October 8, 2020
In attendance: Mary, Meaghan, Melissa, Karen, Brendan, Adam, Jasmine, Elise, Maisha, Gregory
Logistics: Standing meeting time changed to the 3rd Thursday of each month at 11:00am. Maisha begins maternity leave with our best wishes!
Financial report
PaLA CRD (PA Library Association, College and Research Division) Funding opportunities:
They fund on a rolling basis and recommend submitting applications at least a month in advance of need. Jess and Jasmine will work on applying in November or December
Wild Apricot fee paid on October 1: $1000.00 for a two year term. We continue to receive new memberships
Program + Planning Committee
October 16th: Registration filled up so fast! Wild Apricot was the wrong registration tool, so we replaced it with a Google Form. Adam will explore costs and benefits of upgrading our Wild Apricot software so that it could accommodate a larger number of registrations.
Registrations limited to 300 due to zoom limitations.
Shall we live tweet? We will have a hashtag, but is live tweeting worth the effort? This might be a good opportunity to grow the Twitter account. Retweeting/liking would be helpful. Brendan will live tweet the morning session. Elise, Mary and Brendan will live tweet afternoon workshops
We’ll send a follow up email after the event to include: session recordings, a call for membership, link to the website and a call for spring program ideas.
November 5th: tentatively titled “Critical Connections, Emergent Organizing: Black Library Workers in Community” Jasmine will meet with Andrea Lemoins on October 9.
December 4th – We’ll hold a discussion of the documentary: Change the Subject . We need suggestions for who could lead a panel talk back session. This event remains in planning stages.
Spring events
Suggestion to shift away from a traditional ‘call for program proposals’ model and instead crowdsource ideas for speakers, formats, and other details with the Chapter providing guidance, support, and help with marketing.
It may be difficult to get volunteers to take responsibility for events, but we could emphasize the opportunity for professional development.
We should mention it in the Chapter meeting at the October event and in the follow-up communication.
We may not be able to get funding, and the spring event is not planned as money generating. Jasmine will reach out to inquire about PaLA funds.
Should we consider either member-only events or charging registration fees for some events in order to be able to fund future speakers? Alternatively, we could balance one large, free event with some member-only events.
Are we ready for this model? Should we wait to adopt it until next year? This year, we’re trying out new programming and showing the value of membership. We can ask for money next time.
Student stipends: We need to be cautious with our funds. We don’t want to award a $1,000 stipend without knowing if we can afford it without draining our account. Should we make the application process more robust or perhaps provide an internship experience?
Communications
Third Interview with Karen is up on the blog. Mary will continue to reach out to board members individually for interviews and Meaghan will send out notifications when they are posted to the blog
Communications will help with the post 10/16 event follow up with recordings, announcements of future events, membership information, etc.
Social committee
Planning noontime social hour during Oct 16th event, keeping the volume of people in mind
Parents’ program: are there parent volunteers who will help facilitate?
Website updates
90% of site traffic comes from Google and bookmarks.Karen is restructuring the membership section and moving content with descriptions of committees (including two new committees) under volunteering opportunities. Additionally, she has added: a link to the membership directory that is more user friendly, a donation option which does not require login, and has updated the general contact email to the president’s email.
Remaining work to be done: Adding a mission statement, continuing a content audit, and exploring opportunities in Wild Apricot for profiles and the directory.
The Board should plan to review content at a future date.