In another room, tables and chairs arranged in a U-shape, with flip charts and post-it notes scattered around. I feel like I have spent a lot of time in rooms like this one over the years, with mixed results.

This particular event is a meeting of the Surfrider Leadership Academy alumni, and we’re here to do a assessment of the program after its first three years. What is working, what needs to be changed and what ideas we might have as it goes forward, those kinds of things. There are various layers to the process and some great ideas are coming to the surface.

As with any program, it is the people involved that give the SLA the energy it needs to go and grow. (That’s Stena, from South Sound Surfrider, presenting in the photo above.) I have fully enjoyed my time with this group and I look forward to future collaborations, putting the lessons learned here to work out there.