The governing body of a nonprofit organization is crucial to its success as it provides the necessary leadership, planning, accountability and oversight to propel the organization forward. The progress a CASA program can make often hinges on the role the board of directors takes on effective planning, policy review, committee work and partnership with the Executive Director (ED). Hill County CASA has been a strong program over the years with continuous growth, stability in board membership, staff and volunteer retention. As the program continues in this successful trend, the governing body for Hill Country CASA has an opportunity to sustain their growth through implementation of their strategic and diversity plan, revision of current policies and collaboration with the ED. The Board Chair and Treasurer for Hill Country CASA described their organization with pride, …show more content…
Board members participated in a strategic plan development process in January 2014. It included a review of the board’s vision of the program and the priorities set to meet the program’s needs for the next four years. The plan contains seven goals and a number of objectives under each goal. Although goals include parties responsible, they are missing measures to track over time and timeframes for completing. The board will have to revise the plan to meet this requirement. The program submitted in their Indicators of Compliance a diversity policy. However, per Texas CASA Standards, programs need to provide a plan that guides and measures progress towards diversity. As the program reviews the strategic plan, the can combine these two required plans and include goals regarding diversity of their board, staff and volunteers in the general strategic plan. Providing this level of detail will move the strategic plan toward greater