President's Message

A Message from our President

Greeting MAND Members,

Happy Fall and welcome back to what I anticipate as another productive and rewarding year! It is truly an honor and my pleasure to serve as your Fiscal Year 2024-2025 President. As we continually evolve as a profession of dedicated registered dietitian nutritionists and registered dietetic technicians, my healthy challenge to you is to remain encouraged, embrace change, and understand your worth as valuable clinicians, public health professionals, administrators, educators/mentors, entrepreneurs, and…the list goes on! For what may have felt like peaks and valleys since the start of this decade between COVID-19, racial/ethnic/disability/gender/sexual orientation inequities, the pros and cons of AI in our lives and controversial changes within our own profession, these experiences have also taught us meaningful lessons. These lessons are pillars that I will be carrying throughout my leadership within our organization and beyond: One, we are resilient. Despite the challenges we have faced, we are still here! As long as we still have breath in this life, we can fulfill the purpose we were put on this earth for. Two, we must roll with resistance. Every valuable achievement that has pushed us forward in society has not been met without resistance from others or even ourselves. Three, diversity, equity, and inclusive practices are imperative and always have been. The antithesis to growth is ignorance. Let’s learn from one another and embrace our differences. Lastly, we must be interdisciplinary in our professional practice. Nutrition is an integral part of the equation in our food system, wellness, diseases of the mind and physical body, sustainability/climate change, education and policy. Therefore, advocating for our seat at the table is not a one-time effort but an ongoing necessity.

We have some very important and exciting activities and events in the pipeline. We will continue to keep you posted on other networking events, member interest surveys, and open election dates so that you can continue to contribute your voices to decisions about our leaders, continuing education opportunities, grassroots efforts, and emerging practices of our field. In the meantime, please mark your calendars for the following upcoming events:

MAND Foundation: We will routinely post information on upcoming Fundraising events with our partners to our website and social media pages throughout the year. Proceeds will go toward supporting student scholarships.
Annual Food and Nutrition Conference & Expo (FNCE 2024): If you plan to travel to Minneapolis, MN this year for FNCE 2024, please don’t forget to register to attend our joint Mid-Atlantic Maryland/DC/Delaware/Pennsylvania affiliate Networking Reception on October 7, 2024 from 5:00-7:00 pm. Please click here to RSVP.
MAND Advocacy Day: Please save the date for our Annual Advocacy Day scheduled for February 5, 2025. This is a prime opportunity for you to join us as we engage with various state legislators to advocate for important Bills that affect our profession and the nutritional well-being of fellow residents of Maryland. This event notably had a positive impact on our ability to maintain/renew our state licensure requirement this past year to ultimately influence consumer protection of all Marylanders.
2025 MAND Annual Conference: Please save the date for our 2025 Annual Conference and post-conference Awards & Honors Reception scheduled for April 11, 2025, at the BWI Airport Marriot! As you know, this is our largest and highest attended continuing education and networking opportunity for nutrition professionals and students. We will begin with our MAND Business Meeting in the first hour followed by a day full of educational updates on emerging topics in nutrition and great food! More details to come on registration as well as this year’s theme.