News

Loretta Arellano
MEMBER GRADE: Senior Member

IEEE has played an important role in Loretta Arellano’s life and career, from student through retirement. Professionally, “IEEE helped me build my network, stay current with technology, and gain the management skills I’ve used throughout my career,” she said. According to Arellano, whose various positions have included serving on the IEEE Board as well as the IEEE Technical Activities (TAB), Member and Geographic Activities (MGA), and USA Boards, IEEE also offered her the opportunity to not only participate in established activities but to create new ones. “For example, working with some great volunteers and staff, we created the Volunteer Leadership Training (VOLT) program, which has trained many leaders within IEEE,” she said. “It’s been very rewarding to see the positive impact it’s had on volunteers and IEEE as a whole.”

Since her retirement in 2016, Arellano, 2018 winner of the IEEE Foundation-sponsored IEEE Haraden Pratt Award for outstanding volunteer service to IEEE, has begun capitalizing on opportunities to engage with areas of IEEE beyond her own field. Among them, “I became involved with the ‘IEEE-USA Community Outreach MOVE’ initiative in 2018 and quickly found a new group of inspired people,” she said of MOVE, an emergency relief program committed to assisting victims of natural disasters with short-term communications, computer, and power solutions. “Since MOVE primarily functions on the east coast of the United States and I’m on the west coast, I didn’t think I could contribute much, but I quickly found that I could participate as the communication lead. MOVE is doing great things by supporting hard-hit areas ravaged by hurricanes and I look forward to engaging more in 2021.”

“One of the nice things about IEEE is that there are so many areas to get involved with,” said Arellano, who’s been inspired by the breadth of IEEE’s impact. “I believe it’s important to give back to an organization that’s given me so much over the years and that’s why I actively engage in many areas of IEEE.”