PRESIDENT’S PERSPECTIVE PRESIDENT’S PERSPECTIVE

Dear JLC Members and Friends,

Our new mission, voted upon by AJLI in May 2022 and the JLC in September 2022, is “The Junior League of Cincinnati is an organization of women whose mission is to advance women’s leadership for meaningful community impact through volunteer action, collaboration, and training.”

The value of JLC membership is provided in three ways: creation of meaningful connections, service opportunities, and valuable civic and personal development training.

Let’s discuss training. Looking at this year, we have offered over 35 training opportunities for our members and leaders. Highlighting a few notable ones in the last quarter:

• Board Bank , where we trained 13 members for nonprofit board service

• Women’s Heart Health Forum, where members came to learn about our heart health from Dr. Quesada of the Christ Hospital Women’s Heart Center. We also heard from two nonprofits, American Heart Association and Closing the Health Gap, on what they are doing in Cincinnati to help with health-related issues

• March GMM, where a panel of organizations including Ignite, YWCA, Family Nurturing Center, St. Vincent de Paul, and Mindpeace shared more on Cincinnati needs and how to take action

• DEIB Watch Night and “I’m Still Here” Book Discussion, two diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging opportunities where members gathered at the Columbia Center to watch America’s Truth: Cincinnati documentary or discuss Austin Channing Brown’s memoir

• Launch into Leadership, where interested members could learn about how to become a JLC leader

While this year has been full of tangible training opportunities, an Ad Hoc committee, led by Anne Miller, has spent time thinking about the future of training. The Ad Hoc just completed their final recommendations to the Board and hopefully you have caught a more detailed glimpse of their learnings and recommendations in a recent e-blast. A few highlights on how the JLC can foster a more robust culture of training:.

• Define what it means to be a JLC trained volunteer

• Align training to the skills nonprofits in Cincinnati need

• Create a training plan that is intentionally aligned with our community focus area

• Tap into community partners to facilitate training

The Ad Hoc has started drafting what it means to be a trained volunteer. Does this resonate with you? A JLC of Cincinnati trained volunteer:

1. Has compassion and empathy for, and awareness of, the needs and challenges of the community we serve

2. Has fundraising skills to support the financial needs of the communities and organizations we serve

3. Has experience leading others

4. Has received training for board service or serves on a board(s)

5. Shows up prepared to serve our community by doing prereads, arriving on time and in appropriate attire and mindset for the work to be done

6. Represents the JLC and our partners well at all times These recommendations have been memorialized into our board-approved Strategic Plan that you can read more about on page seven of this issue.

The new Strategic Plan also has input from 3 other Ad Hocs that were working behind the scenes this year (Financial Ad Hoc, Community Ad Hoc, and Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Leadership Ad Hoc). The plan includes goals and strategies to increase our impact in our community, foster internal belonging, and continue to be fiscally responsible.

You will see the details of this plan as it rolls out in 23/24 JLC year though I wanted to mention it here to raise awareness that this important strategic work is being done to help the JLC continue to live our mission and our commitment to provide value to both our members and our community at large.

I hope this message fills you with as much excitement as I have for our future. While I wind down my Presidential responsibilities, I plan to remain an active member working alongside you to make these plans a reality. I encourage you to join and help us continue the legacy of 103 years of impact.

Love,

Kate Fortlage 2022-2023 President