1. Taking your chapter to the next level
Eric R. Evarts, PSMC
We all want to have the best chapter possible.  Separate from membership and programmatic success, the way the day-to-day chapter workings go on drive the quality of both our members and our programs. 

2. Who am I - DeMolay? 20 years of DeMolay experience
Past Master Councilor of Marcus Holcomb Chapter
Past State Master Councilor of Connecticut DeMolay,
Chevalier
Active Legion of Honor
5 years as an advisor in Pennsylvania
5 years as an advisor in Colorado
Have served as Chapter Dad and Chapter Chairman
Now living in Albany, NY

3. Who am I – Professional?
Ph.D. in Physics from Carnegie Mellon University
Worked 5 years at the National Institute of Standards and Technology
Now at IBM in Albany, NY as the testing lead on a new program
Specialty is really tiny magnets
Experimentation, data collection, and analysis – applied to DeMolay

4. What is our #1 goal as advisors?
Provide a safe environment for our young men to _________
fail
and
learn
Building on Dad Drouin’s 6 different types of advisors – like his type 4-5 warn there’s a cliff, warns there’s a cliff and suggests changes to avoid the cliff

5. What is chapter success?
Membership?
Training young men?
Running a solid program?
Upholding the precepts?
Getting members is fine, but keeping members is key. The program drives keeping members. The character training we do should come out of the program and happen “by accident”

6. Raising the bar Where is your chapter today?
Where do you want your chapter to be?
How can we facilitate that journey?
What is the role of the Advisor in the journey?

7. Communication with member and advisors
How do you communicate:
Inside the chapter room
Outside the chapter room
Between events
How frequently do you communicate?
What do you communicate about?

8. Break Out Report back top 2 answers per group
1,4:How do you raise the bar for your chapter?
2,5:How do you communicate with your chapter?
3,6:How do you communicate with your fellow advisors?
All: Questions you never expected from a DeMolay

9. Raising the Bar Never let the chapter reach the bar
When they get close to the bar, simply raise it without telling the members
Key points: Slowly increase the level of expectation for the members, and commensurately decrease the work put in by the advisors

10. What should we expect from a chapter?
Open and close a chapter from memory
Plan the agenda for the meeting
Organize their own events
Set up a budget for an event/term
Communicate with each other
Clean up after themselves

11. Communication with Members
Find the way your members communicate with each other
JOIN it
Keep talking between the events

12. Communication with Advisors
Not always the same methods as communicating with the members

13. What do you, an advisor, do in the chapter room?
Why are we here?
To support the young men
Things NOT to do:
Talk more than once in a meeting
Set the meeting agenda
Take over the meeting
Have side conversations
Things to do:
Only speak when called upon
Make sure the MC has the agenda items before the meeting
Allow the Chapter Advisor to be the only advisor to speak unless given a direct question

14. Questions you never expected