Dear CLEA membership,

This has been an exciting year for CLEA. One of our major accomplishments was finalizing CLEA’s Strategic Plan.  Please find attached the final Strategic Plan recently approved by the CLEA Board here.   

CLEA's Strategic Plan is based on a year-long endeavor to gather information and ideas from both our membership and CLEA’s board.  As you may recall, we first started this process last fall by surveying our membership to decipher what you saw as CLEA’s strengths as well as areas requiring further development.  We discussed strategic planning during the January 2016 Board and Membership meetings. We then held a strategic planning retreat where we generated many thoughtful, comprehensive, and exciting ideas about how to shape the organization over the next several years.  At each step along the way we were guided by our pro bono consultant, Peter Toran. 

At the beginning of the summer Margaret and I convened a strategic planning ad hoc committee, which included Beth Schwartz, Martina Cartwright, and Lisa Martin. This committee was invaluable for creating the version of the plan we are circulating today.  Based on all the feedback we received from the retreat, the meetings, and the survey, the ad hoc committee (in consultation with Peter) drafted the plan. Finally, we received feedback from our CLEA committee co-chairs and incorporated their suggestions into the final version after presenting the co-chairs’ feedback to the Board. We are very thankful for the feedback we received throughout this process and look forward to working with next year’s co-presidents, Benjie Louis and Beth Schwartz, on implementing the plan.

To accomplish our plan, of course, CLEA needs the involvement of its members!  If you are interested in serving on a CLEA committee, please let us know.  

As always, let us know if you have any questions.  Have a wonderful rest of 2016!

Best,

Maritza & Margaret