Welcome to Our Blog - by Marissa Todd

July 1 kicked off a new board year for Apra Missouri/Kansas (Mo/Kan) and I am so excited to share some of the plans taking shape for 2018-2019!

Hopefully you joined us at our first ever joint conference with Apra Great Plains in March. We welcomed over 80 members from the Midwest for two days of networking and learning. It was an overwhelming success and based on survey responses, we will plan to do another joint conference in 2020 in the Great Plains Chapter area. Our next Chapter conference will be spring 2019 in St. Louis and more details will be coming this fall, as well as a call for presentations. If you are feeling particularly inspired after this year, please consider sharing your knowledge in St. Louis!

Your membership connects you to an amazing professional network of prospect development professionals across Missouri, Kansas and even some of our neighboring states. This year, we are ramping up the value of your membership by planning virtual educational opportunities and local networking events so you can meet more of your peers face-to-face outside of our annual conference. We also plan to communicate with you more via this blog on our website so our board and volunteers can share useful information about resources, events and opportunities to engage.

If you are going to be in Pittsburgh for Apra’s Prospect Development conference, you will have lots of fellow Apra Mo/Kan members to meet! Heidi Harmelik from University of Missouri is on the Data Analytics Symposium committee, so if you work in analytics or are just wanting to get started, consider adding this to your agenda and supporting the efforts of one of our members. I hope all of you in Pittsburgh will join me at an Apra Mo/Kan happy hour we are organizing. More details to come in a few weeks.

Increased programming takes many hands and we want YOU to be part of the fun! We need volunteers to help plan events in your local area, be a mentor to newer professionals, write for our blog and share knowledge and information through our social media. The time commitment varies but the reward of helping grow our Chapter into a more robust professional network is worth it. If you are interested in learning more or volunteering, please reach out to me at mtodd@nelson-atkins.org.

I hope to engage with each of our members this year at some point, whether at a networking event or out in the Twittersphere. And I hope you will feel free to send your comments and suggestions to me or any board member about how we can add value to your professional development through Apra Missouri/Kansas. Thank you for being a member! ​And if you are not already a member, consider this my personal invitation to join us!