A New STC Year... a new adventure

by Opal Gamble, President

It's already September of 2004... can you believe the summer went by so quickly? I barely feel like summer had a chance to start, and it's already time to start digging out the sweaters. Which means that it's officially my time to start my term as chapter president.

Perspective

All incoming presidents seem to have an arm-twisting story to tell. I do too, but I'll spare you the details. Let's just say that despite the terror of suddenly realizing that I am in charge of the chapter's well-being for the next 12 months (eek!) I'm happy to be here.

More importantly, I'm looking forward to the challenge of continuing our chapter's impressive history of shaking things up while providing first-rate services for our membership. I have some very big shoes to fill.

The Transformation

Many of you have probably heard about the STC's Transformation. While big, scary rumours are flying about these changes, our incoming management team emphasized at the Balitimore Conference that the transformation is not about the end of chapters, or the end of anything. It's about providing member value.

That sounds like a pretty sensible goal to me.

Goals for This Year

So, in the spirit of providing member value, your council is focusing on three areas this year:

1. Retain current membership—each and every chapter member is important to us and we want you to know it!
2. Provide self-directed benefits—do you need an answer to a problem? We think we can help!
3. Increase student and new member involvement—breaking into the technical communication field can be daunting...the STC is a valuable resource.

Current Membership Benefits

STC-SOC has, and will continue to, support these goals with ongoing projects. For example, our chapter provides the following benefits:

• general meetings and phone seminars that address a variety of technical communication topics and levels of experience
• education days that entertain and enlighten
• award winning, informative monthly newsletters
• successful writing competitions to provide peer-driven feedback about your projects

And that's just the really big stuff!

New Benefits

We plan on expanding on our accomplishments to give you even more bang with your membership dollar. Over the next month, you'll hear about the first of what I hope will become a number of networking, learning, and mentoring events.

However, we can't expand our chapter services without your help.

Volunteers Needed

Please, share your comments—positive and negative—with us throughout the year. Feel free to contact me, or any other council member, about your concerns. We really do want to hear what you have to say! Likewise, I encourage you to be an active member of our chapter; all of us are volunteers—and you know what they say about many hands and light work.

Welcome to a new year of STC. I hope you are as excited about it as I am!

About Opal Gamble

Technical writer, web monkey, and general geek, Opal's wanted to be a tech writer since high school; she became a STC-SOC council member in 1997. A graduate of UW's co-op Rhetoric and Professional Writing program, Opal is a Technical Writer and (unofficial) web designer at Virtek. She also runs her own freelance business.

When she's not doing STC business, Opal participates in auto-cross events (with a hybrid car, no less!) and tries to cultivate a green thumb in her garden.