This month, I am grateful for women’s college basketball, especially the Iowa Hawkeyes, Caitlin Clark, and Coach Lisa Bluder. My family started following Iowa women’s basketball a few years ago and it’s been fun to watch the team progress and now compete in the Final Four. I often watch the games with my four-year-old daughter who is a big Caitlin Clark fan, primarily because she thinks Caitlin is nice. One of the things we always talk about at the end of the game is how Caitlin thanks her teammates and Coach Bluder thanks the fans. Following those great examples, I decided to channel Caitlin and Coach Bluder and take this opportunity to thank my teammates.

I would like to thank the Board of Directors, especially my partner, Sara Pirzadeh-Miller, NSGC President-Elect. The Board has been hard at work and this week began our in-depth strategic planning conversations. I look forward to seeing them all next month when we visit Capitol Hill, continue strategic planning, and have our May Board meeting. I would also like to thank our Smithbucklin staff partners, especially Meghan Carey. The Board has decided to take on a very robust strategic planning process that includes twelve modules or areas of work, and many of these modules require our staff partners to obtain and conduct preliminary data analyses which will be presented to the board of directors to enable informed decision-making as we develop the next strategic plan for our organization.

These modules include a self-evaluation of our current strategic plan; analysis of networks of impact to understand current and potential market opportunities; an external market scan to identify trends, member needs and potential member interests; a growth pro forma to model our finances for the next four years; a review of our current J.E.D.I. implementation plan, approach, and activities; and several additional modules. This is a very thorough process that would not be possible without the assistance of our staff partners. I am really excited to review all of the data the staff have been collecting! I am also grateful to the board of directors for volunteering extra time to dedicate to the strategic planning process both through reading and reviewing materials, as well as through attending the extra meetings we are having to prepare and develop the next strategic plan.

I would like to thank all of our committee volunteers who have begun their work on the committee charges that help move our current strategic plan forward.

I would also like to thank the past NSGC Presidents. I recently had the opportunity to email our Past Presidents and have enjoyed hearing updates from them. Even though I am only a quarter of the way into my term as NSGC President, I can already appreciate how much they have done and continue to do for our organization.

Finally, I would like to thank my home team of genetic counselors at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, and my family for supporting me through the first quarter of 2024.

Go Hawks!

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