EAA remains financially strong, membership numbers now exceed 300,0000, and youths have many more opportunities to become involved in aviation through a myriad of new programs, said EAA CEO and Chairman of the Board Jack J. Pelton during the 2024 Annual Meeting on Wednesday.
Jack said the membership growth is particularly encouraging. “No. 1, there’s a big increase in the number of youth members, which will help ensure that we can grow the future of aviation,” he said. But there is also an increase in lifetime memberships, and it’s not because people think it’s a better financial deal. “It’s because they believe in what we are doing. And that’s very important to all of us.”
The 2023 convention was a record year, and Jack says he’s hoping this year’s event will be just as successful. May, June, and the beginning of July were very wet and created a lot of challenges to the grounds crew.
“Two weeks ago we were looking at 25 percent of the grounds being saturated, so we could not occupy those areas,” he said. But the weather took a turn and the team jumped in and was able to get grounds ready.
Youth programs have been expanded and are helping to grow youth involvement. EAA’s Youth Education Center cost $7 million but was paid for totally by donations. “We had 6,000 kids come through the Youth Education Center,” Jack said. “We offered over 19 different options of in-person educational programs for kids in grades K-12. That included over 482 Title 1 students, students who may never have had the opportunity to see what aviation is all about.”
EAA also had 579 scouts and 200 young women take part in programs, he added, as well as its Air Academy, AeroEducate, and other programs. KidVenture alone reached over 22,000 children.
In addition, EAA volunteers have now flown nearly 2.4 million Young Eagles, including giving over 61,000 flights last year, in part thanks to more than 1,200 new pilots in the program. EAA has also awarded more than 500 students Ray Aviation Scholarships for flying lessons, who have an 85 percent success rate.
“We’re very proud of these numbers and we will … continue to expand our offerings and the number of kids that we can serve,” Jack said.
But EAA’s programing for adults also saw increases. “Our webinar series, which gets information and knowledge out to our members, had a very strong attendance and over 27,000 people took advantage of those programs in the last year,” Jack said. “The Flight Proficiency Center was also off to a very solid first year … with 30-plus program offerings offered outside of AirVenture.”
In addition, the museum had record attendance with 90,000 visitors.
