Charlie Nutt, NACADA Executive Director 

First, THANK YOU to all who attended our Annual Conference in Chicago! What a great conference! In addition to the outstanding sessions that many of you presented and attended, exciting new activities, like our Common Reading Discussion, Silent Auction, and Town Hall meeting, added great opportunities for networking, community building, and stronger connections to NACADA. I want to publicly thank everyone who made this year’s event such a success for the many hours of time and energy they spent both prior to and during the Conference. This includes special recognition of the efforts of Nancy Barnes, Rhonda Baker, and the entire Executive Office staff; the Chicago planning committee; and all the presenters and participants!

It was exciting to be a part of so many Annual Conference conversations and meetings focused on the future of NACADA. Our Board of Directors, Council, Divisions, and Executive Office staff were all engaged in exciting conversations about where NACADA must move within the next five, ten, and even twenty years. In addition to projecting a variety of professional development opportunities and publications for the future, the issue of expanding the Association’s use of technology to support member services, professional development, and networking opportunities for our members was high on everyone’s agenda of needs for the future.

With this in mind, I want to take this opportunity to outline for you the goals for enhanced use of technology by October 2009:

• online new and renewal membership processing;
• online member updates (change of address, institution, commission/interest group selection);
• online purchasing of NACADA publications, CDs, DVDs, and products;
• online registration for professional development events, including conferences, institutes, and webinars;
• interactive blogs and discussions;
• an enhanced conference proposal submission and evaluation system for both region and annual conferences; and
• password-protected access to membership directory.

In addition, we have goals for enhancing our leaders’ ability to access data to assist them in their roles, such as:

• access to member information for their region, commission, interest group, etc.;
• access to immediate Web updates; and
• increased on-line communication with regions, commissions, interest groups, etc.

I know this is just a beginning for the leaps that NACADA must make in the next few years in order to keep up with the advances in technology that are essential to be an association on the cutting edge! I look forward to your input into these ideas and others for the future. Please do not hesitate to contact me at any time if you have any questions or if you have additional ideas for the future.

Charlie Nutt, Executive Director
NACADA: The Global Community for Academic Advising
(785) 532-5717
cnutt@ksu.edu