The needs of the one...

Just got back from ASGA's National Student Government Summit in DC. It was the largest training conference we've ever produced, with 555 registrants from 101 institutions in 35 states. The entire ASGA staff and nearly all of our speakers participated. We think it was the best conference we've ever produced.

With this said, we did encounter a new situation there. One student told me that she was very uncomfortable being photographed. We always have a professional photographer and videographer capturing "moments" that we can then post at the conference web site. Potential future attendees then can learn what it's really like to come to the conference.

I personally don't think it's a "big deal" to be photographed, and initially thought this student was overreacting. "Just deal with it," I was thinking to myself.

But then I reconsidered. Maybe she had something happen in her past that caused her to feel this way about photos. ASGA and I certainly need to be considerate of all of our attendees' concerns and opinions. We need to be listening and trying to serve them better.

When an SGA registers for one of our conferences, they agree on the form that all photos and video taken are ASGA's property and may be used for promotional purposes. But individual students rarely see this form, as an advisor or one officer signs up for the entire group.

I don't want to make the registration process take longer and be more complex. But I'm thinking that in the future, we may allow students who don't want to have their photo taken to put a red "sticker" on their conference name tags. This would alert our photographers that these students are "off limits" for photos.

ASGA's conferences serve thousands of students and advisors each year. We've now produced nearly 60 conferences in the past five years. While we've never had a complaint before about photos, we are taking this one student's concerns seriously. And we may change and improve policy because of it.

ASGA does serve the "masses," but we're also conscious about the needs of the one.

800 members strong!

Today, ASGA reached and surpassed 800 member institutions. We now have 806.

This is an amazing number, as ASGA was only launched in March 2004. We're adding more new member institutions annually, and the number is growing each year (166 so far in 2008, 164 in 2007, 158 in 2006). I predict that we could have 1,200 members by 2011.

Most higher education professional associations hover around 1,200 member schools. This seems to be the "magic number." But I think the sky is the limit for ASGA. We could have 1,500 to 2,000 member institutions.

Why is this important? The more members ASGA has, the more accurate our databases will be, as our members help us keep information on new officers and advisors curent.

More members mean more attendees at our conferences. More training of SG officers means better student governments nationwide. More members and attendees at ASGA conferences also means more resources for ASGA to improve our services for members, conduct more research, and help more colleges and universities.

It's an exciting time at ASGA, as we continue to grow and improve every day.

ASGA keeps growing and growing...

In four years, ASGA has grown from an idea to by far the largest student leadership organization in the nation.

ASGA now has 774 member institutions, plus we store information in our searchable database on every Student Government in America. Our ASGA team adds new and updated information every day.

We now produce 10 Student Government training conferences, which frankly are the most helpful and practical in the nation. Our conferences always get better, as we bring in new speakers and new and more interactive workshops and roundtables.

ASGA is the only organization that I know of that gets visibly better ever day. We literally impove every day. We add more knowledge every day. We help solve our members' problems. Everything we do improves our resources and makes ASGA more valuable to all of our members who take avantage of our support.

There is no sign that ASGA is slowing down! We're averaging 170 new member schools each year (probably closer to 200 this year). Every one of our conferences this year has attracted more attendees than the previous year. We're doing more consulting, helping members improve their constitutions and train their members.

It's an exciting time for ASGA and our members. We love serving Student Governments and helping students and administrators!

Always improving, always growing

In my 25 years in student leadership, I've never encountered an SG organization that literally gets better by the minute. ASGA does.

We literally are growing and improving our resources every minute of every day during the work week. Our data team is gathering more information, we're conducting more research, adding new members, producing new conferences, and much more.

It's exciting to be part of something that is truly changing the face of student governments across America!

Advisors training

Just got back from ASGA's Advisors conference in Miami. We had more attendees for the third year in a row. It was a good time to get to know some new, green advisors and also reconnect with other allies we've worked with for several years. I enjoyed having dinners two nights with our speakers, Chris, Vicky, and Suzette. They're super-smart people and share the vision of ASGA: improving student governments and in the long-run, improving our nation's government.

It was a long drive down and back (five hours each way), but I got home about 11:30 p.m. on Saturday night and was able to spend the day with my wife and children.

All in all, it was a great conference and ASGA continued to improve and grow and serve our members better. We learn from every one of the conferences we produce.