Membership and Regions Chair's Message
December 2012 Newsletter Article
Hello everyone! Hope the holiday season is greeting you with good health and at least a tiny measure of relaxation. Our membership continues to grow and is now solidly above 2000 on a consistent basis. We have many new members this fall, not just those applying for small grants, but also more experienced faculty, which is great.
We do also have a lot of people who don't renew their membership. Why? Some become members mainly to apply for our very popular career development awards, and never get a chance to experience the lasting benefits of membership before they opt out. Others are, understandably, squeezed by shrinking budgets and need to choose between memberships (though ours is the least expensive of the major pediatric organizations!) Lately, the Board and several Region Chairs have been taking advantage of a really innovative and helpful new tool designed by Jennifer Padilla in the APA office to quickly and easily contact members who have not renewed, and have found that many value their membership highly, and just forget to renew! (For those of you who are Region Chairs, please check it out and use it!) We are also, however, constantly striving to enhance the experience of membership for APA Members.
Our regions are thriving, with each holding regional meetings this academic year, and several continue their innovation in holding virtual meetings and learning from their experiences with them. A few have started holding periodic conference calls or web-based meetings on academic topics of interest to members, several of which are not easily available elsewhere. I hope this trend will continue! We are also continuing to hold quarterly Board calls with Region Chairs to maintain communication and gather new ideas.
As always, please send me any comments, concerns or ideas
at Christopher.stille@childrenscolorado.org. Happy New Year!
Christopher Stille
Chair of Membership and Regions
Academic Pediatric Association
Christopher.Stille@childrenscolorado.org
