TACA 2010 Achievements and New Year's Resolutions for 2011

The TACA Maryland/DC leadership team is back from our annual conference. We learned a lot while connecting with TACA chapter coordinators from around the country and came home ready for an exciting 2011. TACA's accomplishments for 2010, shared with all of us at the conference, are truly inspiring. 2010 included both challenges and accomplishments for our chapter; based on those, here are our resolutions for 2011:

• Continue to listen to and support our members. Our Yahoo group has grown to 180 members. We thank all of our regular contributors to the discussions there and encourage everyone to keep posting their questions. We want to keep hearing from you, both via the Yahoo group and via e-mail if needed.
• Maintain a presence at community events. Our chapter coordinators served as mentors at the ARI/DAN conference in April 2010. We also sponsored a leg of Dr. Bob Sears' book tour for The Autism Book and met with Baltimore-area broadcasters to educate them about concerns of families affected by autism and to inform them of chapter events.
• Meet regularly in the same place. In early 2010, we continued to struggle with locations and times for meetings. Free space in this area was hard to come by, but consistent meeting locations and times are now well established. We will have at least 10 meetings in Bethesda, MD, and at least 10 meetings in Severna Park, MD, this year. We will continue to host coffee talks to augment the support and education offered at the meetings. We appreciate everyone's patience and support while we were alternating between counties and locations. We cover a large geographic area that includes two states, the District, and many school systems. We would love to be in everyone's favorite location every month, but we're not superhuman. If a group of people from a particular area would like to schedule a coffee talk with one or more of the coordinators, please contact us, and we will do our best to arrange one.
• Recruit more parent mentors. TACA's parent mentoring program is another excellent (and free) source of support for families. If you have been on the autism journey for two years or longer, please consider sharing your expertise with others. There is payoff for mentors also -- Holly Bortfeld, the parent support coordinator, arranges excellent conference calls for mentors. Presenters have included Dr. Anju Usman and Dr. Dan Rossignol. There has been some discussion on the chapter Yahoo group about whether more monthly TACA meetings can be added. There are multiple factors that contribute to the foundation's decisions about adding new chapters (fundraising is a big one). It is worth noting that the first step toward becoming a TACA coordinator is becoming a mentor. More information and the mentor application are available at the TACA web site.
• Encourage our new members to apply for mentors. The one-on-one support and information can be invaluable. Information for mentees can also be found at the TACA web site.
• Keep the blog alive. We are hoping to revitalize the blog and expand it to include posts from our members. We will tap some of you to share your experiences with particular issues. If you have an idea for a blog entry, please share it! All contributions are submitted to Alison Hamilton for proofreading prior to posting. Please e-mail her with ideas for posts.

We are happy to offer support by e-mail. You can address questions or concerns directly to the four chapter coordinators. For Montgomery County/DC, contact Ali Hoffman (alison.hoffman@tacanow.org) or Katherine O'Brien (katherine.obrien@tacanow.org); for Baltimore/Annapolis, contact Alison Hamilton (alison.hamilton@tacanow.org) or Jill Zaukus (jill.zaukus@tacanow.org).

We are grateful for each of you and hope that 2011 will be a great year!