Philip Bakelaar's blog

The IFVP board of directors met for their regular monthly meeting on Saturday, September 14. We took time to check in about our current lives and work. Our finances are in good shape after the Montclair Summit, the university offers us a very good rate on the space we use (but food is not such a good rate!) and we discussed possibly holding another summit there in the future. Our membership is at 247, with most of those being premium members but a significant number of basic members.

The IFVP Institute board met on Saturday, September 7 for our monthly board meeting. After checking in, we reviewed progress with regard to our accreditation process with INIFAC, which is nearing completion. We will be preparing materials regarding the certification process for release soon. The competency model is finalized and we will begin to connect a variety of books, trainings and articles to each of the competencies. Dr B is teaching a graduate class at Montclair this Fall and this will be part of their work as they study visual facilitation.

The IFVP board of directors met on Saturday, August 11, 2024 at 8:30AM NYC time. We took time to check in about our current lives and work, and then reviewed the membership reports about membership numbers and finances. Initial indicators are that we have met our summit expenses and will be able to recoup some of the loss from previous conferences. We shared thoughts about the summt at Montclair and celebrated the connections and conversations that were held there. It seemed like a calm conference where people were glad to meet and talk and learn from each other.

The IFVP board of directors met on Saturday, July 13, 2024 for our regular monthly board meeting. We opened the meeting with checking in on our current condition and recent professional activities. We approved minutes from the last meeting and received membership and financial reports. Our membership is stable at this time with 241 members. Our finances include current funds that will be disbursed for the summit at the end of July. We discussed a policy on the IFVP and social issue advocacy and agreed that we would stay focused on our international professional identity.

The IFVP Institute Board met for their April meeting. We took time to check in and noted various health challenges that have slowed down our work, but are glad that we are all doing better lately! We discussed our various individual projects, and then received updates on the certification project. We have gotten clarity on a variety of concerns and are making progress on an automated registration process that will reduce administrative overhead and allow us to focus more on assessment. When that system is in place, we will begin to implement our pilot cohort.

The IFVP Board of Directors met on Saturday, April 13, 2024. We took time to check in by sharing our sense of the value of being part of the IFVP and the board. Most all agreed that the international networking and friendships were greatly valued, especially by those in areas where visual practice is not so widespread, and it can feel lonely doing this work. We then transitioned to reports about membership and finance, which are stable at this point. We are hoping to continue to work on increasing membership value and numerical growth after the summit focus is past.

The IFVP Board of Directors met on Saturday, March 9. We took time to check in about our family connections, and then reviewed reports for our finances and membership. We spent most of our meeting discussing the upcoming summit and planning for it. We noted that contracts have been signed for the space, the gala dinner entertainment, professional headshots and video clips, general photography and some off-site housing. We should be finalizing workshop presentations, the schedule and on-site dorm housing soon.

In the years I've been participating in IFVP and the conferences/summits, one of my vivid memories is of trainings with Heather Martinez. I can still picture a previous conference workshop where there was literally standing room only, with the room full of people standing shoulder to shoulder all practicing their lettering. I'm looking forward to taking Heather's presummit on lettering, as this is one of the weakest parts of my visual practice.

I'm going to write a series of blogs on why I'm excited about the upcoming Global Summit at Montclair State. The image above is part of the story of why I'm really looking forward to seeing Bruce VanPatter at the summit. For many years I have served on the board of Compass82, a nonprofit organization working to provide case management to people recovering from flood events.

The IFVP Board of Directors met on Saturday, February 10 for our regular meeting. After checking in, we looked at reports on membership and finances. We have an increasing number of basic memberships, which was our hope for increasing our diversity, equity and inclusion by offering a lower cost version of membership. This has presented a challenge however as memberships are our primary income stream for maintaining our operation. We discussed the need to develop multiple income streams and to research whether the basic membership is meeting our DEI hopes.