Happy Friday! We wanted to send you a quick update on the 2021 work following the brainstorming sessions.  

First, THANK YOU to all of you who participated in the sessions. We learned a lot, and we look forward to continuing this work with you. We shared out THE NOTES and a SURVEY, and we used these to inform meetings this week. 

In short, 2021 will be heavily focused on strengthening our movement on the ground and creating a more connected network. We will put our resources into grassroots efforts and help support the work you are doing in your communities. Some other things we are thinking about based on what we've heard:

• Creating a model for true youth leadership including: more youth representation, prioritizing youth making decisions, and creating better feedback loops.
• Improving communication across the org.
• Finding more ways for young people to collaborate.
• Creating accessible opportunities for professional development.

NEXT STEPS:

• 2nd Survey: Post-election, we'll send around another survey that will be a little more specific to campaigns, policy efforts, etc. so that you all can weigh in.
• Regional Planning: We recognize that what is effective or important for chapters varies. Post-election, we will hold regional planning sessions so that chapters in our 7 regions can work to plan for the things that will be effective in individual areas. Schedule to come post-election!
• 1st Draft of Plan: Following the above actions, we will write a first draft of the 2021 plan and share it out for feedback. 

We also heard that people want to have more of a say in how MFOL spends money for programs. So, we plan to share a breakdown of where we think we will spend money on activities next year. We just need a little time to build it out since the budget corresponds directly to our strategic plans! Also, please know that these numbers will be estimated since how much we have to spend depends on how much money we can raise! 

If you have any questions/comments/concerns, please feel free to reach out, either to me directly or through any other staff member.

Good luck in these last few days! 
Alexis Confer
Executive Director