Many of you may not know what the elected Board of Directors of the NCFR does in the role of serving the organization. You may only think of the Board when you see the request to vote in our elections for Board members; perhaps the major face-to-face contact you have with Board members is at the annual conference, where we hold the annual NCFR business meeting and where members of the Board attend all of the Section meetings to engage in organizational discussions. The Board President also connects with the members through the President’s Report published in each issue of the NCFR Report. Beyond these more visible activities, the work of the Board may be less obvious. Therefore, I want to briefly share with you some of the responsibilities of the Board and to outline our latest new work.

Our Board member job description says we are responsible for the overall governance of the organization on behalf of all NCFR members. We are to work within the NCFR Board Policy Governance model to articulate vision, set priorities, and monitor staff performance. And we are to take responsibility for maintaining contact with the membership and reflect the needs of all NCFR members.

So how do we attempt to fill our Board role? The Board meets monthly (mainly via phone conference) to review and discuss the work that the staff has undertaken on behalf of the NCFR. In our conversation we try to assess if the activities of the organization are helping NCFR meet its mission to develop and disseminate research, theory, and practice to support the well-being of families. We also attempt to identify, collect, and generate suggestions for new actions the staff and membership might undertake in order to meet the NCFR mission.

As I mentioned in the last issue of the NCFR Report, the Board’s new actions this year are to help envision and set priorities in three areas: increased engagement and activities for our Sections, elevating the role of NCFR in our policy discourse, and the development of international partnerships and opportunities.

So what have we been doing these past three months on these initiatives? First, we formed three board subcommittees—Policy, Section, and International. Each subcommittee is composed of three different Board members: Policy—Rose Allen, Brad van Eeden-Moorefield, Andrew Beneke; Section—Maureen Perry-Jenkins, Jennifer Hardesty, Carolyn Henry; and International—Paul Amato, Joyce Chang, Lyndal Khaw.

These subcommittees have convened to discuss and identify goals for their committee and to determine where and how to collect information that could inform the committee about possible actions, challenges, and areas for further investigation. We have been listening to you by looking at your comments from the annual conference evaluation, reviewing surveys of member views conducted by several Sections and the NCFR, and contacting members individually and just talking to you. You have also given us the names of other people we should contact. The subcommittees have begun to report back to the Board about things they have learned. Already the staff has responded to several items.

Through these discussions as well as the ongoing conversations between the Board and staff, we determined there was a need to tweak the conference planning process in order to increase the number of presentations by senior researchers at the NCFR Annual Conference. The Board encouraged the section chairs to reach out to NCFR members whose engagement with NCFR is not what it once was and invite them to submit symposia ideas to the sections. Concurrently, the NCFR staff developed a procedure whereby all section chairs have an opportunity to cross over section lines to plan conference sessions and partner with other sections in order to increase the number of interdisciplinary sessions. As a consequence of these actions, numerous sessions for the 2012 conference will integrate the work of members from multiple sections to highlight the interdisciplinary nature of our work in the area of health and family.

When we started talking to members regarding perspectives on international involvement, we were excited to learn how useful the Zippy News tool has become for many members. They reported looking forward to its arrival and reviewing the materials closely, and they suggested the addition of international family news. Subsequently, staff contacted the leadership of the International Section, who put a call out to all members of the Section; staff already has received suggestions for news items as well as other international opportunities. A new area of Zippy News will focus on international initiatives and members of the International Section are now engaged by sharing their expertise. These are just two examples of what the Board subcommittee work has spawned in a few short weeks.

At this point it appears this subcommittee process is working. Several new actions have grown out of our Board work that we hope will benefit you and your work to support the well-being of families. As the Board continues to expand our inquiries on these initiatives, we welcome connections and contacts with you, the membership. The Board represents you for the development of the organization, and we are to be the eyes and ears of the membership, but we can only fulfill that role with your help. We need to hear your voices, receive your ideas, and get your feedback. Member engagement is very important to the life of any organization. We are excited and pleased with member willingness to engage in discussions with us on these important areas and look forward to our future conversations. You will continue to hear more about additional outcomes from this Board work in future months.