Thank you for visiting our website.  We are a volunteer service organization for business and professional women serving in southwest Baltimore County since 1965.

We work to raise money to support local, regional and international projects that improve the lives of women and girls.  Soroptimist International of Arbutus participates in a wide range of service programs in our local community and throughout the world. These programs include the club’s signature project; “Comfort Caps” in which we distribute hats, free of charge, to women experiencing hair loss due to cancer treatments.

Each year we provide a cash award to a head of household woman enrolled in an undergraduate or vocations skills program.  The Women’s Opportunity Award is the major service project of Soroptimist International of the America’s. Additionally our club recognizes a young woman, ages 14-17 who is an active volunteer through our participation in the Violet Richardson Award.

Domestic Violence awareness and prevention is a focal point at the club, region and international level of the Soroptimist organization.  SI Arbutus has distributed magnets with Domestic Violence hotline numbers and we produce and distribute Teen Dating Bookmarks which lists the signs of an abusive or potentially abusive relationship one side and the signs of a healthy relationship on the other.

We work to raise awareness as part of an effort to stop the heinous practice of sex trafficking.  This form of slavery is particularly relevant to women and girls and is growing at an alarming rate.  Soroptimist International of the Americas has launched a project to increase awareness and bring this issue to the forefront.

We honor and recognize women in our community annually with the Ruby Award – Women Helping Women.  This award is given to a woman who is making an extraordinary difference in the lives of other women or girls through professional or volunteer efforts.  We also bestow the Betty Riedel Award, named for the club’s charter president, to a local woman entrepreneur who is active in the community and an effective role model for other women and girls.

This is a broad overview of the projects we participate in. We additionally support other local programs and projects as we work to improve the lives of women and girls locally and globally.