| May/June | 2001 |
| Vol. 58, | No. 5 |
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Inside . . .You can view the Boston Broadside in PDF. Adobe's free Acrobat Reader is required to view PDF files. President's Message: Denise Dunne Bids Farewell Director-Sponsor's Report: STC's 48th Annual Conference Avid Takes Top Honors at Competitions2000 Review of e-Video: Producing Internet Video as Broadband Technologies Converge Society for Technical Communication, Inc. |
The Winter 2001 STC Board ReportBy Kathleen B. Aughey The winter STC Board of Directors meeting was held in San Diego, CA., this past January. The temperature stayed in the mid 60s, and I enjoyed it to the maximum; sunshine does make you feel great! The STC Board Report is below, but I would like to add that Region 1 had 13 Distinguished Chapter Service Awards approved, Jane Aronovitch from Toronto and Nan Fritz from Boston were elected as Associate Fellows, and Deborah Sauer from Boston was elected a Fellow. Actions Taken at the MeetingFormation of three new chapters was approved, bringing the total number of chapters worldwide to 153 (120 regular chapters and 33 student chapters):
The following appointments to Society-level committees were approved: Kathryn M. Poe (Manager, STC Public Relations Competition Committee) and Paula Stanzioni (Manager, Education & Research Special Interest Group). Fiscal year 2001 income and expenses as of October 31, 2000, were reviewed and approved. Income and expenses are well within budget. STC will be returning about two-thirds of $1 million to chapters to support their fiscal year 2001 programs and activities. A merit grant of $3,000 was awarded to the Mercer University student chapter to build its scholarship fund. A research grant of $10,000 was awarded to Eva R. Brumberger for a study entitled The Rhetoric of Typography: A Study Investigating Typeface Personality and Its Impact on the Reading Process. Other Items of InterestNew STC logo. A graphic toolkit and templates for STC materials were made available to chapters (presidents, newsletter editors, and Webmasters), Society-level committees, and Special Interest Groups (SIGs) and placed on the STC Web site in March. These tools will help guide groups in implementing the new look. Work is under way to redesign the STC Web site. Elections. This year, the balloting process will include an option to vote online. The 2001 election materials will contain the necessary information to ensure secure online voting. Voting online will be optional; members may still choose to vote by mail. Membership. STC continues to grow at a steady rate, and membership now stands at 23,553. Total membership is projected to reach 26,000 by the end of March. Current distribution of membership: U.S. 87.2%, Canada 8.6%, other countries 4.1%. STC's annualized 10-year growth rate is 4.6%, with growth rates as follows: U.S. 3.9%, Canada 10.8%, other countries 11.7% (the greatest area of growth). Membership directory. The STC membership directory has been placed online. It allows members to search on members' first and last names. The results display the member's name, address, phone number, fax number, e-mail address, chapter, grade, and date joined. Annual Conference. Preparations for the 48th Annual Conference in Chicago (May 13-16) are well under way. The conference program committee reviewed nearly 400 proposals and selected about 440 speakers for 256 sessions. About 41 booths have already been contracted for the vendor exhibit. For updated information about the Annual Conference, visit the STC's conference pages. Technical Communication journal. Abstracts and PDFs of the 1996 and 1997 issues have now been posted on the Technical Communication Online Web site. Recommendations from usability studies performed by graduate students at Mercer University have been incorporated in the Web site. Check it out! STC governance. This year, the STC Board of Directors is conducting a series of workshops at its regular meetings to evaluate governance. This activity is an outgrowth of STC's new mission statement: "Designing the future of technical communication." What model of governance would be most effective in leading STC into that future? Aspects being evaluated include the structure of representation, the way that decisions are made, the balance of volunteer and office staff workloads, and communication patterns. A clear picture of leadership has dominated the workshopone that focuses on trends, vision, strategy, and best practices; that embraces outside influences; that concentrates on setting policy rather than on operational details. A concluding workshop in May will set short-term and long-term goals for meeting those objectives. Kathleen B. Aughey is the Director-Sponsor for Region 1. May 1, 2001 |