Six people gathered on the evening of February 20 for the new organization’s first volunteers’ meeting. Attending was Sebastien Duverne, Kelly L’Archevêque, Chris L., Mary Perchanok, Charles Roburn, and Jim Royal.
The volunteer group spent about an hour brainstorming for a name for the new organization, based on discussions held earlier on the “After STC-Montreal” blog.
The group strongly preferred a bilingual name and acronym. Although the language of most technical writing in Montreal is English, and events held by the organization will primarily be in English, the group concluded that a bilingual name and French content on the web site might make the organization welcoming to a larger number of people.
The volunteer group also felt that the term “communicators” (instead of “communication”) would make the new name more personal and engaging, as it directly refers to people rather than to the profession.
The group came up with five names, which will be posted on the blog for feedback and a general poll.
The volunteers’ group also discussed new types of events for the organization; events that go beyond the dinner-and-lecture format. While Andy Gural is continuing to work toward scheduling educational events, the focus of this discussion was to create social events that foster more interaction among the attendees.
In addition to reviewing the ideas put forward in the new org proposal, the group considered holding a short video competition (aka “32 Short Videos About Technical Communication”), “5 à 7” evenings, and bowling.
The group also discussed the possibility of holding an inter-association event, where people from multiple writer’s organizations in Montreal would attend.
The following action items were decided upon:
- Mary Perchanok will research and determine the feasibility of a Pecha Kucha event.
- Kelly L’Archevêque will research a grub crawl for the spring/summer.
- Sebastien Duverne and Kelly L’Archevêque will both translate content for the new web site.
- Jim Royal will post a poll on the new web site (once it is live) on the subject of French-language events.
- Charles Roburn will review the STC-Montreal bylaws with an eye to simplifying them for use by the new organization.
The next volunteers’ meeting will be on March 20, 2012. Anyone wishing to join up is welcome.
After STC-Montreal 
Hello Jim,
Has a place and time been determined for the next meeting on 20 March?
Thanks.
@Michel: I’ll send an email to all the volunteers to confirm everyone’s availability. I’ll include you as well.
Food for thought: http://echanges.sqrp.org/. An orgaization that might be interesting for us. It is French based but I am told that they offer some activities in English.