WA ACDA History (continued)
these pages written by Leora Schwitters
2007-2008
 By mid-2007, the officers and R&S Chair for WA ACDA were: Past-President: Linda Hamilton, President: Leora Schwitters, President-Elect: Marc Hafso, Treasurer: Georgina Philippson, Secretary and Newsletter Editor: Josh Viles, R & S Chairs: Kristina Ploeger (Children’s), Dawn McCormick (MS/JH), Joel Ulrich (HS), Justin Wisness (Multicultural), Barbara Irish (Men’s), John Weiss (College/University), Ron Bayer (Two Year College), Giselle Wyers (Student Activities), Tom Almli (Jazz), Ron Mallory (Worship), Karen Thomas/Robert Bode (Community), and Tim Fitzpatrick (Women’s).
When the Fall 2007 Board Meeting at Issaquah High School came to an end that early Saturday afternoon in September, a general frustration emerged in that the usual four hour meeting was not sufficient to do all that the board wanted to do, and that it might be better to meet for a full eight hours at a time in the future. since members travel from all ends of the state. As the group adjourned, the possibility of having a board retreat so that the group could really get past the nuts and bolts of planning and administrating the Summer Institute and actually do some visioning about other projects was mentioned.
Throughout the 2007-2008 year, Treasurer Georgina Philippson took over the books, and with Past-President Linda Hamilton’s strong support, managed to get our records into a Quickbooks format and finally reconcile everything to the satisfaction of the national ACDA Accountant, Mark Smith.
Summer Institute 2008 Program Chair Marc Hafso’s efforts resulted in a new record for attendance with 216 attendees enjoying the humor and expertise of headliner, Dr. Tim Seelig for the three day event, held as usual at UPS in July. (Summer Institute 2008 Summary)
J.W. Pepper again supplied the music packets with Pat Howland and Kathy Rasmussen in charge. Pepper’s co-sponsorship is valued immensely as they supply thousands of dollars worth of free music for the reading sessions while WA-ACDA began this year to pick up more of the print costs for music that is not in their catalog. The books, CD’s and other materials available for perusal and purchase by J.W. Pepper and staff add an important component to the success of the conference.
WA and NW ACDA presenters for SI 08 included Dr. Sandra Glover discussing the vocal mechanism, and Megan Oberfield shared Kodály methods for older singers in rehearsals. Reading sessions were led by Bernard Crouse, Judy Filibeck, Vicky Thomas, Gary Cannon, Julia Meyering, Brian Hoskins, Solveig Holmquist, Richard Nance, Frank DeMiero, Kenny Kraintz, Dave Cazier, Darla Pumphrey, Kurt McKee, Stacy Winn Jenny Price, Susan Windham, Ron Bayer, John Weiss, Bayard Dubois for Barbara Irish, and Josh Viles.
Ron Mallory resurrected the Wednesday Vespers service after the salmon dinner on the lawn. Tim Fitzpatrick and Anni Stankovic were the accompanists, and DJ Records made hundreds of CD’s available for purchase.
Karen Fulmer was presented with the Leadership and Service Award by her high school director, Howard Meharg.
President Leora Schwitters instituted the first WA ACDA Board Retreat, which extended the UPS experience at the Summer Institute from Friday afternoon, overnight in the dorm, and through Saturday noon. Since everyone was already there, no travel reimbursements were necessary, and the retreat was deemed so successful, fiscally and otherwise, that the board agreed it should become an annual event.
Friday afternoon was spent debriefing the conference, basking in its success, and planning for next summer’s event.
The incredible myriad of a year’s worth of tasks for the program chair was laid out in detail to the astonishment of the rest of the board.
The board took immediate steps to identify sub tasks that could be farmed out to other board members for following years, and make the Program Chair position more manageable in the future. A Summer Institute Manual began to be assembled describing these tasks in detail.
The following morning was mostly a visioning session, with President-Elect Marc Hafso reporting on the ACDA officer training retreat in Oklahoma City and his very positive feelings about the new Executive Director, Tim Sharp. Marc shared some of Sharp’s many visionary ideas, which touched off much excitem ent among the board as they brainstormed ways ACD A could better serve Washington State.
Sue Green and Russell Seaton were tasked with exploring ideas on offering a fall or winter workshop on the Eastside and on the Westside.
Discussions included exploring methods to liaise with WMEA in ways that would benefit our members and their students, perhaps in how contests are structured and administered, among other things. |
2008-2009
President: Leora Schwitters, President-Elect: Marc Hafso, Vice President: Linda Hamilton, Webmaster: Howard Meharg, Secretary/Unison Editor: Josh Viles, Treasurer: Leora Schwitters, Eastern Liaison: Russell Seaton, Western Liaison: Sue Green, R & S Chairs: Kristina Ploeger (College/University), Joel Ulrich (HS), Giselle Wyers (Student Activities), Josh Viles (Men’s), Justin Wisness (Multicultural), Ron Bayer  (Two Year Colleges), Robert Bode (Community), Tim Fitzpatrick (Women’s), Ron Mallory (Worship), Dawn McCormick (MS/JH), Jenny Price (Children’s)
A full day September board meeting gave the board a chance to make sure preparations for SI 09 were well underway, and also allowed for expansion of several ideas generated at the retreat in July.
Don Clausen, WMEA President, was invited as a guest, and the first communications began regarding ACDA’s collective concerns regarding regional and state festivals and contests.
Concerns that were discussed included standards in these areas: adjudication forms, literature lists, adjudicator certification, and sight reading components. Ron Bayer was appointed as a liaison between WMEA and WA ACDA, and was invited to a collaborative meeting for the following January to further this discussion.
National ACDA has given WA ACDA the task of adding 57 new active members and 14 new student members to their rolls by June 2009. Ideas were explored as to how this could come about, including contacting personally all members who had slipped off the roll over the past few years. Online renewals, eventually with monthly payments through the new national website and exciting members-only benefits there will help. This task will be daunting, given the recent collapse of the economy.
Giselle Wyers volunteered to set up a WA ACDA Facebook page, and the board discussed the possibility of each R & S Chair having their own page on the WA ACDA website as a resource.
A committee of past presidents secured two outstanding candidates for President-Elect: Lori Wiest and Russell Seaton.
The spring board meeting included guest, new President-Elect Lori Wiest. The “How to” manual for planning Summer Institutes has begun to flesh out, and the board’s goal of taking on more duties previously owned by the program chair are panning out well.
Several board positions will open up for 2009-2011. Replacements were nominated, and were subsequently contacted and asked to submit applications. A committee with current officers and past presidents was assigned to evaluate and select replacements and invite them to attend the board retreat in July.
Ron Bayer reported some progress on the WMEA Liaison front. Another collaborative meeting was scheduled for August.
Sue Green reported little improvement on growing the membership despite much effort, but noted optimistically that given the economic situation, job losses, etc., WA ACDA is not losing members, but holding steady.
Joel Ulrich will pursue an “Ambassador” program to schools, churches and community choirs who wish for help. Funds were allocated for this purpose.
Before adjourning, the board gave permission to Leora Schwitters to begin working on a program to allow for annual recognition of more of the membership, i.e., “Outstanding Young Choral Director”, “Outstanding Choral Director” Awards such as other states offer.
Summer Institute 2009
President and Program Chair, Marc Hafso, again hosted a successful conference, themed “Sing Out Your Stories…… A tale rises from the heart and the mind to be sung” with another record attendance of 229.
Summer Institute 2009 brochure...>
Headliners Tom Carter and Charlene Archibeque gave attendees many practical and inspirational ideas. Phillip Copeland of Choral Net and chair of the National ACDA Technology Committee, added a bonus session on using technology which had been presented at the national ACDA Conference in Oklahoma City earlier in the year. It was well received by those in attendance.
Leslie Guelker-Cone received the Leadership and Service Award, presented by her WWU colleague, Tim Fitzpatrick.
Other information, including a list of state presenters can be found on this page.
   
New board members were introduced: Brian Mitchell, (HS R & S), Julie Whalen (MS/JH R & S) and David Anderson (College & University R & S).
Barbara Tappa was announced as the new Eastern Liaison as Russell Seaton rotates off from that position.
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