21 University of Toledo students have led the field in recent years with our chapter’s NextGen efforts – but University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) is another institution where MWSCC is forging a deeper relationship. The College of Engineering in particular has engaged with us – not only for career fairs – but actual participation for events like our Fall Meeting and SCJ tour in Racine WI. Lisa Kringas of Vantage Chemical, our 2019 MWSCC Chair, coordinated the WI meeting and it was a smashing success! The chapter is committed to better reach outside Chicago and IL – and our first attempt in many years meeting outside IL had over 90 attendees! The meeting was held in Racine WI – as the chapter targeted SC Johnson as one of the companies overlapping Personal Care and Home Care for which we would like to increase membership, education and activities. Midwest The Midwest Chapter embarked upon 2018 with very ambitious goals. Our vision and goals for the year focused on student engagement, STEM and community outreach, fiscal planning at a more strategic level, at least one physical meeting (not skype/remote) outside the Chicago area, Homecare inclusion in events, elevating the Teamworks experience, and a renewed priority on membership value proposition. My Year in Review is written to share the MWSCC “firsts” along these lines. Information on our traditional activities outside these firsts, including our fantastic chapter monthly meetings and speakers/topics, can be found at www.midwestscc.org via our SCCOOP newsletter section. STEM outreach is how we started our 2018 year, with a chapter donation of $1000 to help a team of students at Fox Valley Christian Academy as they advanced from a regional level competition to sectional, state, national and even the global competition! Team C3s was coached by none other than our former MWSCC Chair Scott Wenzel of Kimberly Clark. Their FIRST Lego League (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) project was Solar Safe, a solar puffer that floats on water and wicks water into the main chamber where sunlight is captured to create heat and condense water. The condensed water is free of dirt, chemicals, salt and microbes. It rolls down the acrylic cover where it is collected. The unit also used copper surfaces and pipes to capture water and ensure it remains clean in the collection chamber. And these budding scientists are only in grades 4-7! The MWSCC Board is working hard to find other worthy STEM projects, teams and students to support – as our nonprofit educational society is committed to the future scientists of the world. Christine Daraska of Croda for years has participated on behalf of the MWSCC at various science days in Chicago and suburbs. Crystal Rampaul of TH Hilson (a Ravago Company) is working with Chris to engage other chapter members in this endeavor – as our only limit to participation in these events is the volunteer hours it takes.

22 The SCJ campus tour was held in the afternoon, followed by a dinner meeting with Dow Chemical educating us about Silicone regulations in various global regions. Thanks to the financial success of Teamworks, the chapter was able to fund 2 vans at no cost to members in IL desiring to attend the Racine WI meeting without having to drive – with 1 of the vans dedicated just to UIC students. Teamworks was a success again this year – with some awesome “firsts” of its own. Thanks to Crystal Rampaul and Rachel Grabenhofer (of Allured), not only did we have student posters for the first time ever at Teamworks – we had 14 posters from 6 educational institutions! Corporate sponsorships enabled the Midwest Chapter to cover the costs for all 14 students to stay at a hotel near the venue, participate in our Social Night, and for travel to/from the event. In conjunction with the NYSCC Chapter, the first and second place poster winners, Margaret Gorz and Syndey Holland (both from University of Toledo) enjoyed a fully paid trip to a New Formulators workshop during NYSCC Suppliers Day. Thank you Marcie Papadakis (of Neuryon) for coordinating the Poster Judging, as I am told decisions were hard and the scores were close. Both Margaret and Sydney are now employed by Nuskin and Estee Lauder – joining other recent students whose MWSCC involvement resulted in placement at member companies of ours like Azelis, Solo Labs, American Blending and Ecoco. The NextGen initiative is seeing much deeper relationships between MWSCC, other chapters and SCC National with various institutions and individual students throughout the nation. Teamworks enjoyed record-breaking attendance for our Social Night with over 300 people! We automated our Call for Papers and Call for Posters so everything was done online. We elevated our sponsorship levels, combining Social Night and Teamworks and offering more sponsorship options for companies to choose from. Sponsorships enabled things like a University of Toledo booth – our first booth at Teamworks from a NextGen educational partner. We did an extensive post-event survey that provided excellent input on how to make Teamworks 2020 even better. Cinda Carlson (my Teamworks co-Chair), IAMI (our tradeshow vendor) and PDR Designs (our webmaster) did an incredible job – especially since incorporating as many changes as we did into the event was not easy. Teamworks also benefited from continued collaboration and support from SCC National and NYSCC. NYSCC sponsored a booth as well as a breakfast. National SCC sponsored and staffed a booth – but also organized 2 CEP courses the day before our Teamworks Education and Suppliers Day. Both NYSCC and National are now a key part of our event that we expect will continue year after year. Marcie Papadakis renewed our efforts on membership, going beyond member retention and into truly understanding and communicating the value of SCC membership. Marcie worked tirelessly to position us better than we have in years for early capture of member renewals. She has developed materials around SCC value, and positioned member survey questions, to capture how we can best serve our members – and those who are not members by understanding what companies and individuals most seek from our educational organization.