PLSO The Oregon Surveyor May/June 2021

4 The Oregon Surveyor | Vol. 44, No. 3 Active Participation in the Organization From the PLSO Office Aimee McAuliffe PLSO Exec. Secretary Active participation makes it all happen, and creates the value of a professional organization. You can’t just join and expect everything to happen. You must show up. Go to chapter meetings, join committees, read the eNews, and send in your input. We get it if there are some days that you just can’t make it happen. But on the days you can, the value you bring is immeasurable. A s PLSO works to provide value and live up to our members’ ex- pectations, it can often feel like our members are moving ahead, as we wrestle with not falling behind. Reading the results of a recent survey PLSO put out regarding a vision statement, I was disheartened by a response comment- ing that PLSO is only good for continuing education credits and will most likely be gone in 10 years. (Surprise! We read the surveys.) First, licensed land surveyors need continuing education credits. Are there different ways to get them? Sure. But isn’t it nice to be able to count on getting what you need for recertifica - tion in one place at the same time every year? Second, other than wondering if the survey responder had a bad day, I questioned what they weren’t doing that others, who get a lot out of PLSO, are. Put simply in two words, the answer is active participation. Before I get too high up onmy pulpit, I will confess that I’ve been that person more than once. I’ve joined a group, sat back on the edge of the room, quietly non- participating and then wondering why I went in the first place. I didn’t meet any - one. I didn’t contribute anything and therefore felt that I made no impact. No- body really spoke to me. I got nothing out of it. Amazingly, those groups are still around, despite my lack of participation. But what if everyone was like that? What if every single surveyor decided they didn’t want to be part of making a place for the Oregon professional community to get to know one another (competition or not), work together towards common inter- ests or help younger surveyors get a leg up in the profession? Active participation makes all that happen and creates the value of a professional organization. You can’t just join and expect everything to happen. You must show up. Go to chap- ter meetings, join committees, read the eNews and send in your input. We get it if there are some days that you just can’t make it happen. But on the days you can, the value you bring is immeasurable. As we all ruminate on active participation (preferably with your beverage of choice), this is also the time to remind you that membership renewals have begun. Our membership year runs July 1–June 30 each year. If you joined for the first time before April 15 online, then your mem- bership was prorated to end June 30. If you joined after April 15, it rolls through the following year. Again, this is for first time new members only. Everyone else —if you renewed in January for the con- ference, you need to renew before July 1 to remain active. Instead of waiting until January again, why not be a member for the full year? Dues have remained the same as last year. Ways to save money through mem- bership include: • NSPS Membership–$175 Savings: • PLSO Member: $50 • Non-member: $225