Message from your Board President, Rachelle Lee

I’m writing this in Week 5 of life in the COVID-19 pandemic breakout in North America.  It seems like a longer time has passed, but that’s just a reflection of how much change has occurred in these past few weeks.  Week 1 was shock and chaos as things were being cancelled, shut down, or abandoned.  Week 2 was organizing at home, jockeying for space, and wondering how to keep kids engaged in learning and non-screen activities.  Week 3 felt like everyone was settling into a “new normal”.  Week 4 was about maintaining routine and finding ways to not get stuck at a desk if you were working from home.  Week 5….enough already! We’re sick of zoom meetings, missing friends, pining for trips, and generally wanting to get out and spread our wings.  

All this makes us even more excited at the prospect of going to camp this summer. If only we could promise it will be so.  We’ve received calls and queries from our community about whether camp will be going ahead. As you’ve been seeing on the news, there’s still a lot of uncertainty and new science being discovered about the virus and its evolution.  As a result, the Executive Committee of your Eliot Board has decided that until the end of May, we will not make any definitive decisions about whether we will run in-person camps or not.  We will follow health official recommendations closely and take action before the end of May if required. In the meantime, your Board will focus on the many other initiatives we have been undertaking, like strategic planning! More on that later…

Whether in-person or not, Eliot will have some form of program to enrich your life during the summer. The one change that has already been made is the program for July Eliot.  The speakers, Meg and Aisha, feel that people will need something more restful and healing after this spring’s COVID lockdown, and engaging in deep and painful honest reflection about Equity and Inclusion would be a better program offering in another year.  Since speakers have already been booked for 2021, Meg and Aisha will deliver their program in July 2022. July Elioteers were notified in late March about this decision. Thank you to the Program Committee for their swift action to secure Will Hornyak to bring a program to July called “Lifting up the Sky: Myths, Poems, Songs, and Rituals of Healing and Renewal.”

Now, back to strategic planning….

I’m really excited to share with you that during the annual Board planning retreat at Seabeck this past January, and at the spring Board meeting just held, the Eliot board developed the following 10-Year Vision and Five-year Goals:

Despite the pandemic, there are exciting times ahead.  We look forward to sharing more about the strategic plan throughout this year, and working with our community and Seabeck to achieve our goals.

It’s wonderful we have this community and we’re all still finding ways to stay connected. I’ve heard of our campers enjoying happy hour on Zoom, hosting virtual game nights, watching a movie together on Netflix share, and I wonder what other creative ways we’ve come up with. Just reminding everyone that we have a FB page where you can post your ideas and pictures and stay connected with other Elioteers.

I wish you and your family all the best as we all continue doing our part to “flatten the curve” and “social distance”. Hmmm, wonder what the Meriam Webster word for 2020 will be…

Rachelle Lee
Board President