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After exhaustive research into the perceived problems of branches and their
relation to the state organization, the Re-Connection Committee proposed six goals.
The third of these is: "Improve the content at state meetings (convention and
summer conference) to be more attractive to more branch members." As program vice
president, I, along with Clara Allen, offer the following suggestions and observations
regarding Goal III.
- The programming for both the convention and the summer conference is the main
responsibility of the program vice president. There is a program committee made
up of a number of state board members. The programming should be spread more evenly
over the committee members. The main problem is that there is almost no time to
meet as a committee and delegate responsibility for portions of the meetings.
Approximately 30 minutes is used during lunch at the summer conference to elicit
comments and ideas for the convention. There is really no other time to meet.
I found that most committee members did not seem to be aware of her responsibility
or she didn’t attend the state meetings. Each committee member should be
informed when she accepts a chair position that she will be expected to participate
in convention planning. More time should be allotted for this and members of the
program committee should be made aware of their responsibility to attend and participate
in the meetings. Conference calls could be used and email is a godsend if all
members are using it. I didn’t find that this was always the case.
- One complaint I heard when I took office was that there was not enough early
information in the Tar Heel News (THN) to entice members to plan to attend the
convention. The two issues of the THN prior to the 2002 and 2003 conventions were
full of publicity. Detailed information was printed about workshops and their
leaders, our Leader on Loan, hotel costs, tours, and local attractions. Although
I think this is a good idea and necessary, it really didn’t draw any additional
members to the convention. Two years ago we drew approximately 145 because it
was our 75th Anniversary. Convention 2003 was back to just about 100
participants.
- Another complaint was that we were too ‘ingrown’ and needed to have
outside people at convention. A tremendous effort was made to have people outside
of AAUW present workshops (particularly in 2003) and we attracted the very top
national officers. For our 2002 anniversary celebration, AAUW President Nancy
Rustad was our Leader on Loan (LOL) and we were pleased to have the dynamic director
of the Legal Advocacy Fund Patty McCabe. In 2003 when education was our theme,
our LOL was Educational Foundation President Mary Ellen Smyth. Through the extraordinary
efforts of our LAF Chair, Doris Bernlohr, a campus outreach program was planned
and executed by the national LAF office on Friday of convention weekend. Bernlohr
planned a well attended fund raising breakfast featuring a speech by an LAF plaintiff
and she raised over $3000. These two events helped tremendously to boost the number
of overnight stays of attendees and increased the bottom line of the convention
finances. These LAF events also drew the new director of the LAF office along
with her two staff members, and the Legal Advocacy Fund President Sylvia Newman.
- Overall, I believe that the bar has been raised on programming for convention.
Evaluations for the 2003 convention indicated that those who attended were very
happy with the programs as well as the hotel facilities. Going back to the summer
conferences, the 2001 meeting on communication was good and the 2002 meeting on
membership was excellent. It was informative and interesting and our two presenters,
Sue Metz and Nancy Shoemaker, worked very hard to give attendees something they
could use and take back to their branches. The thing I found most difficult about
the summer conference planning was that a subject and outline is really needed
by the time of convention. That is the time when the program VP needs to get in
touch with possible presenters and begin the publicity for the meeting. She is
expected to have an article for the spring THN within a few weeks detailing the
planned activities. I think Mary Peterson has done extremely well, perhaps partly
because I told her what she would need to do before she accepted the program VP
nomination. It is really essential, and only fair, for the outgoing program VP
to communicate with the incoming VP. It appears Peterson is well prepared and
has planned a dynamic summer program for July 2003. I’m sure she has plans
already for the 2004 convention.
- This brings us back to how we can encourage more members to attend these state
meetings. Clara Allen has suggested, and I agree, that we should expand the scope
of our cluster meetings and use them to better advantage. Each cluster is in a
relatively small area geographically. Members may feel more comfortable attending
cluster meetings because they can travel to them fairly easily. When clusters
were originated in North Carolina, each one had a representative who met with
the state cluster chairman, a board member appointed by the president. Responsibilities
were more defined. As with all things, some clusters were more successful than
others. However, the cluster system could give an opportunity to do some serious
leadership training planned on the state and cluster level and disseminated through
the clusters. The AAUW-NC Strategic Plan approved for 1999-2003, namely the 1st
action plan for the 2nd goal of developing leadership skills states:
"Include leadership training at each cluster meeting." Members who attend cluster
meetings that have meaningful programming may be motivated to attend other state
meetings. The cluster chair and her cluster representatives could work together
to produce a thematic program and leadership training. The cluster regions may
need to be redrawn. Currently, our cluster is now only three branches which puts
undue burden on each branch to host and plan a program. The cluster representative
working with the cluster chair could plan at least a part of the day’s program
which would allow the host branch to assist in some way without bearing full responsibility
for program and host duties.
- To reiterate:
- Strengthen program committee
- Strengthen clusters and discuss realignment of branches in the clusters
- Continue advanced publicity for state/cluster meetings
- Establish a cluster representative from each cluster who will work with the
state cluster chair on meeting themes and leadership programming
- Allow more time at state board meetings for committees to meet.
Respectfully submitted:
Grace Knechtel, Program Vice President
Clara Allen, Historian
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