There’s a particular kind of quiet that comes with a milestone like this one. The celebrations are wonderful, and I’ve loved every one of them. But underneath the anniversary events and the old photographs, I keep coming back to a question that feels less like a celebration and more like a responsibility: what does it take to carry something this meaningful forward?
Gateway began in 1926 as a small gathering place for people who were hard of hearing. This year, we served 8,255 individuals and businesses across every county in Maryland, DC, and seven other states. We provided more than 30,000 interpreting hours. We run a K–8 school. We offer audiology, speech therapy, occupational therapy, ASL education, and community programs that reach people at every stage of life.
That is an extraordinary amount of change for one organization to hold. And yet, when I read about the people who started Gateway, I recognize them. The tools are different, the buildings are different, but the belief is the same: everyone deserves to understand and be understood.
So the question isn’t whether Gateway will change in its next century. It will. The question is how we lead that change without losing what makes us who we are.
Knowing what to protect
Every organization with a long history faces a temptation to treat everything it has ever done as sacred. I understand the instinct. When something has worked for decades, it feels risky to touch it.
But I’ve come to believe that protecting a mission and protecting every habit are two very different things. The mission is the reason we exist. The habits are just the way we’ve done things so far.
What I want to protect at Gateway is the part you can’t write into a procedure manual: the way our staff meet people where they are. The patience of a speech therapist working with a child who is finding their words. The care an audiologist takes to make sure a patient leaves understanding their options, not just their results. The interpreter who shows up prepared because they know that a medical appointment or a parent-teacher conference matters deeply to the person relying on them.
Being willing to update the rest
Here’s the harder part. A 100-year-old organization carries a lot of structure it has built along the way. Some of it was built for a Gateway that was smaller, simpler, or serving a different set of needs. Some of it still serves us beautifully. Some of it creates friction that nobody chose on purpose.
I spend a lot of my time thinking about the work behind the work: how information moves between departments, how people get onboarded, how decisions get made and communicated. None of it is glamorous. All of it shapes what it feels like to work here and what it feels like to be served by us.
When a family calls Gateway, they don’t experience our org chart. They experience us. If our systems are confusing internally, that confusion eventually reaches the people we exist to serve. That’s why I believe culture is operational. The way we run things is the way we treat people.
What the next century asks of leaders
When I think about what Gateway needs from its leaders going forward, three things rise to the top.
Clarity. People do their best work when expectations are clear and support is consistent. As we grow, it becomes easier for priorities to blur and for teams to assume someone else is holding a piece of the work. Clarity is care. It’s one of the most practical ways leaders can protect the people doing the hardest parts of this job.
Sustainability. Mission-driven work has a way of asking for everything. Our staff care deeply, and that care can quietly turn into overextension if we aren’t paying attention. Leadership isn’t just about pace. It’s about building an organization where people can do this work for years, not just survive it for a season.
Unity. Gateway is many departments, but it’s one mission. A student in our school, a patient in our audiology clinic, a business booking an interpreter, and an adult learning ASL for the first time are all part of the same story. The more we lead like one organization, the more fully we can serve people whose needs don’t fit neatly into a single program.
Honoring history without being limited by it
I think the best way to honor the people who built Gateway is to do what they did: pay attention to what the community needs and have the courage to respond. They didn’t know what Gateway would become in 2026. They just knew people deserved to be understood, and they built something around that belief.
We don’t know what Gateway will look like in 2126, either. The technology will change. The needs will change. Some of the services we offer today may look very different or be joined by ones we haven’t imagined yet.
What I hope stays the same is the belief at the center and the people who carry it. If we protect that, and build structures strong enough to support it, the next century is in good hands.
Here’s to the next hundred years. We’re building it right now.
Learn More About Gateway
Gateway gives hope, changes lives, and builds connections for Marylanders. Gateway connects people to their worlds and aids individuals in their ability to understand and to be understood. Gateway has grown into an organization that serves more than 8,000 children and adults every year, helping them communicate more effectively. With programming both on our Baltimore campus and through community-based programming, we provide education, access, and medical support to anyone who needs it.
We envision a society where everyone can understand and be understood and where everyone is treated with integrity, compassion, and equity.
