President’s Message, By Angela Scarlett

As I enter my third year as president of our AAUW branch, I have been reflecting on the fact that I didn’t think I would be here. Many of you know that we have struggled to find replacement board members and officers in the past year.

This lack of volunteers is a likely consequence of our branch aging. We have had many dedicated members who served in leadership for multiple years. It is only natural that folks would want to step back and allow others to step forward.

Our Nominating Committee recruited Susana Mullen and Carole Cline to serve as our financial director and secretary but could not find a president. We held a branch meeting to address our volunteer gap with our members. After this meeting, Lori Franz and Mary Miller stepped forward to helm our Tech Trek program.

We also convened a Strategic Planning Committee to address long-term branch needs. Marty McKnew, Gloria Yost, Liz Jordan, Tiffany Ardisana, Hedda Smithson, and I serve on the committee. Nancy Lawrence, a long-time dedicated member and former president of AAUW Sacramento, was originally going to help but recently passed away after a bout with cancer. We will greatly miss her and will memorialize her in next month’s newsletter.

We have had some productive sessions and have come up with excellent suggestions for restructuring the board. We will review this first piece of committee work at the September 17 meeting for feedback. To give you an idea of “Regroup, Renew, Refresh,” here are some bullet points.

• The board will consist of nine members.
• Four elected officers: president, vice-president of programming, financial officer, and secretary
• Five appointed directors-at-large.
• Officers shall serve a two-year term.
• The board officers shall appoint directors for an initial one year.

Please share your ideas and suggestions with us! We are in the directory. But most importantly, come to the September meeting!