Membership!
It’s our members that make C.A.R. fun, exciting, and really worth being a member. Our members make life-long friendships within their local Societies, across the state at the annual State Conference and the summer and winter members’ meetings, and across the country and around the world at the annual National Conference, regional meetings, and other national-level events. I have seen this happen first-hand as my own daughter expanded her level of involvement over the years and made really great friends along the way with people she would never have met without her C.A.R. activities. I believe it is these strong friendships, along with the hard work that our seniors do delivering excellent programming and development year-in and year-out, that keeps our members coming back.
Our members learn a lot during their years in C.A.R. They learn the love of country, good citizenship, organizational skills, respect for others and for their seniors. C.A.R. is also where our youth develop the tradition and enjoyment of active membership in a genealogical and patriotic organization, that they will hopefully extend and continue as they get older and we help transition them into life-long memberships in our parent Societies of DAR, SAR, and SR.
And that completes the membership cycle.
Overwhelmingly our members are the children, grandchildren, nephews, and nieces of current DAR, SAR, and SR members, and we rely heavily upon our parent Societies to pass along their history and ancestry to their progeny by getting them involved in C.A.R. We also rely upon those active DAR, SAR, and SR members to be the senior leaders of our Societies.
This represents a truly symbiotic relationship between CAR, DAR, SAR, and SR. I ask our Societies to reach out and strengthen their relationship with the parent Society chapters in their area. Help the parent Societies see how important CAR is to our youth today and to their membership tomorrow. Help our CAR members experience and understand the common goals and heritage we share with those parent Societies. Our futures depend on it!
Feel free to reach out to me or any of our senior state officers if we can be of any help in improving our societal relationships. And don’t forget to look at the membership program headed by our state membership chairman Bethany Westbrook and senior membership chairman Janet Westbrook, found in the State Program Packet and Handbook. The membership program contest has lots of good ideas on how to get new members, and keep the active members you have today… and even offers some ideas you can you to make a local Society meeting more exciting!
I hope to see you all at the State Member Meeting on November 17 th in Denver, NC!
All the best
George Dolicker
Senior State President