It is a new year – I hope everyone had a nice holiday season and that your 2025 is off to a great start!
Reflecting back on my first year as President, I am proud of everything that the Board, our Chapters and our Members accomplished last year. In 2024, we launched our first official Mentorship program with our 80 applicants – which was one of my goals as President-Elect in 2023. We added two new chapters – Central Florida and Edmonton, Canada which allowed us to expand our international footprint.
We threw two well-attended, industry conference parties; one at LEDucation and one at ArchLIGHT Summit. The WILD International Board put together a sponsorship program for each chapter to do their own fundraising, which I have already seen some rolling in! Please continue to support your local chapter – and don’t forget that WILD International will do our own call for Sponsorship next month. Our Chapter’s hosted dozens of events from self-defense to yoga, we had educational seminars on work-life balance to menopause in workplace and more. Some chapters donated to various charities including Habit for Humanity and Paddle for Cure, we also had some student outreach which is extremely important for the industry as whole! Moving into my second, and final, year as President I am proud of what WILD accomplished last year and look forward of what is to come.
This year we are welcoming four new board members; I hope to finalize and finetune our internal processes so we can focus on bigger picture goals such as raising women’s voices, increasing women in leadership and equality. I’ve been in the lighting industry for nearly fifteen years and still to this day, I have customers who still want to hear a technical answer from a male engineer or give credit to a male colleague. Women, we have come a long way, but we have a ways to go – don’t be afraid to speak up for yourself. Embrace and use the wonderful community you have here with our organization. This year remember to be confident, be kind and be supportive – and of course, stay WILD.
Your President, Alessa
