The following message was sent to the organization roster following the May 30th meeting:
Folks,
We had a very productive meeting of the group I’ve been referring to as “Writing Across Virginia” just before the 4Cs Regional Conference at Old Dominion University last week. I’m writing today with details regarding that meeting and some next steps.
If you’re not interested in continuing to be part of this distribution list, please let me know; I can remove you from future emails. I, however, hope you’ll stay and be part of this important discussion.
Meeting Minutes
Twenty-one interested parties met on May 30 (including 7 joining us via WebEx). Elizabeth Losh (William and Mary) kindly prepared minutes for for this meeting, which I hope you’ll take some time to review. I’ve allowed comments on this document. If you have notes, corrections, or questions, please feel free to provide them via comment on the document.
Elections
This summer we will move forward with elections to help us formalize our group and seek affiliate status from the Council of Writing Program Administrators. Kevin DePew has agreed to serve as our election supervisor. If you are interested in nominating yourself or someone else for an officer position within our organization, please let Kevin know directly. You can reach him at kdepew@odu.edu. If you’re nominating someone, please ensure you have their permission before you put forward the nomination. We encourage self-nominations! Don’t be shy. At this stage, nominations only need to include the nominees name, contact information, and desired position.
For this first election we will seek nominations for the following positions:
- chairs (2; possibly co-chairs or chair/chair-elect; from both two-year and two-year contexts),
- secretary,
- treasurer, and
- webmaster.
Please submit nominations to Kevin by July 1. For our first election, all parties on the organization’s roster will be eligible to vote.
Roster
Speaking of the organization roster, we now have a developing GoogleSheet that will serve as our roster. Please take a moment to visit this roster and contribute details to your own row / check the information contained in the document for errors. In particular, you’ll notice that I have added a column for collaborative email (for those of us who do not have an institutional account with Google integration or who prefer to work from a personal account for field-related business), a row for position, and a row for areas of interest.
If you know I have missed someone, please let me know. If anyone is missing from this roster that you’d like to invite to our group, please forward this message along to them and encourage them to add themselves to the list.
Working Groups
There are two working groups that formed as a result of last week’s meeting. If you’d like to participate in either, please let me know. If I have made any errors with the current members list, let me know that too:
- By-Laws Working Group: This group will begin with the template (from Michigan’s Affiliate by-laws) to make suggestions for revision / addition / clarification before we adopt official by-laws for the organization. Currently, the following people have agreed to work on this task: Kristi Murray Costello, Tom Geary, J. Meredith Privott and Cheri Lemieux Spiegel.
- Grant Funding Working Group: This group will prepare an application for the Paul Lee Workshop Mini Grant (VCCS) and identify other opportunities for the organization to see funding during AY 2019-2020. Participants: Karen Doheney, Megan Doney, Lauren Foster, Tom Geary, Melissa Johnson, and Cheri Lemieux Spiegel
Next Meeting
After our meeting Christina McDonald wrote with the gracious offer to help host our next meeting on Post at Virginia Military Institute during Fall 2019. VMI’s Institute WritingProgram hosts the Annual Spilman Symposium on Issues in Teaching Writing. If you’re not familiar with Spilman, you’re in for a treat. The symposium has been one of my favorite professional development events since I was an MA student. The next Spilman is scheduled for Saturday, October 26, 2019. Christina’s suggestion was that we might, with enough notice, be able to reserve space and hold a meeting that Friday (October 25). Having talked to many of you at the most recent Spilman, I think this opportunity has great potential. Thus, I’ll ask that you consider penciling those dates into your calendars. If you see any reason this date should not be used as our next meeting time, please do voice it with me. We will, of course, still offer an online option for participation.
Thanks, Ya’ll
I continue to be amazed at the excitement and dedication of this small, but growing, group. Thanks for all you do to support Writing Across Virginia!
Cheri