Past Annual Meetings
By Aimee Greeter
As we prepare for next week’s 2024 WIF Annual Meeting and eagerly anticipate some of its new features and activities, we are also looking back at prior years’ Annual Meetings with fondness. See below for memories shared by our WIF members of their favorite moments from recent and more distant past Annual Meetings.
Toni Freeman: I remember our very first Annual Meeting and the newness of our effort coming to fruition, where we were able to award our first grant. It was with several months of planning, learning about our community, and being better informed about what needs existed. It was so exciting to see a group of women come together and realize the impact we could make! Twenty years ago, we didn’t have the staff, systems, and confidence we have today – we just had the will. But we made it happen!
Arrington Mixon: I have fond memories of our 2019 Annual Meeting when I turned the Board chair gavel over to Lisa Miller. The Annual Meeting was held at UNC Charlotte, which had just experienced a shooting tragedy on April 30th (and here we are again five years later….). We announced our first Spark grant that year, we refreshed our values based on member and community feedback, and we commenced our search for our first full-time Executive Director – which ended with the successful hiring of Patricia. It was a privilege to serve this impactful organization!
Lisa Miller: I leave all our annual meetings buoyed by a sense of deep gratitude for the impact of our collective giving. And I absolutely loved the women’s power moment when the Planned Parenthood grant was announced at last year’s meeting and the auditorium erupted in cheers!
Carolyn Meade: Going on 10 years ago, I met a young, enthusiastic woman from my hometown of Greensboro, NC at the Annual Meeting. Fun fact: that same lovely woman, Katie Susong, is now our incoming Board chair! This experience is just one of many highlights that seem to happen at each Annual Meeting – so many conversations exchanged, connections made, and new friendships created!
Ellen Rankin: My favorite annual meeting moment was from 2022, when we were finally able to gather in person after a zoom meeting in 2020 and one live streamed from a television studio in 2021. My opening remarks focused on the transformational journey that WIF had undertaken those few years, and our movement towards unrestricted funding and trust-based philanthropy principles. It was a proud moment reflecting on how much we had learned and grown during that time. WIF is a dynamic and thriving community, and I love the way that our annual meetings always reflect this, and most especially how we focus most on celebrating and lifting up our nonprofit partners.
Mary Gallivan: I love that the Annual Meeting celebrates the amazing dedication of our committee members and the extraordinary work of our local nonprofits. While we may not see each other often throughout the year, the Annual Meeting is the perfect place for members to connect and reconnect. It feels like just yesterday that we were commemorating the 10th Anniversary, and now we are celebrating the remarkable 20th Anniversary milestone.
