Friday, June 8, 2012

SCGS Jamboree - Friday

While Jamboree sessions requiring registration began at 1:30 today, the exhibit hall opened at noon and the morning choices including a tour, a research trip to the SCGS Library, roundtable discussions, and more.

I chose to attend four sessions all concerning Genealogy Society Development.  Wow!  So much information; SO MANY IDEAS.  Too bad I'm not 10 people (or perhaps I need to be 20).  Cath Madden Trindle's topic was Projects.  Then Schelly Talalay Darshashti spoke about Publicity.  George Morgan provided a long, long list of Affordable Member Benefits.  We finished with Josh Taylor's presentation about Creating a Website.  Most societies have web sites, but Josh gave us great ideas to improve our sites.  I wrote notes and more notes. 

If you are interested in these presentations, you can order video or audio copies of them by contacting Conference Resource at www.myconferenceresource.com or calling 866-813-2451.  No, I am receiving no compensation for this review.  However, if you want some exciting ideas to energize your society, you can get them through these presentations.

SCGS Jamboree Tech Trax

Preconference Day is over.  Five sessions.  I really thought four were great.  The most helpful to me was Barry Ewell's talk on photo editing.  Since I have had my digital camera for less than 2 years, and have never tried to edit anything except for cropping (a little) and pushing the button for auto editing, I was quite hesitant before he started.  I was afraid that it was all going to be over my head.  With his clear explanations and his offer to send even more info to us, I am excited to try some cleaning up of photos.  Thank you, Barry.

Today, this morning I'm going to the society track.  Then, Jamboree sessions begin after lunch.  I still haven't made all of my choices.  Some hours there are just too many great topics and speakers.  My suggestion to others in this position, check out which sessions are video or audio taped.  Yes, it's a little extra expense, but far less than attending another conference. AND, you can listen to these over and over and over.  I started that a year ago and I'm so glad I did. 

In fact, Dawn Thurston was a part of the Writers' conference yesterday and her four session were video taped and are on sale at a discount if you buy all 4.  Her syllabus pages were good, but her sessions were packed.  Some people were turned away because the room was full.  And there was lots of excited talk at lunch and later.  So, I think I'll get hers.  Now for other decisions.

One great day down;  3 more to go