May is the month of graduations!  I’m sure most of us have at least one graduation on our schedule this month!  We are fortunate to have two high school graduates this year, a nephew in Illinois and a great niece in Kentucky!  The 2013 Leadership Learning Community held their final community call on Friday and ended their conference call sessions on the topic of “Annoying Conversations & Conversations of Curiosity.”  Community members revisited values they had defined in an earlier session and discussed what they looked like in action, particularly during conversations.  The 2013 Leadership Learning Community will have a final face-to-face meeting on Friday, June 20^th in St. Louis, kind of like a graduation for this group of network leaders!   If you are interested in joining a future Leadership Learning Community, please let me know. 

In addition to the upcoming Annual Educational Conference – “Your Gateway to Innovation, Leadership, and Collaboration” we are busy completing some other NCHN projects.  First of all, if you haven’t registered for the conference and made your hotel reservations, please do so today – our deadline for the conference rate at the hotel of $109/night ends on May 26.  This year’s conference will prove to be one of the best!  We are looking forward to meeting with approximately 100 health network leaders and networks supporters from across the nation!  As of today we have registrants from over 50% of the states!  The Conference Planning Committee is including lots of fun networking activities, so be prepared to meet and get to know your peers from across the country.

Other activities that we are finishing up this month includes the 2014 NCHN Network Leader Salary and Benefit Survey.  We conduct this survey every two years and it is the only one of its kind that deals exclusively with network leaders.  Thanks so much to the 80% of the membership that has completed it to date.  Come on, we need the other 20% to participate.  You should have received an email this week with the final deadline date and link!  If you have questions about whether or not you need to complete it, please contact Christy.

And lastly, each year at the Conference, we recognize network leaders and network organizations.  The 6^th Annual NCHN Awards Luncheon will be held on Wednesday, June 18 in St. Louis.  Recognition by one’s peers is one of the greatest compliments a person can receive during their professional career.  I encourage you to review the NCHN Awards Program and nominate a deserving peer today!  Deadline is Thursday, May 29. 

I will close with some Missouri Facts & Trivia:

• Missouri is known as the “Show Me State” – there will be a lot of showing of the great work networks are doing in June!
• The first successful parachute jump to be made from a moving airplane was made by Captain Berry at St. Louis, in 1912.  One hundred and two years later – network leaders will be making all kinds of leaps in moving their networks forward!
• Missouri ties with Tennessee as the most neighborly state in the union, bordered by 8 states.  I took a look, and we have conference registrants from 7 of those adjoining state!
• The state animal is the Mule.  I think at some point in time, network leaders are seen as being stubborn as a mule!  Don’t we have to be to get things done? 
• State insect: the honey bee (designated July 3, 1985).  We are going to have a buzzing good time!  So, see you in St. Louis!