AFCEAN of the Month, February 2025
Courtney Powell, president and CEO of AceApplications, serves as the Orlando Chapter president, Central Florida Chapter small business chair and Orlando liaison. He promotes AFCEA membership through active participation in external events, provides direction and input on matters outside of his volunteer role, and he single-handedly got the Space Coast AFCEA presence activated by planning and hosting events. Most notably, he is the main reason that AFCEA’s Orlando Chapter has been rechartered.
The Orlando Chapter had been closed and absorbed into the Central Florida Chapter the previous year, and after attending only a few Central Florida Chapter luncheons, Powell raised his hand and was appointed to be the chapter’s Orlando liaison. The liaison position was created by the Central Florida board to extend the reach beyond the Tampa area to the AFCEA members in the Orlando area. Powell jumped right in, hosting several evening events with the initial goal of keeping an AFCEA presence in that area and the long-term goal of gauging interest in fully reestablishing the Orlando Chapter. From the beginning, it was obvious that Powell had a more compressed timeframe, and he quickly gathered a mountain of community support from the Orlando business and educational communities. He saw that reestablishing the AFCEA chapter could become a differentiator in a crowded professional organization landscape.
Powell quickly partnered with Central Florida Tech Grove, a 6,400-square-foot modeling and simulation collaboration space created for technical incubation. This partnership offered a consistent and cost-effective meeting place to grow AFCEA’s presence. In a very short period of months, Powell established a dedicated group of volunteers and was scheduling and hosting well-attended meetings on a regular basis.
During this time, Powell also stepped up to volunteer and serve in a second role as the Central Florida small business chair, making the two-to-three hour drive down Florida’s dreaded I-4 corridor to plan and coordinate the chapter’s small business events. Powell’s contributions to AFCEA are many, but none greater than his commitment to recharter the Orlando Chapter.
With his leadership and the help of the dedicated team of Orlando volunteers, the Orlando Chapter was rechartered by AFCEA International President and CEO Lt. Gen. Susan Lawrence, USA (Ret.), on November 6, 2024. We are extremely proud to award our AFCEAN of the Month to Courtney Powell.
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