President’s Message By Nancy McCabe

After a break of six years, I’m back again as branch president and a lot has changed in that time. Most of our paperwork is now on the computer, which will take a bit of learning. That doesn’t affect most of you until it is time for renewal of membership. The larger change is more recent and it is in the organization of the leadership positions.

Strangely, a number of our officers aren’t fans of monthly evening meetings. A group met for strategic planning and divided the tasks into five Directors who will get reports from their respective officers and will attend the meetings as their representative. The first one is Membership Support, who will report for Member Outreach, Membership Treasurer, Interest Group Coordinator, Directory and Sunshine. The second one is Membership Development, who covers Membership Recruitment, College/University Relations, and Diversity/Equity and Inclusion. Third is Director of Local Projects, covering Scholarship, Speech Trek, Tech Trek and Gov Trek.  Fourth is Director of AAUW Priorities, covering Public Policy, Civil Rights Advocacy, Title IX, and AAUW Funds. Fifth is Director of Communications, which covers the newsletter (which you are reading,) Social Media, Technology Coordinator, Email Tree, Newsletter Mailer and Webmaster. The Parliamentarian keeps the President in line, and the Reservations and Hospitality Coordinators assist the Program Vice Presidents.  

If I still have your attention, we still need to fill several positions:

– Gov Trek, which has a knowledgeable committee member who can offer help and guidance.

– Public Policy, which has a number of knowledgeable otherwise occupied members who can supply guidance.

– Title IX, which can be designed by the volunteer.

– Hospitality, who contacts members for help with snacks and keeps track of the requisite paper goods. Failing volunteer bakers, there is a budget for grocery store cookies. We all know how important meeting snacks are! This is a public service!

If interested, you can find out who is doing what by clicking <here>. I hope to see you at the September meeting, which is the kickoff for our business year. More information on the September Kickoff can be found in this newsletter. We will be voting on the year’s proposed budget, which you can find <here>. At the meeting, please introduce yourself if we don’t know one another.