1. Log in at http://groups.google.com/ as the contracola user. (Or if you are already logged into http://gmail.com/, type "http://groups.google.com" in the address bar of your browser, and hit "Enter".)
2. Click on "My Groups", then click on the "Manage" link under "Columbia Traditional Music and Dance".
3. Under Members (on the left-hand side of the page), click on "Direct add members".
4. Enter the new email addresses in the "Enter email addresses to add as members" box. Include each person's name (enclosed in double-quotes) and email address (enclosed in angle brackets). You can add several people at once (up to 10 at a time), one person per line, with a comma between each person:
"John Smith" <jsmith@hotmail.com>,
"Jane Doe" <jane.doe@yahoo.com>
5. In the "Write a welcome message" box enter text similar to "This is a general announcement list. You will normally get only one or two emails each month, one of which will be a reminder for the upcoming dance."
6. Make sure the radio button for "All email: send each message as it arrives" is checked.
7. Click the "Add members" button.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Minutes 12/8/09
Attending:
Virginia Winn (hostess)
John Wetzel
Dianne Britton
Fred Druseikis
Marguerite Frongillo
Lucy Gordon
Stephanie and Scott McCravy
Previous minutes approved.
Treasurer's Report:
We had 66 dancers in attendance at November's dance. We have $343 from that dance, and combined with what is already in the bank, we now have $1001 total. Scott has not yet deposited the $343 into the bank as of yet (12/8/09). Much discussion ensued when Lucy brought up the idea of creating what is essentially a savings or emergency fund for either unforeseen costs (i.e. hall rental increases) and/or projects that would benefit the organization. Everyone agreed that we should have such a fund, but we have not decided how such a situation would be managed. One idea is that we would put a percentage from each dance in which we are in the black. Another idea is that we would put a percentage of our yearly profits after the current dance season is over. After much discussion, Fred volunteered to compile data from the previous two dance seasons and come up with percentages that reflect our financial situation, so that we can address this issue more fully. Treasurer's Report is approved.
Form 990
John is going to call CDSS to see if we need to coordinate our fiscal year to theirs, which runs January to January. He can't submit the electronic form until after January 1st. There is a possibility we may need to change our bylaws.
Reunion Dance List
John, Dianne, and Connie have compiled their respective lists, so all that needs to be done is to incorporate Lucy's information and trim down the information to exclude people who will probably not be able to come, i.e. those who live too far away.
Email + Reply To
Dianne will separate the reply functions so that we can respond to either the individual or the entire group. Note that if you only reply to the individual, your response will not be archived. You must Reply All for the information to be archived.
Musician Outreach + New Caller Outreach/Community Development
John, Fred, and Dianne decided to come up with individual ways to garner new musicians. Fred suggested creating opportunities for musicians by having one or two dances a year where "guest" musicians can play, so that they can get experience playing music in a dance setting. Lucy brought some information on CDSS about the grants, etc. that they offer for callers and musicians.
Virginia reports that we do have one person who is interested in learning to call, but the person has not been contacted. We decided to put this person in contact with Kenny and/or Patrick to see what develops. Although Kenny lives out of town and Patrick has not officially called any dances there is potential there for developing a new caller. We could also invite the person(s) interested in calling to one of the dances where Kenny will be calling, so that he might begin showing/mentoring them. Fred and Lucy suggested having more active New Dancer's Workshops, where experienced dancers explain and teach the various dance moves. This could also become the first step in training new callers, so that they would not feel as if they were going in "cold", so to speak.
Lucy proposed that we get a more concrete organization of volunteers to do such things as helping new dancers. We could put some defining mark on the name tags, or create a special button so that experienced dancers who volunteer are easy to identify. Virginia suggested that we add the requests for volunteers on Connie's Facebook and Twitter accounts. Virginia also mentioned that she knows a freelance writer who may come and do a writeup of the dance for one of several publications.
Next meeting is scheduled for February 9, 2010.
Meeting adjourned at 9:37PM.
Virginia Winn (hostess)
John Wetzel
Dianne Britton
Fred Druseikis
Marguerite Frongillo
Lucy Gordon
Stephanie and Scott McCravy
Previous minutes approved.
Treasurer's Report:
We had 66 dancers in attendance at November's dance. We have $343 from that dance, and combined with what is already in the bank, we now have $1001 total. Scott has not yet deposited the $343 into the bank as of yet (12/8/09). Much discussion ensued when Lucy brought up the idea of creating what is essentially a savings or emergency fund for either unforeseen costs (i.e. hall rental increases) and/or projects that would benefit the organization. Everyone agreed that we should have such a fund, but we have not decided how such a situation would be managed. One idea is that we would put a percentage from each dance in which we are in the black. Another idea is that we would put a percentage of our yearly profits after the current dance season is over. After much discussion, Fred volunteered to compile data from the previous two dance seasons and come up with percentages that reflect our financial situation, so that we can address this issue more fully. Treasurer's Report is approved.
Form 990
John is going to call CDSS to see if we need to coordinate our fiscal year to theirs, which runs January to January. He can't submit the electronic form until after January 1st. There is a possibility we may need to change our bylaws.
Reunion Dance List
John, Dianne, and Connie have compiled their respective lists, so all that needs to be done is to incorporate Lucy's information and trim down the information to exclude people who will probably not be able to come, i.e. those who live too far away.
Email + Reply To
Dianne will separate the reply functions so that we can respond to either the individual or the entire group. Note that if you only reply to the individual, your response will not be archived. You must Reply All for the information to be archived.
Musician Outreach + New Caller Outreach/Community Development
John, Fred, and Dianne decided to come up with individual ways to garner new musicians. Fred suggested creating opportunities for musicians by having one or two dances a year where "guest" musicians can play, so that they can get experience playing music in a dance setting. Lucy brought some information on CDSS about the grants, etc. that they offer for callers and musicians.
Virginia reports that we do have one person who is interested in learning to call, but the person has not been contacted. We decided to put this person in contact with Kenny and/or Patrick to see what develops. Although Kenny lives out of town and Patrick has not officially called any dances there is potential there for developing a new caller. We could also invite the person(s) interested in calling to one of the dances where Kenny will be calling, so that he might begin showing/mentoring them. Fred and Lucy suggested having more active New Dancer's Workshops, where experienced dancers explain and teach the various dance moves. This could also become the first step in training new callers, so that they would not feel as if they were going in "cold", so to speak.
Lucy proposed that we get a more concrete organization of volunteers to do such things as helping new dancers. We could put some defining mark on the name tags, or create a special button so that experienced dancers who volunteer are easy to identify. Virginia suggested that we add the requests for volunteers on Connie's Facebook and Twitter accounts. Virginia also mentioned that she knows a freelance writer who may come and do a writeup of the dance for one of several publications.
Next meeting is scheduled for February 9, 2010.
Meeting adjourned at 9:37PM.
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Minutes 11/10/09
Attending:
Stephanie and Scott McCravy
John Wetzel
Dianne Britton
Fred Druseikis
Virginia Winn
Connie Robinette (hostess)
Previous minutes approved.
Connie reported that the schedule looks good regarding bands and callers.
We briefly discussed the musician outreach idea and decided that John, Connie, Fred, and Dianne would continue to head/develop such a committee.
John will take care of the Form 990 situation, which requires submission of a statement regarding our financial gross within three months of our fiscal year. This would mean that the statement needed to be submitted by October. John also suggested we set some kind of reminder in place so that this form get filed on time.
Treasurer's Report: We currently have $658, and we need over $700 for hall and organization fees. As a result, we will defer any extraneous spending. Treasurer's Report approved.
Website Status:
Dianne reported that the website looks good and the transition is going well. The emails are in the system, and Dianne can inform others on the board on how to add emails and send out announcements. She will continue to do the announcements and the Q & A portion of the website.
Community Development/Membership Committee:
Virginia and Lucy are still collecting and updating emails. Virginia provided samples of the outreach CDs that may require editing. There is also a signup sheet for volunteers at the community development table in addition to email signup. We discussed splitting the Publicity Committee from the Community Committee, but as of now there are not enough people to split these functions up.
Fred discovered that the Free Times are not so free for people wanting to place ads, so that venue is not viable for our organization. We discussed Public Service Announcements as another publicity device, but those are not viable either. However, WUSC is run by students at their own discretion, so perhaps Marina could plug COTMD when she is on-air. Fred and Dianne agreed to ask her opinion on this idea.
Reunion Dance:
Fred suggested that we use the idea of a reunion dance but not the function. Essentially we would promote one of our regularly scheduled dances as a "Reunion Dance" to hopefully bring out dancers whom we haven't seen for a time, while giving our regular dance a little something extra. We decided to dig up the old email list to send out to board members, so we could all go through the names and compile a new list with updated information of former regulars to notify.
Our next meeting is scheduled for December 8, 2009.
Meeting adjourned at 8:56PM.
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