7 Tips to Make Your Chapter Report Shine

Completing the annual chapter report is one of the requirements to retain active status for your ACS student chapter and to be eligible for grants, awards, and other ACS programs. But it also has two important benefits: 1. Your chapter receives valuable feedback and helpful tips on how to make improvements. 2. It’s an opportunity to improve skills in reporting about activities and their impact, a vital skill for the workplace.

If you want to write a standout report, follow these seven tips.

1. Think about your annual chapter report like a lab report.

The goals you set for the year are your hypothesis. The events you share,  descriptions, and pictures taken throughout the year are your materials and methods. Your responses to the report questions are your results and discussion. Be sure to give enough detail to show the impact that you've made on your members, department, institution, and community.

2. Explain how your chapter supports the ACS Strategic Plan.

Because your chapter is a part of ACS, you want to show how your activities and goals aligned with any part of the ACS Strategic Plan. Take time to learn about ACS’s commitment, mission, vision, core values, and strategic goals and address how your chapter incorporates some of these ideas in your responses.

3. Share the workload.

There is a lot to cover and you want to make sure that all sections are completed, so it’s best to have more than one person write the report. Plan which officers or committees will complete each section.

This is also a great time to think about Passing the Chapter Officer Baton. If you have outgoing officers have them work with incoming officers on the reports; the new officers will have a chance to learn about the process, what went well, what could be better, and what to avoid in the future.

Don’t skip any entries! Type in a 0 if you don’t have anything. And remember to add pictures (showing good safety practices) of your events!

4. Read the questions and compose your responses before going into the reporting system.

The system will time you out after 15 minutes of “inactivity” even if you’re typing. To avoid losing all your work, draft your responses to the chapter report questions outside the system, then copy and paste them into your report.

5. Highlight things that make your chapter unique.

Think about the advantages and disadvantages you have at your institution. Institutions can be large, small, urban, rural, surrounded by resources and collaborators, or isolated. What do you do with the resources you have? How do you address your challenges? What keeps your members engaged? What are you most proud of? How do you stand out from other clubs and ACS student chapters?

6. Proofread, proofread, proofread!

Because you're human, you are bound to introduce errors into the report. Your faculty advisor can help by reviewing your entries before submission to catch typos, unclear descriptions, or entries that should be in different categories.

7. Submit on time.

Chapter reports are due the same time every year: by 11:59 p.m. in your time zone on May 31. Don’t miss out on the chance to be recognized with an ACS Student Communities Chapter Award. 

Bonus tip: Celebrate!

After you've completed the report, celebrate your accomplishments from the year! Be ready to celebrate again in the fall when the awards are announced.