Arrowmen,
I hope this letter finds all of you well! Since I last wrote to you all, the Order of the Arrow has had a very eventful month, marked most notably by our 2024 National Conference (NOAC).
NOAC was an absolute success! With over 6500 Arrowmen in Boulder, you could feel the energy and excitement all week. John Andrew, Cam, Jake, and I are grateful to all of the attendees for making this conference one of the best weeks of our lives, and we hope that you continue to carry the flame that was ignited at NOAC.
As we enter into the Fall, some exciting opportunities await you - this fall, we will have five National Leadership Seminar (NLS) & Developing Youth Leadership Conference (DYLC) courses that you can attend. Check out our website to review some of these opportunities. With courses in Houston, Alpine, Denver, Nashville, and Sacramento, you are bound to have a chance to summit new heights of leadership.
For this month’s short story, I would like to share one of my recent experiences at the Centennial Celebration hosted by Totanhan Nakaha Lodge #16. In the Land of 10,000 Lakes, hundreds of Arrowmen gathered to reflect on 100 years of youth leadership, cheerful service, and community development. As I traveled to Minnesota, one quote that I had learned early in my days at the University of Virginia continued to ring in my mind.
“No human institution lives long unless it meets a human need”
-Elihu Root
As the celebration occurred, Root’s statement kept surfacing in my thoughts, I decided to share it during my address at the Saturday evening show. I prompted the audience, asking what human need they felt the Order of the Arrow met. Answers rang out - Friendship! Helping the community! Empowering others! While all of those things may be different, they share a core value - love.
When you look out into the future of the Order of the Arrow, you must remember that love is the most important tenet that we can carry, share, and display. As the brotherly love of our organization continues, our organization will not only persist, but flourish, for the next century.
Congrats to Totanhan Nakaha on 100 years, and I cannot wait to see what the next 100 provides for TNL and the Order of the Arrow!
Yours in Cheerful Service,
David Gosik
National Chief