Organization Update – 4/19/19

Hello Competent Women!

Thanks for checking in! My apologies for being MIA – first I was in Florida at the ASAM conference, and then I got sick – again, ugh (I think I might be allergic to spring in PA). It’s late and I’ve been working on financials all day so I don’t have a lot of time, but I didn’t want to let you down 3 weeks in a row! So here is the whirlwind tour of what’s up at WFS:

ASAM Annual Conference

I had a great weekend with our Volunteer Coordinator Lisa – that’s her stuffing packets in our booth! (Sorry for the blur – I am terrible at taking pictures.) She picked things up so quickly and we were unstoppable telling all the addiction medicine specialists about our great program. They were very excited to hear about our free option for their patients and our extensive online support.

We also stood out for being abstinence-based but also medication-friendly. That’s right: for those of you who aren’t aware, WFS is somewhat unique in this way. We believe that addiction is tough enough to overcome, and if women and their doctors’ think medication will help, then by all means it should be used.

We gave away all 47 of the physician Professional Sample Kits that we brought, and got a mailing list of 25 more to send out.

WFS Annual Weekend Conference

For our own annual conference, Early Bird Registration closed strong with 89 registrants – that’s up 15% from last year’s Early Bird period. The number today is up to 102 – wow!

Those of you on our postal mailing list may have noticed on this year’s conference flyer that we mentioned that WFS is on the move. This year will be our last year at the beloved DeSales University. Now don’t worry, because we have a great place picked out for 2020. Keep an eye on your inbox for the big announcement!

I’m also very proud to report that we were able to offer a work scholarship to every woman that applied this year. That’s right, we’re bringing 14 women to conference who might not otherwise be able to attend. It helps them, it helps me because I have more hands on deck, and it helps everyone in WFS because we are stronger together!

Teddy Bear Challenge

We received our first 2 bears in the mail today! They will be lovingly stored until conference, when a drawing of all our Teddy Bear Challenge donors’ names will be completed and the bears re-homed. The latest totals are 52 donors and $6,530 donated – that’s almost as much as we raised in all of last year’s challenge, and we still have over a month left!

New Literature Coming

One of our office volunteers has been hard at work getting our new Men’s Collection formatted for printing. Thanks to the hard work of one of our Men for Sobriety groups at Above and Beyond Family Recovery Center in Chicago, IL, four of our seminal pieces have been adapted for men. These include the Program Booklet, the Beginner’s Booklet, the New Life Diary, and the Levels of Recovery. These great guys have truly gone above and beyond in this task. They didn’t just change the pronouns; they also provided some male-specific examples to make the material even more relevant. Let’s hear it for the boys!

Next up is our Reflections for Growth daily reader series. Part of our strategic plan is to outsource our production and fulfillment services. To accomplish this, we need to combine some of our smaller booklets into bigger pieces. Members of the Materials & Literature Management Team have been hard at work reviewing the daily reflection booklets and adding a Statement for each day. The edits are in, and now our trusty volunteer is formatting away. We can’t wait to premiere this updated work at this year’s conference!

 

Alright, folks, that’s it for me today. Please let me know what you think of these exciting changes and feel free to share your ideas on how we can bring the WFS to even more women! (And a few good men, too!)

Enthusiastically Yours!
Adrienne Miller
President/CEO
Women for Sobriety, Inc.