Tennessee State Affiliate Report
Summer Board Meeting
July 2016
New Name: TACEE (Tennessee Association for Children’s Early Education), old name TAEYC
Status: Non-dual and Dual (as explained below)
Report Prepared: June 30, 2016 by Cathy Waggoner
1. What is your current position as it relates to the Early Childhood arena? Currently NAEYC continues to consider Tennessee a Dual Affiliate, as we are doing business as TAEYC and TACEE, but as of July 2016, individuals will be able to join TACEE and not join NAEYC. Some members will continue to be members of NAEYC, SECA, TAEYC, and a local affiliate or chapter, but some will be SECA, TACEE and at some point a local Region.
2. Has your affiliate signed the new charter agreement with SECA?
· If so, state the date. On March 29, 2016
· If not, where is your affiliate in the process?
· State concerns, issues. Transition is rolling along fairly smooth at this point.
3. Financial status of your state affiliate
· Balance in checking account. Healthy
· Balance in savings account. Healthy
· CDs/Investments. Adequate
· What are your state affiliate’s revenue streams? Membership, conference, corporate, and donations
4. Number of current members: As of June 28, 2016, we dropped to 1476.
5. Date and number of last reported number of members: In 2008, we had over 2400 members, but in 2014 our numbers dropped to 1867, June 2015, membership was 1744, and now in 2016, it is 1476. In 8 years, we have dropped almost a thousand members. Many people say they are waiting to see what is going to happen before they join NAEYC again. We believe these people will start joining SECA after the July 2016 start date, because it is cheaper and has less drama involved.
6. As SECA Rep for your sate affiliate, your communication with membership
· Visits to local chapters/affiliates - one
· Emails - some
· Newsletter - none
· Blogs – none
7. Describe your state and local affiliates efforts to:
· Increase membership – We have approved new categories for membership with a Student Membership costing $30 for SECA (formerly $80 for NAEYC). We are also going to market the Center Transferable Membership at $49/membership (formerly $82 and non-transferrable); many site directors are interested in this option. We are also talking to Home Visitors and anticipate interest there.
· Retain membership – We designed and mailed a postcard to notify members of a change in affiliation. We plan to follow up with an additional postcard in August to announce the new structure of membership and contest for new logo.
· Describe the success of such efforts – Time will tell.
8. Describe the challenges/concerns your affiliate is currently facing. Communicating the complicated timeline NAEYC has designed is our biggest challenge. We will continue our affiliation with them until September 2017 or later if they change the date again. Even members who have been in all of the discussions up to this point are confused about how they should approach their membership purchase. Several local affiliates have considered not being affiliated with any association and just having a club, charging dues, and operating as unaffiliated local entities.
9. Describe how SECA can support and assist your state affiliate and membership in their endeavors to improve the lives of the young children in your state. SECA already has the substance to make a membership valuable to professionals in the South. At this point, Tennessee is dependent on SECA to manage the membership options we are marketing to our members and non-members. The non-members group is where we believe we will see a significant increase in enrollment. Non-members are not in the middle of trying to understand the issues with NAEYC and are, therefore, excited to see a membership package that is lower in cost than NAEYC. We believe the Center Transferable membership is going to draw in large numbers of members from the people actually providing services in the classrooms. This fall we will be encouraging Student memberships which are now going to be much more affordable. Our SECA technology is going to be key in making this work successfully and that will require SECA staff be given adequate tools and personnel to be successful.