April 2009 Newsletter

Larry Schmitz, CCP, CMC
AITP Region 5 President

To all Region 5 AITP members:

Well we survived the Winter and are now “officially” into Spring. And we have a lot of exciting things to tell you about in regard to AITP, and specifically Region 5.

• 2008 was a financially successful year for Region 5. We ended the year with profit of $1,649.
  
  
• We had two very successful conferences in 2008. The Spring Conference in Bettendorf, Iowa was hosted by the Illowa Chapter and drew 66 members and guests. The Fall Conference in Green Bay, Wisconsin was hosted by the Northeastern Wisconsin chapter and drew 163 members and guests. One very nice thing at both conferences was that we had a good number of student members also attending and participating in a Region event.
  
  
• The 2009 Spring Conference will be in Arlington Heights, Illinois on May 14-15 and will be hosted by the Windy City Chapter. This promises to be one of the biggest Region 5 AITP events in some time. Be sure to attend. For more information, go to the Region 5 Upcoming Events Page
  
  
• The recipients of the Region 5 NCC Grants this year were Eastern Illinois University, Michigan Technological University and Gateway Technical College-Racine Campus. Congratulations to those fine student chapters. We also had a number of other chapters, all deserving, that applied but the Region lacks the funds to honor all requests.
  
  
• The winner of the Region 5 Outstanding Student Chapter selected this year, based on their performance in 2008, was Central Michigan University. Congratulations!!
  
  
• John Gorski, Past President of the Blackhawk Technical College Student Chapter, has been selected to serve on the Association Student Leadership Council to represent Region 5. Congrats John!!
  
  
• I think it will be “official” by the time this newsletter goes out, so I am proud to announce that we have a new professional chapter starting up in our Region. That chapter is the East Central Indiana Chapter headquartered in Muncie, Indiana. Thanks to the hard work of Gary Kern, and others in the Muncie area, with some help from Mark Gilfand, your Region VP, they went from zero to over 25 members in a matter of weeks. Congrats ECI and welcome to Region 5 and AITP.
  
  
• We also have a number of new Student Chapters that are in the formation stage. They include the chapters being formed at UW_Stout in Menominee, WI and Rasmussen College in Green Bay, WI. ITT Technical College in Louisville, KY is also forming. They elected to be sponsored by the Nashville chapter in Region 7. Welcome to one and all!!
  
  
• Region 5 has also become a member of Culminis. This is an excellent program for all chapters, professional and student, to also join. The benefits are many and the cost of membership is ZERO. Check Information Executive for the article on how to go about joining. For one thing, your chapter can apply twice a year for up to $500 each time to be given those funds to help defray the cost of one of your AITP meetings or events.
  
  
• The Region officers, at our annual Planning Meeting, set new goal for Region 5 for 2009. These goals were subsequently approved by the Region 5 Board of Directors. I will be publishing these goals, which will be discussed at the Leadership Workshop that will be held in conjunction with the Spring Region 5 Conference in Arlington Heights, in a future news letter. But why wait. Come to Chicago and participate in the Leadership Workshop and give us your input on how to best implement and achieve these goals.
  
  
• Finally, the Fall Conference of Region 5 will be held in Wausau, WI on Sept 30 and Oct 1. Save those dates. More details to follow.

Until I hopefully see you all in Arlington Heights May 14, remember, we are the “Pacesetter Region” - let’s live up to our moniker in 2009.

Larry Schmitz, CCP, CMC
AITP Region 5 President