Free Education: The Hunt for a Red-Hot Speaker

by Debbie Kerr, President

Part of the joy of being a technical communicator is constantly learning new information. We learn new information so that we can explain it, because that is what we do. We also have to learn things to keep ahead in our profession. The question is, “What do we want to learn?”

The Purpose

Every year, we select speakers that we think you might want to hear. This year, we thought we would try something new. We want you to tell us who you want to be our presenter(s) at this year’s education seminars. Maybe you have seen a particular speaker advertised at a conference and thought you’d love to hear that speaker, but not been able to attend that conference. Maybe you have seen someone on the Internet, but not seen a speaking engagement listed anywhere close to you. We want to know the names of those speakers.

We want to know what are hot topics for you. What topics would interest you enough to make a trip to the Cambridge/Kitchener-Waterloo area to attend our seminars? We can only offer you what you want if we know what you want.

The Process

1. Find that perfect speaker.
2. Write a paragraph about why this is the perfect speaker.
3. Provide the name of the speaker, the speaker's contact information, a website that describes the workshops/seminars that the speaker does.
4. Provide your contact information.
5. Email everything to education@stc-soc.org by November 3, 2006.

The council will then review the entries and decide whether to use one of the entries as the speaker for the seminar. Topic, availability, and price can all be deciding factors. It's finding the correct combination that makes this so special.

The Prize

In fact, because this is such a special event, we decided to make this a prize-worthy event. If you send us information that ultimately leads to us selecting your speaker for our education seminars, then we will let you attend the seminars for free. Where more than one person submits the same speaker's name, the person who submits the speaker's name first will be considered the winner. Where one speaker is used for each day, each submitter will receive one free seminar day.

If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask. Your success is our success.

About Debbie Kerr

In the 20 years that Debbie has been writing documentation, she has worked in a variety of industries: government, retail, software, and insurance. She is currently employed at The Economical Insurance Group in Waterloo, where she has stepped out of her traditional role of writing user guides and help files, and now writes a variety of specifications.

Debbie has been a member of the STC since 1994 and has been a council member for many years. For the second year in a row, Debbie has bravely taken on the role of Chapter President.