Dear $firstname$,

I look forward every year to the opportunity to gather in person with all of you at our Annual Meeting. The event has traditionally provided USMS volunteers an opportunity to catch up with each other and manage the responsibilities of the House of Delegates, including the legislation and rules processes of USMS. Although we missed the networking and social element during last year’s meetings, we successfully accomplished the requisite nonprofit governance requirements of USMS in a virtual format.

USMS will again be hosting the Annual Meeting virtually in 2021. The Board of Directors approved this change during our virtual winter meeting earlier this month. Although we’ll miss the chance to meet in person, this switch offers benefits.

USMS and its LMSCs will save on travel costs, participants won’t have to gather and travel during the pandemic (or its immediate aftermath), and volunteers who were unable to block off several days in their busy schedules to join us in our previous in-person Annual Meeting format will now have a greater opportunity to participate.

With increased expectation that the pandemic-related challenges will subside this summer, we hope LMSCs will be able to apply resources, both time and money, to focus on helping Masters clubs return to pre-pandemic membership levels and restarting local events that may not have been held over the past year. 

To ensure we provide an improved virtual experience, the Executive Committee is actively reviewing the format of and feedback from last year’s virtual Annual Meeting. The core of this year's meeting is expected to generally take place over the time period as the previously scheduled USAS Convention, Sept. 23-27. Further information about this year’s virtual Annual Meeting will be sent via email and posted on the Annual Meeting page on the USMS website.

For those of you who, like me, look forward to gathering in person again, the Board of Directors has commissioned a task force to develop an enriching volunteer summit for the first half of 2022 with recommendations expected to be presented to the Board of Directors during the summer Board meeting. 

During that meeting, the Board intends to review recommendations for both the Annual Meeting and the volunteer summit concept, and to discuss appropriate format, schedule, and content for these events in 2022 and beyond. 

If you have any questions regarding this year’s virtual Annual Meeting or development on planning for 2022 meetings, please contact Volunteer Services at volunteer@usmastersswimming.org.

Thank you for everything you do in support of USMS,

Peter Guadagni
President | U.S. Masters Swimming

Note: This email was sent to all national and LMSC-level volunteers.