Rings of Council - by Jody Watermann

The National Council of Catholic Women is organized into several levels of rings. It is important to understand these rings and how they work as a vehicle to get important information from one level to the next and how to use the representation at each level to its best advantage.
The most comprehensive level is the National Council of Catholic Women. Every woman who is a member in another ring is a member of NCCW. The officers of NCCW are elected by the membership. The board members are the Province Directors from throughout the United States and the Military CCW. These Province Directors attend NCCW board meetings and bring information and suggested activities back to their Province.
A Province is made up of several dioceses. NCCW uses the same geographical divisions as the United States Council of Catholic Bishops to define the province. The president of each member diocese serves on the Province Board. The president of the province may be appointed or elected. Each province has its own guidelines that it follows.
The next level is a diocese. The diocesan board should be made up of officers that may be elected and the presidents of the next level. This next level can be referred to in many ways, depending on the area of the country you live in. It can be called a deanery, a district, a vicariate or some other name. Basically, it again follows USCCB divisions.
Leadership at the deanery level should bring parish presidents together as its board. Unfortunately, this level is sometimes inactive and information doesn’t get to the parish level. When this happens, the programs of NCCW may suffer.
BUT, if your parish is affiliated with NCCW, and you finance attendance at the NCCW Annual Convention for your president where she has a vote in all the business sessions, you will be able to implement NCCW programs directly. Be aware that many parishes use different names to identify their woman’s group so check with your parish to make sure they pay their annual dues to NCCW.
Finally, the most important level is YOU! Without you there would be no NCCW. You are invited to be an individual member (go to www.nccw.org/membership/ to join if you are not already an individual member) .
Together we can be a force for good in our communities. Thank you for being a part of NCCW!