Letter from the President - January 2019
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
It is with great pleasure that I welcome you to 2019 as the new AUGI president. So many thanks to Kate Morrical for serving us as president the past two years, and for her contributions to AUGI over the years. We wish her the best in her upcoming spring wedding! As well, Scott Wilcox has finished his tenure as a board member and was also a previous AUGI president. Many cheers to Scott for his years of hard work with AUGI. I am sure both of them will remain active within AUGI!
We are excited to welcome two new board members: Matt Wunch and Sam Lucido. Make sure you stop by the AUGI forums to say hello and welcome! Matt and Sam have a long history with AUGI and the Autodesk community, and we are thrilled to have them on board.
As much as I dislike talking about myself, I wanted to give you some of my background and let you know how I came to be involved in AUGI. This year marks my 26th year in the AEC industry, mostly in Architectural and Civil design and project management. My first Autodesk product was AutoCAD® 10! I am currently working on my own as an Architectural Technology consultant. I participate in the Autodesk Expert Elite program, the Autodesk Developer Network, and Revit Inside the Factory Live (Boston) events. I have been a speaker at Autodesk University, BILT NA, and Midwest University. One of my passions is sustainability as a LEED AP BD+C, and I serve on the board of directors for the USGBC - Central PA Community. I also believe in equipping the next generation (ok, I’m just really looking forward to retirement and training my replacements!), so I help shape curriculum on several local college advisory boards for Architectural Technology. I served as the Revit Structure Content Manager for AUGIWORLD before joining the board of directors. I also occasionally write for R. K. McSwain’s cadpanacea.com blog. On a personal note, I live in south central Pennsylvania (that’s the state between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh!) with my husband, three children, and spoiled dog (or spoiled husband, children, and dog?).
Up until a few years ago, AUGI was an afterthought in my career life. While always a great resource, I used to visit the forums on occasion when I had a question, and I briefly scanned AUGIWORLD articles. When I was first starting in my career many years ago, it was one of the few online resources for all things Autodesk related. A search for a new career path in 2014 led to a conversation with David Harrington. That conversation led to me volunteering as the Revit Structure Content Manager. From that one conversation, I was introduced to the behind-the-scenes workings of AUGI, eventually becoming a member of the board of directors, and now president. The connections and friendships I have made over the years as a result have been priceless. The majority of the previous paragraph happened only because I said yes when asked to volunteer!
I hope you will consider ways to not just use AUGI resources, but to be an active participant. AUGI is volunteer-run and we are reliant on our membership to help guide the direction of this organization. This is the very definition of a “user group.” You can volunteer to enhance our offerings and enlighten our membership with your experience and expertise. We are always accepting new authors for AUGIWORLD, forum participants and moderators, and webinar presenters. You can do it!
We have high expectations for 2019, and look forward to great things happening for our AUGI user group this year. As of this writing, our LinkedIn group has grown to almost 8,000 members and has become an active place for sharing among the industry. Our forums continue to thrive, and we look forward to enhancing our online user group experience in a variety of ways over the coming year. Stay tuned!
