“Learning to Live in a Technical World”

November has been a great month for PA-TSA. The State Officer team has been hard at work—not only planning the 2012 TSA State Conference, but also focusing on various initiatives that have the potential to truly progress this organization as a leader in the field of technology education. The officer team first met for our yearly "Cabin" meeting and then two weeks later, joined the PA-TSA Board of Directors and Tech. Ed. instructors from across the state for the annual TEEAP conference. The officer team also meets, as needed, for online web conferences. We had one such web conference in November, specifically focusing on finalizing events happening at the state conference. The following include initiatives that were officially discussed at our meetings:

• The Conference Planning Committee, led by Sergeant-at-Arms Matt Basile and also including Kelsey Johnson and Liza Atillasoy, have been finalizing a document detailing the planning intricacies of the events at the state conference. This new process allows the officer team to multi-task more effectively and focus on the many other initiatives which it is working on. This includes some very interesting special interest sessions that are being planned by all of the officers.
• The Membership Committee has recruited a strong group of about ten students to focus on contacting and maintaining contact with new chapters throughout Pennsylvania. Dhruv Pillai, your Vice President and the committee's leader, has taken on great initiative in organizing the projects of the committee, which also included establishing connections with advisors at the recent TEEAP conference. The committee is newly advised by Mr. Dennis Gold, who graciously lends the committee his experience and time.
• The Green Committee, led by Kristi Barr, has restructured the timeline for its national Electronic Submission Project for High School. The PA-TSA Green Committee and its former leader, Josh Hoffman, have been instrumental in initiating electronic event submission throughout the PA-TSA organization. The committee continues to be led by Mr. Chris Weaver, Welsh Valley Middle School advisor, who also dedicates valuable time to the initiative.
• The Media Outreach Project, run by Ben Hewitt (PA-TSA Reporter) has progressed meaningfully. The project now boasts a list of media outlets across the state and is working on organizing these by region. The process to contact media outlets will be setup by the time the state conference is held in 2012, which will bring PA-TSA great publicity.
• Sabrina Sayoc, your PA-TSA Secretary, has likewise taken a role of engagement with a project to revamp the current alumni association of PA-TSA. Her plan includes communication with the association to try to collaboratively suggest modification of certain statutes in the Alumni bylaws in order to make it a more comprehensive organization.
• In an attempt to bolster our organization's effective communication, Liza Atillasoy is working on a proposed system which would allow state officers to communicate directly with chapter Presidents. She is also continuing her former initiative of collecting membership referendums via patsa.org polls.

These are just samples of what we're doing—I am privileged to work with this team, which is not only initiative-driven, but also very passionate in their efforts to propel PA-TSA to the forefront of national delegations. Like I said in July, I truly believe that 2012 will be PA-TSA's best year yet, and that you, the PA-TSA member, has a lot to look forward to.