Needless to say, this year hasn't exactly gone as we expected.

When we began 2020, we had high hopes for an exciting year of Scrabble tournaments - we started out with six events on the calendar, that number quickly grew to nine, and we were in talks to sanction a few more. We were ready to start sanctioning high-level Scrabble all over North America.

We got one tournament in, and then the pandemic hit. We had to cancel all of our remaining events, pivot to online play, and quite frankly spend a lot of time at home, isolating, twiddling our thumbs. Not great.

But here's the silver lining: While we haven't been able to direct many live tournaments in 2020, we've had plenty of time to work on building an infrastructure for the CoCo. At the start of this year, the Collins Coalition was a small operation - it was myself, Jennifer, and a small handful of tournament directors. We've grown a lot since then. We added a Board of Directors in October, and we've simultaneously been working to build five teams of people focused on five key strategic priorities for the CoCo moving forward.

The Board, you might know a little about already. Geoff Thevenot, our chair, published a post in this space a few weeks ago discussing what we've been working on so far. So today, I wanted to update you all on what our teams are working on. Here's a rundown on each of the five - where they stand right now, what they're up to, and what still lies ahead.

• Finance Team: Led by Peter Armstrong and Becky Dyer, this group has made great strides. Pete secured a federal Employer Identification Number (EIN) for the organization and conducted thorough research on options for setting up the organization's bank account. He and Becky are working with Jennifer to apply for federal 501(c)(3) nonprofit status. Pete also completed a full audit of the organization's past expenses and donations to ensure our budget is accurate and properly documented, and he's built out a much more sophisticated budgeting and accounting system than we had previously. You can see how we spend every dollar by checking out our budget online. Becky has also contributed beyond the finance team by spearheading an effort to compile a more complete list of current and potential CoCo members.

• Legal Team: Attorneys and Scrabble players Mike McKenna and Mary Goulet joined Jennifer on the legal team and have been actively discussing a wide range of important legal issues. They've considered liability insurance, intellectual property and trademark questions, as well as legal guidance for the organization's officers. Mike drafted a forthcoming conflict of interest policy, as well as guidance on the duties of loyalty, care, and obedience to ensure that the Board and the Executive Director always act in the best interests of the organization and not for their own personal financial gain. Together with the tournaments team, the legal team has also explored what health and safety parameters we might set upon our eventual return to live tournament play.

• Tournaments Team: The tournaments team has been thinking hard on its own, too. Team members Scott Jackson, Zachary Dang, and Will Anderson have looked at the current director certification process in light of the continually changing face of tournaments during the pandemic. They have also talked about hosting virtual tournaments on Woogles and setting up virtual clubs that would meet on a regular schedule.

• Communications and Marketing Team, Growth and Outreach Team: These are the two areas that we still need to flesh out. We definitely have ideas for both of them - the communications group will eventually be focused on putting out web and social content, such as the blog you're reading right now, as well as crafting long-term strategies for marketing and PR. The growth group, meanwhile, will be thinking of ways to expand the Scrabble community by bringing in new blood. So far, it's mostly been me managing the blog and social channels, and myself and Jennifer working on longer-term growth projects, and I'm definitely interested in adding some new team members to help with both. If this is something that interests you, please do get in touch.

For that matter, please contact us if you're interested in any of the above. The CoCo can't exist without the contributions of volunteer team members - so if you're thinking of stepping up and doing your part to help our community thrive, there's no better time than the present.