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ZzZzz…… Oh wow! Where has time gone? I fell asleep for a second and now half the year is gone. This school year is flying by so fast! I know that all of the chapters are working hard on reaching their Gimme 5 goal! Hopefully this article helps you in your membership recruitment efforts.
To my knowledge, two chapters have started My Space accounts for their members to communicate with each other– Belleville High School and Romulus High School. I encourage all chapters to promote their chapters through the Internet. It does not have to be My Space, it can be Facebook or a chapter web page. Be creative and go “wild” with networking ideas!
There is always the traditional way of promoting your chapter by making festive posters and hanging them up around your school. You can also make flyers with information about your chapter on them. If you want to get fancy you can make pamphlets up on the computer and hand those out…there is even a sample on Michigan FCCLA’s website at www.mifccla.org - just click on the “Gimme Five” logo, and you’ll find a lot of membership resources, even a sample PowerPoint!
Do you know the Muffin Man? Wait no that’s not right. Do you know about FCCLA? Now that sounds better! The best way to recruit members is to go out there and talk to the students. Just like in the Muffin Man Game that many of you participated in at the Fall Leadership Workshops, go up to as many people as you can who don’t know about FCCLA and fill them in so they can go and tell other people about it. There is one other difference between the Muffin Man Game and this strategy; it’s probably not a good idea to jump up and down while telling them about FCCLA, that may just scare them away. When they are a paid member then you can jump up and down all you want to!
Another way for you to gain new members is to invite people to just sit in at your meetings. This will allow them to see how your chapter is run. Make sure while you have a guest that you try to make the meeting run as smoothly as possible. Make it a point to learn the potential member’s name. During the meeting try to ask them for ideas or their opinion to show them they already have a voice without even joining FCCLA yet. Also ask them after the meeting how they liked it and if they are still interested in joining your chapter. No matter what their response is, thank them for taking the time to come to the meeting.
When talking to potential members make sure you let them know all about the positive things that your chapter does. Share personal experiences with them. Tell them how FCCLA has affected you personally. When talking to administrators let them know that a good FCCLA chapter brings great publicity for your school, a little positive PR for the school always makes administrators, and your community, happy.
In the end, be “wild” and have fun while recruiting members! If you need any help or ideas feel free to email me at Lil_sammie15@yahoo.com. State officers are also able to come to your school to help motivate members and work with you on getting projects together for the State Leadership Meeting, so let us know if you’re interested.
Check out your chapter's current membership and Gimme Five Goal here!
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