Dear ASTD-Cascadia Members,

As I look back at my year as President, all I can say to everyone is Thanks! What a wonderful learning experience it has been to lead this organization and be a part of every growing and dynamic chapter.

Here’s an update on some of our primary focus areas for 2007:

Foundation

• Structure/Infrastructure – to better serve our increasing membership and continue to deliver top-notch programs and services, we expanded the Board – bringing on three new roles (Chief Learning Officer, Chief Operating Officer and VP of Outreach. This change has come with some challenges, but more importantly, it has become a catalyst for some very exciting new ideas. We will build upon these new ideas to make ourselves better in 2008!

Partnerships

• Connect – we committed to making connections with new internal/external audiences who share our vision. Throughout the year, we have partnered with other associations in the area of cultural competency.
• National ASTD – we committed to learn and understand National’s direction, including the CPLP certification and OneVoice initiative. We are currently looking at ways to better support the CPLP certification within our membership.

Awareness

• Look outward – in order to sustain our membership growth in an every increasing diverse community, we committed to answering the question - who’s missing in our membership? With the help from our VP of Outreach, we are continuing to look at our cultural competence to help us understand the needs of groups outside our own. As a first step, several programs and activities have focused on identifying key values of groups outside our own.

Some additional 2007 highlights:

• 600 members!
• Launched BlogCascadia. Thank you Christine Martell!
• Took Marketing to a new and exciting level, bringing a marketing professional onto the Board. Thank you Jessica Singh!
• Have three new Special Interest Groups: Learning Leaders, Transitions and Social Learning. Thank you Rob Porter!
• Have unified all programmatic functions and aligned them with the National ASTD Competency Model. Thank you Julie Bulrice!
• Held our most successful Regional Conference with over 300 attendees. Thank you Susan Zabriskie and Conference Committee members!
• A growing student club at PSU. Thank you Christine Martell!
• Expanded our scholarship program and initiated an endowment fund. Thank you Dion Kerr!
• Continued success with our forums (Fundamentals, Training Managers, and e-Learning). Thank you Pat Lake!

Special thanks go out to all of the hundreds of volunteers who made it all happen. Whether as a volunteer at one event, or throughout the year as a committee member - you make this Chapter shine!

Lastly, thank you to the entire 2007 Board of Directors. Your energy, enthusiasm, drive and commitment to excellence is unmatched! It has been an honor serving with all of you!

Here’s to a very exciting and dynamic 2008!

Theme Grenz
Past President
ASTD Cascadia Chapter

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