Empowering DeMolay Advisors for Chapter Success

Taking your chapter to the next level Eric R. Evarts, PSMC

Who am I - DeMolay? 20 years of DeMolay experience Past Master Councilor of Marcus Holcomb Chapter Past State Master Councilor of Connecticut DeMolay, 2001-2002 Chevalier Active Legion of Honor 5 years as an advisor in Pennsylvania 5 years as an advisor in Colorado Have served as Chapter Dad and Chapter Chairman Now living in Albany, NY

Who am I Professional? Ph.D. in Physics from Carnegie Mellon University Worked 5 years at the National Institute of Standards and Technology Now at IBM in Albany, NY as the testing lead on a new program Specialty is really tiny magnets Experimentation, data collection, and analysis applied to DeMolay

What is our #1 goal as advisors? Provide a safe environment for our young men to _________ fail and learn

What is chapter success? Membership? Training young men? Running a solid program? Upholding the precepts?

Raising the bar Where is your chapter today? Where do you want your chapter to be? How can we facilitate that journey? What is the role of the Advisor in the journey?

Communication with member and advisors How do you communicate: Inside the chapter room Outside the chapter room Between events How frequently do you communicate? What do you communicate about?

Break Out Report back top 2 answers per group 1,4:How do you raise the bar for your chapter? 2,5:How do you communicate with your chapter? 3,6:How do you communicate with your fellow advisors? All: Questions you never expected from a DeMolay

Raising the Bar Never let the chapter reach the bar When they get close to the bar, simply raise it without telling the members

What should we expect from a chapter? Open and close a chapter from memory Plan the agenda for the meeting Organize their own events Set up a budget for an event/term Communicate with each other Clean up after themselves

Communication with Members Find the way your members communicate with each other JOIN it Keep talking between the events

Communication with Advisors Not always the same methods as communicating with the members

What do you, an advisor, do in the chapter room? Why are we here? To support the young men Things NOT to do: Talk more than once in a meeting Set the meeting agenda Take over the meeting Have side conversations Things to do: Only speak when called upon Make sure the MC has the agenda items before the meeting Allow the Chapter Advisor to be the only advisor to speak unless given a direct question

Questions you never expected