Message from the President

Paul Francisco
ALPFA Boston President

Saludos ALPFA Boston Family,

I hope all of you are well and have enjoyed a spring of new beginnings and looking forward to a summer of success. I want to first thank and congratulate the members of the PR/Marketing committee for putting together another wonderful ALPFA Boston Insider newsletter, in particular Romina Wilmot Editor-in-Chief of the ALPFA Boston Insider, as well as our VP of Marketing/PR. Thank you also to Anabel Castillo and Bianca Gonzalez Olivares for their many contributions to this newsletter.

This edition highlights many of the people, happenings, accomplishments that make ALPFA Boston special. Nine years go when I joined ALPFA Boston, I would have never imagined that we would be at this point. We have come a long way with under the leadership of people like Juan Carlos Morales, Carol Sanchez, Fidel Vasquez, Eduardo Tobon, Rene Jarquin, and most recently Yvonne Garcia.

We owe a tremendous amount of thanks to these individuals who blazed the trail for many of us as leaders, mentors, but most of all friends. It is my honor to now be leading this talented team and continue our winning traditions in ALPFA Boston.

Our membership numbers continue to grow, and we continue to be the largest ALPFA chapter in the nation with over 1,500 members, with a goal of being 2,000+ by year end. Our growth is spurred not only by the addition of new corporate partners like TJX, EMC, McCarter and English, Rockland Trust and Sullivan and Worcester, but also by our expanding reach into our community, individual business owners, and other professions outside of Finance and Accounting. This has also been accomplished with the help of our generous media partners like El Mundo Newspaper, Color Magazine, El Planeta, Encuentro Latino, Univision Boston, Channel 7’s Revista and Urban Update, as well as Channel 4’s Centro, and Boston Latino TV.

In the coming months you will see ALPFA’s efforts to have a larger voice within larger audiences, we will focus on critical issues of advancing leadership of Latinos and other minorities not only in the corporate environment but also in other areas like government, higher education, law, and others. What makes ALPFA Boston different is the realization that advancement both personally and professionally isn’t particular to any minority group or profession, it is something that is critical to us all.

On a programmatic note, We have been busy preparing for an exciting year ahead, in addition to our regular monthly networking/professional development meetings we recently re-launched a new and exciting ALPFA Boston website (www.alpfaboston.org) , hosted an ALPFA Student Summit in March, will be hosting our Third Annual Women of ALPFA Latina Business Summit on May 15th, a Spring social networking mixer event in partnership with NAAAP (National Association of Asian American Professionals), the Spring launch of the fourth cohort of our Mentoring and Coaching Program in conjunction with Mass Mentoring Inc., our Second Annual Scholarship Fund Raiser Golf Tournament on August 12th, and we are ready to host the National ALPFA Convention in Boston August 8th-12th. This is the first time ALPFA has chosen a Northeast location for their convention. We invite you to be a part of this wonderful celebration.

Speaking of national celebrations, I would like to congratulate ALPFA Boston’s own Yvonne Garcia on her appointment to the National ALPFA Board as National Vice President, and more recently for being named one of the Top 25 Hispanic Business Women of the Year by Hispanic Magazine. Congratulations Yvonne!

Lastly, I would like to take this opportunity to thank ALPFA Boston’s Board and the many committees and volunteers without whose support and leadership, any of this would be possible. Héctor López Camacho, Marcela Aldaz, Nadia Colón, Mark White, Marcel Quiroga, Juan Lopera, Elvia Bautista, Perla Cardenas, Karen Agredo, Gerardo Díaz-Martinez, Romina Wilmot and Anabel Castillo, thank you!

As we always like to say, “It is the Power of Many Working as One”.
Looking forward to a successful year!

Paul Francisco
ALPFA Boston President