2012 National Order of the Arrow Conference Session #: The OA’s Many Useful Publications
SESSION LENGTH: 50 Minutes
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
§ Define what a “publication” is.
§ Discuss different publications your lodge uses
§ Identify different ways of spreading the word.
§ Recognize how publications are used in different ways.
§ Understand different groups that will be affected by a publication.
REQUIRED MATERIALS:
§ Computer with internet connection
§ Power Point presentation file
§ Projector
§ National bulletin to hand out
§ Access to internet
§ Flipchart and markers
Trainer preparation
Because this session involves instruction of the internet, having access to the internet to explain/demonstrate the technologies is essential. It is suggested that the trainer become familiar with the technologies before the scheduled presentation. When breakout sessions occur make an effort to form breakout groups with members from different parts of the country. It is also essential that the trainer have examples of different types of publications.
TRAINER TIP: Trainer should have a PowerPoint presentation developed and able to be shown at time of training session that shows the essential parts to an important publication. Also have a list of different types of publications
SESSION NARRATIVE
INTRODUCTION: 5-7 MINUTES
To begin, let’s all introduce ourselves. Knowing how your lodge reaches out to its members is important. When you introduce yourself, please state your name, lodge, and what you believe to be the biggest communication challenge your lodge is facing right now or one place where publications were the reason for your success or failure.
All of us have experienced situations where publications have either been the key to success or the reason for failure. Publications with in a lodge can truly be a make or break factor in the lodge’s ability to meet its goals.
[Review session objectives with participants.]
Begin discussion by looking at some of the situations raised by participants in their introduction. How was communications that make or break factor for that situation?
[Solicit a few responses from participants; discuss the effect of communication on that situation. Ask for other thoughts/ideas from the group]
Advance PP Slide Effective Publications
Effective publications can be broken down into three major components:
§ Who is your intended audience?
§ What is the goal of your publication?
§ What methods will you implement to communicate?
[Ask the participants:]
Who are our lodges trying to communicate with using our communication strategies?
[Solicit responses from the group. Answers may include, but are not limited to the following:]
§ General Lodge Membership
§ Special Emphasis
o OA Troop/Team Representatives
o Brotherhood Candidates
o Specific Event Attendees
§ LEC members
§ Unit Leaders
§ Council Leadership
§ Community
§ Parents
[Ask the participants:]
So, now that we have an idea of who we are trying to reach, what and/or why are we trying to communicate to these people using our communication strategies?
[Solicit responses from the group. Answers may include, but are not limited to the following:]
§ Information (Dates, times, fees, logistics)
§ Changes in information
§ Ideas and Values
§ History and Traditions
§ Motivation and encouragement
§ Building community/sense of purpose and being
§ Promotional
§ Benefits (to troop, community, council, parents/guardians, individual scouts)
[Ask the participants:]
So, we have an idea of who we are trying to reach, and what we are trying to communicate to them. How are we currently trying to do this? What methods are your lodges currently implementing to communicate with your members?
[Solicit responses from the group. Record them on the flip chart. Answers may include, but are not limited to the following:]
§ Newsletter
§ Website
§ Email lists
§ Facebook page
§ Instant Message
Trainer Tip: This list may not be very long. The next question is intended to try to draw a contrast between what our lodges are currently using and how many people prefer to communicate. This will lead into a discussion of what can be done.
The trainer should divide the room between youth and adults.
[When divided ask participants]
How do you communicate with and get information from your friends/colleagues/school/work/other public news sources?
[Solicit responses from the group. Record them on two flip charts, one for youth, and one for adults. Answers may include, but are not limited to the following:]
§ Newsletter
§ Website
§ Email lists
§ Facebook/MySpace/Social Networking site
§ RSS Feeds
§ Podcasts
§ Voice over IP (VoIP)
§ Collaborative File Sharing
§ Wikis
§ Text Messaging
§ Instant Messaging
[It is likely, that the adults in the room will come up with a list of more “traditional methods” such as over the phone, letters/mailings, email. The youth may have a list that is similar to the one above. Comment on the two lists. The idea here is to demonstrate that most of today’s youth operate in a much more digital world.]
It is probable that most lodges are not implementing as many techniques as we have listed above. Many will not even be close. Especially when many lodges are looking to retain members, especially youth, why aren’t we communicating with them in the ways that they naturally communicate with each other?
Let’s look at some of the latest technologies in use today and see if/how they could be used as communications tools for your lodge.
Today’s Communication Technologies 20-30 Minutes
Advance PP Slide Online Social Networking Communities
Trainer Tip: If possible, demonstrate these technologies during the session. All of these either involve free accounts or have easily accessible examples that can be shown. It is suggested that your examples and demonstrations be practiced and staged before the session in order to conserve set-up time.
Trainer Tip: In this section avoid giving suggestions/ideas for implementation. The participants will be asked to brainstorm how these technologies could be beneficial later on in the session.
Online Social Networking Communities
Trainer Tip: If possible, then navigate to your Facebook, MySpace, or MyScouting community website. Show the participants how to use the website.
Social networking websites have grown rapidly in popularity over the past few years. The sites focus on building online communities of people who share interests and/or activities, or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. One way of communicating to your lodge/chapter members is to start a group on one of these sites. Groups are ways to connect people with a very specific common interest.
[On Facebook, search for groups involving “Order of the Arrow”. At the time of this writing, there were hundreds of OA related groups. Show some examples of the different groups]
Most online networking communities include a space for email when you register. Every time that a group sends a message, the group member gets an email. This is great to communicate with members. It fills email boxes with reminders about meetings, registration deadlines for events, etc. Other social networking website features include:
§ Discussion Boards
§ Ability to contact and live chat with other group members
§ Areas to post pictures and videos
§ Create event lists
§ Create links to other resources
§ Mobile access from smartphones
Popular social networking sites include Facebook (http://www.facebook.com), MySpace (http://www.myspace.com) and LinkedIn (http://www.linkedin.com). At the 2009 National Conference, the NOAC re:MIX (http://www.noacremix.org) site was launched as a social networking site for conference staff and participants.
Advance PP Slide Blogging
Blogging
A blog (short for "weblog") is a website, usually maintained by a person who makes regular postings. Postings are usually displayed in reverse-chronological order. Many blogs provide commentary or news on a particular subject, while other blogs function as more of a personal online diary. One of the signature features of a blog is the ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format.
[Navigate to a website that has been setup using a blogging service or software. Find an OA related blog if possible]
Trainer Tip: If time permits, the trainer may want to go to a site such as Blogger and demonstrate how to set up a site. (In most cases, a blog can be set up in under five minutes).
If your lodge, chapter, or committee is looking to start or redesign their website, blogging software may be a fast, cost effective, and easy to maintain solution. There are many free blogging services available today. They take only a few minutes to setup, and can be easily updated by anyone as most blogs do not require a background in web design, HTML, or computer programming. A simple WYSIWYG (What you see is what you get) interface is used to post announcements, pictures, etc.
Popular blogging services include Blogger (http://www.blogger.com), LiveJournal (http://www.livejournal.com), Blog.com (http://www.blog.com), TypePad (http://www.typepad.com), and Word Press (http://www.wordpress.org).
Advance PP Slide Micro-Blogging
Micro-Blogging
Micro-blogging is a type of blog that has become popular over the past two or three years. The concept is the same as a blog, except micro-blog entries are typically shorter; in most cases under 140 characters in length. The most popular micro-blogging service is Twitter (http://www.twitter.com). Twitter asks one question of its users: “What are you doing?”
[Navigate to Twitter. If an account has been created, login to your account. Demonstrate how simple it is to post to your account. ]
Recently the National Council, BSA started using Twitter. The BSA website, Boy’s Life, and ScoutStuff are all using Twitter to send out updates! (http://www.scouting.org/follow/twitter.aspx)
Advance PP Slide Podcasting
Podcasting
Podcasts are “a series of digital computer files, usually either digital audio or video, which is released periodically and made available for download by means of web syndication.”
The syndication aspect of the delivery is what differentiates podcasts from other ways of accessing files. Special client software applications known as podcatchers can automatically identify and retrieve new files in a given series when they are made available, new files can thus be downloaded automatically by the podcatcher and stored locally on the user's computer or other device for offline use.
[Find an example of a site that uses podcasts and show to the group. At the time of the writing of this syllabus, the National BSA website was featuring podcasting at http://www.scouting.org/ScoutCast.aspx. If this link is broken, go to the http://www.scouting.org and search the site for podcast. If neither work, search online for an appropriate podcast]
While it can look intimidating, podcasting is very simple to do. All you need is a microphone or video camera, recording software on your computer, and a connection to the internet. A free, and easy to use recording software is Audacity (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/) Once you have created your podcast, you can upload it to your lodge website, or some other hosting service. To subscribe to podcasts you will require a program called a podcatcher. This software will check your subscription to the podcast and look for new episodes. When new ones arrive, it will download them to your computer for you to watch when ever or where ever you want. Two popular podcatcher software packages are Apple Inc.'s iTunes (http://www.apple.com/itunes/) or Nullsoft's Winamp (http://www.winamp.com/)
When you have downloaded the podcast, you can listen or watch it on your computer, or load it to your smartphone, or MP3 player and take it with you on the go.
Advance PP Slide Internet Telephony
Internet Telephony
Phone calls are obviously nothing new. But using the internet to have a voice conversation with someone is. For people who are paying per call, or for lodges where calling the ceremonies chairman is a long distance call, paying for all of these important phone conversations can become very expensive.
Skype may be a great solution of this. Skype is a software application that allows users to make telephone calls over the Internet. Calls to other users of the service are free, while calls to other landlines and mobile phones can be made for a fee,(in some cases for a cheaper price than your phone company is offering). Additional features of Skype include instant messaging, conference calling, file transfer and video conferencing.
To begin Skyping, all you have to do is download the software, install it and sign up for an account. Then you can begin connecting with other friends who have Skype. If you have an internet connection and a microphone, you can begin talking directly to them. The Skype client software can be downloaded at http://www.skype.com.
[If time permits, demonstrate how Skype works. Prearrange a time during the session for you and a friend to be signed into Skype and have a brief conversation.]
Advance PP Slide SMS Messaging
SMS Messaging
Anyone who has been around someone with a smartphone or cell phone has seen how popular SMS (text) messaging has become. Many people use SMS as one of the primary ways of communicating with friends and family. We are seeing companies using direct SMS messaging as a way to market products and services to potential customers. We are also seeing universities, schools, and businesses using a mass SMS messaging system as a means to communicate with the school or office community in the event of an emergency. Text messaging has been a big part of this year’s conference as well.
In addition to a lodge email distribution list, could we offer a lodge SMS distribution list? The answer is yes, with a few thoughts. Of all the technologies we have talked about, this can potentially be the most pricey to implement. Many companies do make software, intended to be installed on a server, which will give you the ability to send mass SMS messages to groups of numbers you have collected, receive messages from users, and manage connections and lists. This software usually has to run on a dedicated server. For the average lodge investing in a $2000 server and about $2500 worth of software might be out of the realm of possibility. There are some other free or most cost effective solutions available.
If you are using blogging software such as WordPress or Joomla, there are plug-ins available that are designed to work with your blog. Google has release the ability to send SMS messages from Google Chat. Other companies are now building SMS into their products. Search around on the internet to find a solution that will work in your lodge or council.