The AAMSC19 Pre-Conference!

Hello, friends!

Pop quiz: what's the only thing better than being at a conference? Answer: showing up a day early to go to the pre-conference BEFORE the conference!

This year, prior to AAMSC19, staff of Asian American chapters were invited to come in a day early and receive some special training related to doing communal evangelism within the Asian American context. While I don't currently lead an AA chapter (or any chapter for that matter), I am leading an evangelism project for AAM, so I thought it would be a good idea to do some networking.

From a training standpoint, this pre-conference was great. I love the innovation that is happening within the Asian American Ministries department. The level of contextualization is great and the tools and paradigms that were presented gave language to something that I think we already knew as staff working with Asian American students. There were so many times in those 24 hours that I heard audible gasps in the room or murmurs of appreciation as a new tool, concept, or paradigm was introduced.

Looking at it from a recruitment perspective, it was definitely fruitful was well. I was originally slated to give a bit of a longer presentation but because of time constraints (read: the guy before me went WAY too long), I had 3 minutes to present my project and present my case. Despite feeling a little squeezed, I got all my information out there and 4 staff leading 4 Asian American Ministries chapters from all over the country found me after the pre-conference to express interest in the project.

However, the question of "was it worth it" is one that is still live for me. The information and new tools were super interesting and are going to be great for Asian American Ministries, but I don't work directly with students anymore so I didn't need to be there for that. The announcement led to new interest in the project but that happened on Day 2 of the pre-conference, meaning I may not have needed to be at Day 1. Still, being at Day 1 allowed me to announce the project using the language of the pre-conference, which may have made it a better announcement. BUT, was it worth leaving my family a day early? Was it worth leaving Meg with the kids for an extra 24 hours? That's a much harder question to answer.

Do I regret going to the pre-conference? Absolutely not. Was it a really informative and helpful time? Most definitely? Was it worth the extra time away? The jury's still out on that one.

Have an excellent day!

~Adam

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