Cards for teens.
Please plan to bring these to our Holiday Lunch and Book Sale. They have 10 children between the ages of 13 and 17 and gift cards are a huge hit. Suggestions: Amazon, Walmart, EB games, Giant Tiger, Indigo, and Canadian Tire. Gift cards that exceed expectations for the teens are given to the moms :-) | | Keep Marg and Hélène Off the Streets! This is, of course, a public safety initiative disguised as a fundraiser: if we don’t raise the necessary dollars for scholarships for deserving high school girls, these two unstoppable dynamos will be forced to again take their campaign curbside - armed with clipboards and a disturbingly high level of enthusiasm! | | For the good of sidewalks, doorbells, and unsuspecting pedestrians everywhere, CFUW members are strongly encouraged to donate promptly, ensuring Marg and Hélène remain safely indoors, empowering young women through education rather than patrolling neighbourhoods like over-caffeinated charity rangers. Give generously—it’s not just philanthropy, it’s community hazard mitigation! Donations can be made via etransfer to: scholarshipfundcfuwstratford@gmail.com PS: If 50 of us each made a contribution of $100, the scholarships for 2026 would be fully funded!
PPS: Any amount will be gratefully received with thanks - plus a charitable tax receipt! | The usual spooky suspects showed up for the Duplicate group’s October game. Was the witchy-looking one in the middle sparing for Jane Cook that day? 😉 | | Lunch Bunch at Demetre’s, Friday October 17th | What a great way to sample a wide variety of restaurants in Stratford! It is amazing how many there are. Each month members of the group are able to sign up to visit a selected location and enjoy meeting and sharing a meal with one another. You may wish to contact group leader Jane Cook.
| | Indigenous Rights Learning Group | Our October presentation of Kanehsatake:
270 Years of Resistance told the story of the 1990 Oka Crisis and was very appreciated by our members. | | Join us at the Little Prince Theatre, an intimate 12 seat movie theatre, 62 Wellington Street, Stratford. Up Next: | Tuesday, November 11th, 4:00 p.m.
The Inconvenient Indian An adaptation of Thomas King's historical and contemporary narratives of Indigenous Canadians Winner of the 2020 TIFF Best Canadian Film Award Guests are welcome. If interested please email Co-Chair Pat Reavy or 519-273-0176
Our December offering will be Trick or Treaty? This NFB film made history as the first film by an Indigenous filmmaker to be part of the Masters section at TIFF. | | CFUW Ontario Council Leadership Seminar November 10th 2025 at 6pm - 7pm | Come to this exciting seminar on Leadership which offers four Ontario Council Club members describing their approach to solving the Leadership Challenge in their Club (by adopting different models of leadership), what circumstances drove them to change the model, how successful the model has been and how it impacted their Bylaws.
Register Here | | On November 29th, via ZOOM, we welcome Kim Verwaayen, Associate Professor, Department of Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies, University of Western Ontario, as she explores the topic of Patriarchy from a historical and modern perspective. Where do we go from here? Join us on November 29th for our speaker and a thoughtful discussion of patriarchy and how society will overcome this social convention rooted in bias. Register Here | | CFUW National Commission on the Status of Women (CSW70) | An exciting and influential international event coming up for women around the world is the 70th Commission on the Status of Women (CSW70) being held in New York City from March 9th to March 20th. CFUW has 20 delegate positions due to our special Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) status with the UN and you are invited to apply for a delegate position. Delegates self-fund their transportation, hotel and meals but there is no charge for the sessions themselves.Refer here | | GWI Celebrating United Nations Day | Gender-based violence refers to harmful acts directed at individuals based on their gender. It disproportionately affects women, girls and gender diverse people, impacting over half of Canada’s population and costing lives. | | The Walrus Talks Ending Gender-Based Violence brings together activists, advocates and experts to examine pressing policy gaps and cultural shifts that can reduce and prevent gender-based violence. This timely event will highlight lived experience, evidence-based solutions and the need for coordinated, cross-sector action. Join us online for this urgent discussion, part of YWCA Canada’s annual Rose Campaign and just ahead of the 16 Days of Activism to End Gender-Based Violence. Connect with fellow advocates, policymakers, and engaged Canadians as we work toward a future free from violence. Speakers to be announced. Register HERE | | | | |
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