Preparing for the upcoming school year during the summer can seem a little premature, but when you have a chapter as big ours, it’s never too early to start. Every year PRSSA National hosts a Leadership Rally in Scottsdale, Arizona for incoming Chapter Presidents and Student-Run Firm Directors. The Rally is hosted to help incoming Chapter Presidents, like myself, prepare for their upcoming term and school year. I was unaware of the amount of knowledge and information I would gain over two and a half short days.
Throughout my weekend in Arizona, I had the chance to listen to keynote speakers, other chapter presidents, and several national committee members. After each interaction, I couldn’t help but feel even more inspired and ready to take on the school year as Chapter President. Being at the conference with so many others who share the same and passion and drive, is not only inspiring but motivational as well. This is the inspiration and motivation I hope to bring and instill in Temple’s PRSSA chapter this coming school year.
One of my favorite parts of the Rally was being divided into groups according to chapter size. Temple’s chapter is a large chapter, so I sat down with other presidents who have memberships larger than 75 people. During this breakout session, we talked about different ways chapters are managed and the things they do for their members. It was interesting to hear about how chapters hundreds of miles apart can have similar strengths and weakness.
While it was great to hear from other large chapters about their successes and their struggles, I also spoke with chapter presidents who have much smaller chapters. Talking with these Chapter Presidents reminded me of some of the smaller things that may get overlooked when dealing with a larger group of people.
PRSSA is supposed to be all about the members. This weekend was about how I can make our chapter more about our members. I was given many tools and connections to use throughout the year to make this year a memorable one for our chapter and our members. I’m excited to see what this year has in store and what fun things we can create and accomplish as an organization. While I hope everyone is enjoying their summer by relaxing, learning lots of new things at their internships or both, I can’t wait to see you all in September! We have plenty of fresh and new ideas that we can’t wait to share!
This blog post was written by Chelsea Seidel, President.