Editor’s note: ASA’s Senior Equity Strategy Director and co-lead of the ASA RISE Fellowship program, Patrice L. Dickerson, recently wrote a letter to ASA members and newsletter subscribers. Here is a reprint of that letter.
Over the past few weeks, ASA’s CEO Leanne Clark-Shirley has been sharing how ASA is listening, learning, and evolving. I want to add another thought to that conversation:
If you shape community, you shape how we age.
The longer I work at ASA, the more convinced I become that the traditional boundaries of the “aging field” are too small for the work ahead.
The longer I work at ASA, the more convinced I become that the traditional boundaries of the “aging field” are too small for the work ahead.
How we experience aging is shaped by far more than the programs and services we typically associate with aging. It is shaped by the communities we create: where we live, how we move, whether we can access care, whether we can afford to remain in the places we call home, and whether we feel connected and that we belong.
Those conditions are shaped every day by planners, housing leaders, financial professionals, pharmacists, healthcare providers, technologists, employers, educators, artists, journalists, policymakers, researchers, and many others who may never have thought of themselves as working “in aging.”
If your work shapes the communities where people live, your work shapes how we age.
And that raises an important question for ASA: How do more of those people find their way into this community?
People come to ASA through different doors. Some seek education and practical resources. Others are looking for people who care about ageism, caregiving, housing, health equity, economic security, elder justice, or belonging. Some come to On Aging for an idea and discover a professional community. Others may encounter ASA and realize for the first time: My work is aging work, too.
Perhaps our opportunity is to create pathways as much as programs: into the field, into relationships, across sectors, into leadership, and ultimately into community. Someone might find ASA through a Community Group.
Someone else through the On Aging Institute, ASA RISE, thought leadership in Generations, the On Aging conference, an issue they care deeply about, or simply a colleague who says, “You need to be part of this.”
What matters is what happens next: Do they find a reason to connect? A place to contribute? People to learn with? Opportunities to lead? A community they want to return to?
That is the ASA I imagine: many ways in and many reasons to stay.
That is also why I’m especially excited about On Aging 2027: Creating Community. What if our invitation to San Diego is bigger than “come to a conference”?
Come to On Aging 2027 and see firsthand how you belong in the ASA community.
I often say that aging isn’t a sector; it’s the lens through which we can reimagine society. ASA is building a community that reflects that idea: a place where people enter because of what they do, connect because of what they care about, contribute what they know, and discover what becomes possible when their expertise meets someone else’s.
Creating a society in which all of us can lead good, long lives will require a bigger community. Let’s build it together.
Creating a society in which all of us can lead good, long lives will require a bigger community. Let’s build it together.
So, as ASA continues evolving, I’ll leave you with a question, and I hope you will reply with your answer:
Who else needs to be in this community, and what door can we open to help them find their way here?
Send your answer to CEO@asaging.org. We will read every reply, and what you share will help shape where ASA turns next.
Patrice L. Dickerson, PhD, is ASA’s Senior Equity Strategy Director, and co-leads the ASA RISE Fellowship program.
