[Arizona-students] AABS Monthly Meetings?

[Silverman, Arielle]

Hello everyone,
 
    I hope that those of you who attended our most recent NFB national convention were inspired, energized, and are ready for another exciting year for the NFB!
 
    While walking to the banquet on Thursday evening, I happened to bump into (almost literally) the president of the New Mexico Association of Blind Students. I told her that I am the president of the Arizona Association of Blind Students, and in the course of our conversation she asked me if our student division holds monthly meetings. I had to admit that as of yet we have managed to have only quarterly meetings. Afterward, though, it occurred to me that there is nothing stopping us from having monthly meetings and that, in fact, doing something once a month, however informal, will help us to grow and stay connected.
 
    On the flight back from convention, I came up with some ideas for how our monthly meetings could work, which I will describe below. This is just one idea, so we welcome your opinions. What do you guys think of the following plan?
 
    Ideally, a different AABS officer will be in charge of each meeting, which will take place on the last Saturday of each month over lunch. The person in charge (from now on referred to as the meeting host) will choose a restaurant where the lunch will be held, and will announce this on our listserv. The host will also call as many students as possible during the week before the meeting to encourage them to come, and will keep a rough count of how many people to expect. The meeting host will come to the lunch meeting and will bring a blindness-related question or scenario to be discussed during the lunch. Examples of topics may include, "When should blind students use additional time when taking exams?", "What's the best way to find a part-time job while in school?", or "When is the best time to get blindness training?" We will also invite NFBA officers to come to the lunch and update the students about local, state, and national NFB activities. Finally, if the meeting host is ambitious, he/she will organize a post-lunch activity that is fun and that also gets us out in the public doing everyday things. Examples of after-lunch activities could include a trip to a local movie theater, shopping at a mall or shopping center, hiking, rock climbing, ice skating, serving food at a soup kitchen, and many other things that I haven't mentioned.
 
    Since a different officer will host each meeting, the meetings will take place in different regions of the state. The goal would not be to get all our members to each and every meeting, but simply to give students a frequent chance to connect with each other in a setting that facilitates confidence building, networking, and learning about our organization and our philosophy. I would hope that some of the meetings could occur in regions of Arizona that have less AABS activity and so can bring in new members. For instance, when it is Ryan's turn to host, the meeting would probably be in Flagstaff and may include mostly NAU students, but the NAU students would have a chance to meet AABS at some point before the next division-wide seminar. We would still, of course, encourage students to join their local chapters as well as coming to the local AABS meetings.
 
    Again, this is a work in progress, so please share your feedback and suggestions on the list regarding monthly meetings. Our board will discuss this briefly at our July meeting and if we approve the idea, I would be happy to get the ball rolling by hosting the first meeting on August 26.
 
    Thank you in advance for your contributions to this effort to strengthen our student division. It is through all of your efforts that we can make our dreams a reality for Arizona's blind students.
 
Arielle Silverman
President, Arizona Association of Blind Students
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Hello everyone,
 
   
I hope that those of you who attended our most recent NFB national convention were inspired, energized, and are ready for another exciting year for the NFB!
 
   
While walking to the banquet on Thursday evening, I happened to bump into (almost literally) the president of the New Mexico Association of Blind Students. I told her that I am the president of the Arizona Association of Blind Students, and in the course of our conversation she asked me if our student division holds monthly meetings. I had to admit that as of yet we have managed to have only quarterly meetings. Afterward, though, it occurred to me that there is nothing stopping us from having monthly meetings and that, in fact, doing something once a month, however informal, will help us to grow and stay connected.
 
   
On the flight back from convention, I came up with some ideas for how our monthly meetings could work, which I will describe below. This is just one idea, so we welcome your opinions. What do you guys think of the following plan?
 
   
Ideally, a different AABS officer will be in charge of each meeting, which will take place on the last Saturday of each month over lunch. The person in charge (from now on referred to as the meeting host) will choose a restaurant where the lunch will be held, and will announce this on our listserv. The host will also call as many students as possible during the week before the meeting to encourage them to come, and will keep a rough count of how many people to expect. The meeting host will come to the lunch meeting and will bring a blindness-related question or scenario to be discussed during the lunch. Examples of topics may include, "When should blind students use additional time when taking exams?", "What's the best way to find a part-time job while in school?", or "When is the best time to get blindness training?" We will also invite NFBA officers to come to the lunch and update the students about local, state, and national NFB activities. Finally, if the meeting host is ambitious, he/she will organize a post-lunch activity that is fun and that also gets us out in the public doing everyday things. Examples of after-lunch activities could include a trip to a local movie theater, shopping at a mall or shopping center, hiking, rock climbing, ice skating, serving food at a soup kitchen, and many other things that I haven't mentioned.
 
   
Since a different officer will host each meeting, the meetings will take place in different regions of the state. The goal would not be to get all our members to each and every meeting, but simply to give students a frequent chance to connect with each other in a setting that facilitates confidence building, networking, and learning about our organization and our philosophy. I would hope that some of the meetings could occur in regions of Arizona that have less AABS activity and so can bring in new members. For instance, when it is Ryan's turn to host, the meeting would probably be in Flagstaff and may include mostly NAU students, but the NAU students would have a chance to meet AABS at some point before the next division-wide seminar. We would still, of course, encourage students to join their local chapters as well as coming to the local AABS meetings.
 
   
Again, this is a work in progress, so please share your feedback and suggestions on the list regarding monthly meetings. Our board will discuss this briefly at our July meeting and if we approve the idea, I would be happy to get the ball rolling by hosting the first meeting on August 26.
 
   
Thank you in advance for your contributions to this effort to strengthen our student division. It is through all of your efforts that we can make our dreams a reality for Arizona's blind students.
 
Arielle Silverman
President, Arizona Association of Blind Students