Dear PFLAG Supporter, We’re preparing for PFLAG National’s annual meeting, and know that many chapters are preparing for their own, too! We’ve gathered some ideas to help make your annual meeting entertaining, engaging, and energizing. As a nonprofit, annual meetings are a great way to engage your audience, create a memorable experience, and increase participation. Here are some ideas to help your chapter shine at your annual meeting: - Opportunities to Celebrate! Annual meetings are a great time to celebrate successes and make a renewed commitment to the year ahead. It’s a great time to celebrate new and former board members, highlight tireless volunteers, and show the important work your chapter has done over the past year.
- Timely Reporting: Great annual meetings include timely and informational reports about chapter activities, the state of the chapter’s affairs including finances, membership, and any ongoing projects. This is also a great opportunity to highlight membership and volunteer opportunities to reach your goals for the year ahead.
- Make it Accessible & Light: Be a good host! Hold your meeting in a way that’s familiar to your members, planned in advance, and upbeat. Pay attention to setting the scene, offer snacks and chapter planning activities or interactive social opportunities for members, set up a membership drive table, and be sure to stick to your agenda so things start and end on time.
Why It’s Important: Well planned annual meetings can become a staple of a chapter’s activities. They help grow and solidify membership and volunteer opportunities, while increasing the capacity of your board. Annual meetings provide a space for community collaboration and feedback–sharing the ownership of the chapter with members and supporters, and a great way to build energy and excitement within the chapter through activities that promote engagement, like an idea share activity. | |
Learning With Love: The 2023 PFLAG National Convention is coming soon, here are items that need your attention: | |
Eddy: This will be my first convention and I cannot overstate how excited I am to meet you all in person! I’ve had the opportunity to meet many of you over email or Zoom, but I’m thrilled to get the chance to connect in person and share a coffee or discuss the amazing workshops we’re attending. I’m looking forward to meeting PFLAGers from the Western United States and watching you all connect with other PFLAGers from across the country to share ideas and gather wisdom. I cannot wait to meet you, so please say hi when you see me at convention! Sachelle: I’m excited for the opportunity to connect in person! At my last in-person convention in Kansas City, I was new to my role at PFLAG, and it was a great opportunity to plug into PFLAG networks. It was incredible to meet folks, have opportunities to connect over a cup of coffee, discuss new ideas from workshops, and learn about things happening across the PFLAG Chapter Network. I hope to see some of you again and others for the first time when we gather in Arlington VA in October. | |
Stay safe,  Eddy Funkhouser (they/he) | |
