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The officers of the Ethnic Minorities (EM) Section are looking forward to planning this year’s conference in Fort Worth, Texas. We hope to continue to provide opportunities in the program that will facilitate a synergy of collaboration. For example, our previous tri-section meetings with the Family Policy Section and Families and Health Section have resulted in numerous proposals and cross-section collaborations among students and new professionals, as well as established faculty.

As always, the section officers are looking for ways to further engage our members throughout the year. One way we do this is through our biannual EM Section newsletter; additionally, our section is now on social media! You can connect with us via Facebook (bit.ly/ncfrEM-fb) and Twitter (@NcfrEM). We plan to utilize these platforms to engage with our members and transmit section news. We continue to ask members to share their work and accomplishments so that we can highlight these in our newsletters and on our social media pages. We want to celebrate your work as an asset to our section. We want to ensure that our section members and their accomplishments remain visible. We also want to ensure that our section members are informed and engaged throughout the year.

With the increases in section proposals over the past few years, we have had a greater presence at the annual conference, and we know this will continue as our membership continues to grow. With growth there is also a need for reflection and sometimes change. A few years ago, section officers discussed changing our section name to eliminate the word minorities. The term minority is often stigmatizing, and we seek to identify a new section name that describes who we are, not just who we’re not. Since that initial discussion we have received numerous inquiries regarding our section’s name change. We have started the process of changing our name this year. We recognize that ethnicity is at the core of our section and want to ensure it remains in our name. We will use the section’s many communication systems to put out a call for potential names, and we will work with NCFR to create an online voting system.

The continuing success of the Ethnic Minorities section depends on the engagement of our members. The officers look forward to working on your behalf to ensure the ongoing success of our conference and the vibrancy of our section.