I have been playing Go actively for nearly 17 years and have been an AGA member since 2008. Since the early days of my Go journey, I have been involved with many facets of the Go community, including competing in tournaments both domestic and international (I still regularly study this game!), managing Go clubs in schools, teaching privately, organizing youth tournaments, streaming on Twitch, and serving as the Youth Coordinator, VP of Tournaments, and the At-Large board member for the AGA (currently all three). As a result, I am in touch with many of the happenings in many aspects of the

Go community and have a well-rounded understanding of current issues as well as what’s feasible and sustainable to help the AGA initiate change and improvement.

I believe that in the past several years, the AGA has taken some good steps to start implementing new changes, but a long road ahead remains. Some of the most urgent goals I believe the AGA should undertake are as follows:

• Volunteer management: The fact of the matter is that there are plenty of good ideas that get sent to the board for review, but few get put into action because there simply aren’t many volunteers to do the implementation. One step towards improving this could be to publish a commission board of projects the AGA is looking for volunteers to accomplish.
• Project management: Related to the above point, I believe it would be good for the AGA to publish quarterly status reports on the various projects that the AGA is undertaking. This would both improve transparency with its membership base, increase accountability, and encourage people to volunteer knowing that progress is being made.

There are many other aspects of the AGA that also could be improved, such as marketing and streamlining information accessibility. While I don’t have the answers for every issue, I’m sure there are people in the Go community who do and together we can continue to improve what the AGA can do for its members.