Our friend, Aaron Woods
Our friend and one of our co-founders, Aaron Woods, recently passed away. It always made me smile when I reflected on his life story. Somehow, each of our decisions led us to arrive in the community we call Wilsonville. I’m from an urban, Black neighborhood in east Cleveland, and he's from an urban, Black neighborhood in south side Chicago, yet here we are, in a white, suburban Oregon. But when I moved here in 2018, I found what Aaron had discovered over a decade earlier: Wilsonville is a collection of diverse, caring people.
Aaron has forever shaped my approach as a leader. I’ll never forget how he taught me that the most significant role a leader can play is to connect. Connect hardworking, passionate people with others like them— and those in power. Do this constantly. Take joy in it. Through these connections, you'll create a network so strong that the community will spawn resiliency, dynamism, and activation.
Being a co-chair with Aaron at WAIC was like having an excellent teammate who is driven to pursue diversity, equity, and inclusion, but in a way that is bipartisan and reaches across all ages, abilities, ethnicities, and touches people from all walks of life.
His passing is so heartbreaking because he wasn’t done! A few weeks ago, he talked to me at length about how he had been working in the legislature and with the Governor to get our state set up to better leverage AI and technology in addressing inequalities in access and training for our most underserved communities. Aaron has been at the forefront of the technology industry for the last 50 years, so I know when he tells me to pay attention to something, I’m all ears. We all should be.
On behalf of the WAIC community, I want to say that our hearts break for this loss, and our love extends to his wife and kids at this time.
Miss you, my friend.
Sincerely,
Great Prior
Take action, donate to help others
Aaron was passionate about connecting people to the training and resources needed to help them survive and thrive. He was serving as a board member on the Clackamas Community College and I would encourage you to make a donation to the Clackamas Community College Foundation (click here) that will help support this work in our community.
For more information, you can read statements from the City of Wilsonville and from his colleagues in the Oregon Legislature. More about his story and the issues he was working on can be found on his webpage.