Cynthia Thurlow Cruver

President and CEO
3rdPlus
Seattle, WA
  • 84-K. Unleashing Your Nonprofit Superpowers to Boost Census

    • Wednesday, October 30, 2024

    9:30 – 10:30 a.m.

    84-K. Unleashing Your Nonprofit Superpowers to Boost Census

    Nonprofit life plan communities are the superheroes of the senior living world. So why are so many communities losing census to for-profit communities? Your nonprofit status brings with it a wealth of powerful advantages, but communicating those advantages to prospective residents takes time and effort. This session will help census-challenged nonprofit communities identify game-changing messaging that will improve their marketing, sales, hiring, and fundraising. Presenters will share a dozen impactful nonprofit messages and stories proven to resonate with different target audiences. They’ll also show you how to identify and mitigate operational activities and behavior patterns that can weaken sales performance, depress lead generation, and impact census.

Donna Thurmond

VP of Resident Services and Programs
Volunteers of America
Alexandria, VA
  • 64-G. Innovating Together: Life Plan Communities and Villages

    • Tuesday, October 29, 2024

    8:15 – 9:15 a.m.

    64-G. Innovating Together: Life Plan Communities and Villages

    A Village is a neighborhood-based nonprofit membership organization that uses volunteers to help older residents remain connected with their neighbors while continuing to live in their own homes. This session will focus on the innovative partnerships that can evolve between Villages and life plan communities. Find out how life plan communities are working with Villages to offer the most appropriate services to individuals living in their homes and communities. You’ll even meet a housing provider that partnered with an Area Agency on Aging to develop a Village within an existing Naturally Occurring Retirement Community. Presenters will discuss federal and state policy changes that could help expand the development of similar models nationwide.

Hugh Tilson

Resident
Carolina Meadows
Chapel Hill, NC
  • 109-F. We Wrote a Musical: Fostering A Culture of Creative Resident Collaboration

    • Monday, October 28, 2024

    4:30 – 5:30 p.m.

    109-F. We Wrote a Musical: Fostering A Culture of Creative Resident Collaboration

    When life plan communities create conditions that nurture spontaneous creative activity, the results can be spectacular for individuals and the community. That’s what happened at Carolina Meadows in Chapel Hill, NC. Community residents wrote and performed an original musical called Movin’ for more than 1,000 people during five performances in 2023. The musical addressed such themes as retirement, unspoken community rules, death, widowhood, new relationships, hip fractures, and early dementia. This session will combine video footage of performances and rehearsals with presentations by the show’s resident organizer and music director, a geriatrician involved in the project, and the community’s administrator. Join this session to discover how resident-generated creative activity can enhance community spirit.

Rebecca Timis

Director of Human Resources
Immanuel Lutheran Communities
Kalispell, MT
  • 45-F. Executive Compensation: One Community’s Journey

    • Monday, October 28, 2024

    4:30 – 5:30 p.m.

    45-F. Executive Compensation: One Community’s Journey

    Several years ago, Immanuel Lutheran Communities, a life plan community in Kalispell, MT, identified executive compensation as a critical part of its planning for the organization’s future. This session will share the community’s compensation journey, including initial research and exploration, articulation of a compensation philosophy and plan, and development of a compensation administration system. Presenters will update you on executive compensation guidelines for tax-exempt organizations, the steps involved in creating an executive compensation system, and the challenges you may encounter. They will also share their thoughts about the importance of including executive compensation in your organization’s strategic plan.

Alicia Titus

Chief Experience Officer
Messiah Lifeways
Mechanicsburg, PA
  • 61-E. Your Lifecycle Stage: What is it and Why Does It Matter?

    • Monday, October 28, 2024

    3:00 – 4:00 p.m.

    61-E. Your Lifecycle Stage: What is it and Why Does It Matter?

    What stage in the Nonprofit Lifecycle does your organization find itself? Is it a young organization at the Idea Stage or the Startup Stage? Or has it moved into the Growth, Maturity, Stagnation, or Decline stages? Knowing the answer to these questions can help your organization develop critical capacity-building, growth, and regeneration strategies that could contribute to its long-term strength and sustainability. This session will help you identify your organization’s current Lifecycle Stage and explore strategies to help you keep moving forward. Two LeadingAge member organizations one at the Growth Stage and the other at the Maturity Stage will describe how their boards aligned their planning processes with their Lifecycle Stage to adopt regeneration strategies for their organizations.

Jeff Tkach

CEO
Rodale Institute
Kutztown, PA
  • 111-H. The Benefits of Organic Farming in a Senior Living Community

    • Tuesday, October 29, 2024

    3:00 – 4:00 p.m.

    111-H. The Benefits of Organic Farming in a Senior Living Community

    The well-being of older adults and the health of Pennsylvania soils received welcome boosts when Cornwall Manor Retirement Community established an organic farm on its campus in collaboration with the Rodale Institute, a nonprofit organization promoting organic farming. The 2.5-acre Trailside Organic Farm supports the dining needs of the life plan community and offers residents opportunities to help with farm tasks and purchase fresh produce at weekly farm markets. Presenters will explain the farm’s operations, detail Rodale’s investment, and describe the public relations and marketing benefits the farm brings to the Cornwall Manor. Don’t have room on your campus for a farm? Rodale Institute executives will tell you how to partner with local organic farms to engage residents in agriculture.

Dawn Elizabeth Todd

ELL Program Coordinator
Friendsview Retirement Community
Newberg, OR
  • 29-D. Creating Career Pathways for English Language Learners

    • Monday, October 28, 2024

    8:15 – 9:15 a.m.

    29-D. Creating Career Pathways for English Language Learners

    Building the skills of English language learners can help senior living organizations fill critical vacancies, retain professional caregivers, and mentor trusted staff. During this session, team members from Friendsview Retirement Community in Newberg, OR, will describe how their organization is putting English language learners on a career path in healthcare, as well as how they addressed academic bias in their training programs in order to help their housekeeping staff to succeed. Get tips for starting an English Language Learners Program in your organization and ensuring that the program leads to new hires. You’ll learn how to partner with external education programs, smooth out your hiring process to be more welcoming to English language learners, ease communication between learners, coworkers, and residents, and boost retention through training and advancement. Most of all, you will learn how benefits transfer to better learning for all your employees.

Eric Tracy

Associate
Kimley-Horn & Associates
Lisle, IL
  • 17-D. Navigating the Stormy Waters of a Campus Expansion

    • Monday, October 28, 2024

    8:15 – 9:15 a.m.

    17-D. Navigating the Stormy Waters of a Campus Expansion

    What happens when an older life plan community campus with a growing need for new housing plans an expansion that involves relocating a stream and adding a detention basin to an adjacent property? During this session, representatives of Covenant Living Communities and Services in Skokie, IL, will describe how they addressed myriad obstacles while still maintaining a quality design. Presenters will offer advice to help you garner support for your project from stakeholders, stay within your budget, obtain additional funding to address delays, and manage a process you don’t fully control. Get an up-close view of the often-turbulent process of seeking approval for a senior living development expansion. Take home advice that could help your next project succeed.

Lindsay Troge

Director of Marketing
Town & Country Senior Living
Santa Ana, CA
  • 84-K. Unleashing Your Nonprofit Superpowers to Boost Census

    • Wednesday, October 30, 2024

    9:30 – 10:30 a.m.

    84-K. Unleashing Your Nonprofit Superpowers to Boost Census

    Nonprofit life plan communities are the superheroes of the senior living world. So why are so many communities losing census to for-profit communities? Your nonprofit status brings with it a wealth of powerful advantages, but communicating those advantages to prospective residents takes time and effort. This session will help census-challenged nonprofit communities identify game-changing messaging that will improve their marketing, sales, hiring, and fundraising. Presenters will share a dozen impactful nonprofit messages and stories proven to resonate with different target audiences. They’ll also show you how to identify and mitigate operational activities and behavior patterns that can weaken sales performance, depress lead generation, and impact census.

Jeff Tucker

Vice President of Human Resources
Christian Living Communities
Englewood, CO
  • 150-J. Reboot Your Organization’s Workforce Culture

    • Wednesday, October 30, 2024

    8:00 – 9:00 a.m.

    150-J. Reboot Your Organization’s Workforce Culture

    The aging services workplace changed forever in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic wreaked havoc on our organizations and the people we serve. As a result, many pre-COVID organizational processes, structures, and strategies are no longer relevant and must be retooled or replaced. During this session, Human Resources experts will describe the methods they used to reboot their organization’s workforce culture by questioning past assumptions about what impacts that culture, building back effective strategies, and experimenting with new approaches. Hear about their successes and failures and take home actionable strategies for helping your organization attract, engage, and retain excellent team members dedicated to enriching the daily lives and experiences of older adults.

Nikia Tucker

Student
Metropolitan State University of Denver
Denver, CO
  • 143-F. Embracing Students as Future Leaders in Aging Services

    • Monday, October 28, 2024

    4:30 – 5:30 p.m.

    143-F. Embracing Students as Future Leaders in Aging Services

    The field of aging services faces a pressing challenge: finding innovative strategies to recruit and retain employees to meet the projected demand of 20 million caregiving positions by 2040. Fresh approaches are essential to tackle this critical need. This session will present a solution that includes actively recruiting from colleges and universities that offer aging services and gerontology programs. Representatives from Metropolitan State University of Denver will demonstrate how to stay ahead of the recruitment curve by creating entry-level job opportunities, volunteer experiences, intergenerational learning moments, and internships to attract college graduates to the field. Attendees will hear from current students, alumni, and faculty and leave with practical strategies for collaborating with educational institutions to address the workforce shortage.

Melissa Turzanski

Program Director, Care Innovation and Transformation
Baycrest
North York, ON
  • 114-J. Transforming the Living Experience for People with Dementia

    • Wednesday, October 30, 2024

    8:00 – 9:00 a.m.

    114-J. Transforming the Living Experience for People with Dementia

    People living with dementia shouldn’t have to give up their values, purpose, preferences, connections, choices, and autonomy when they move into residential care. Instead, they should have access to models that disrupt traditional institutionalized approaches and enable an exceptional residential experience. This session will describe Possibilities by Baycrestu2122, a formal approach to delivering care for people living with dementia in residential settings. Representatives of Baycrest Health Sciences in Toronto, Canada, will give you a high-level overview of the model and explain how it maximizes abilities and potential by customizing a living experience for each person.