January and February History

by Carol Lawless, Treasurer

The Southwestern Ontario Chapter has a strong tradition of successful February workshops. That meant we were usually busy planning through January, but there are some notables, over the years:

• January 1990 - Still a fledgling chapter, locally we identified 26 companies with technical communicators on staff, and a further 10 freelance/contracting companies.
• February 1995 - Our new FTP site was up and running on the internet. Most of the chapter’s executive could be reached via e-mail.
• February 1997 - Growing fast! In just over a year, the chapter membership grew by over 40% to 141.
• February 2001 - A new SIG was in the works - the Contractors/Independents/Consultants (CICs) SIG was looking for volunteers and members. It’s going strong today!

Our first workshop like "Managing Documentation Projects, and Estimating, Scheduling and Tracking Documentation Projects" was jointly sponsored by the Southwestern Ontario Chapter STC and the Centre for Professional Writing, University of Waterloo, in February 1991. A symposium on The Changed Role of the Technical Communicator in the Corporate Workplace followed.

Other successful workshops:

• JoAnn Hackos on Managing Documentation Projects.
• Jared Spool on Usability
• John Bowie on Reinventing Technical Communication
• Ginny Redish on Web Design
• Kim Goodwin on Goal Oriented Design for Communication Professionals
• Jonathan Price on Writing for Electronic Delivery