[10657] in APO News
[Minutes] CPPC Part I
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jessy McQuaw)
Wed Jan 9 22:24:46 2008
Date: Wed, 09 Jan 2008 22:21:47 -0500
From: Jessy McQuaw <jmcquaw@MIT.EDU>
To: apo-minutes@mit.edu
CPPC part I
Tuesday, January 8th, 2008
Called to order at 1817 by zev
(who may have been too enthusiastic with the gavel)
Present: zev, jmcquaw, holmesmd, y_lin, cristen, kkbrown, mitchb, lwest,
kree, ahailes, droshan, ede, Lori
Agenda
______
Introduction
Announcements
Review old minutes
Brainstorm areas of improvement
-Leadership
-Fellowship
-Service
Announcements
___________________________________________________________________________
Feb 9th Leadership day at Yukon.
APO LEADS courses will be offered.
Feb 29th - March 2nd
Conclave (We're not running it! Yay!)
Nationals are next year. You should tell you parents now, so they're not
confused when you don't come home.
"How are you guys?"
"Is that an announcement?"
-it's unclear
If you haven't paid your dues, you should.
There will be tools training sometime soon.
Next Wednesday (1-16-08), there will be blanket making at the National
Braille
Press from 1815 to 2115.
(see pmd.org)
They don't have enough people, so you should go.
You don't need to know how to sew.
Old Minutes
__________________________________________________________________________
_There was a proposal to bring back 5-min discussion at the end of meetings
_Get more west campus members
_How to deal with prospectives from non-recruitment periods
_Membership retention
_We might be lame
_We should record stuff about projects
_Have a non-traditional study-break, not in the office
_Alumni Database
-How did the 5 minute discussion go?
The 5 minute discussion lasted for a whole 2 meetings. Didn't really happen.
-Did we get more west campus members?
We had really pretty posters in west campus. But we still don't have
more west
campus members. We should poster earlier next term. And continue trying.
-Prospectives out of season?
We haven't really made a policy.
It's pretty much been just adding them to apo-prospectives, tell them about
projects and events, be friendly with them.
People don't have opinions or ideas.
-Membership Retention?
"I feel there were lots of people last spring who were very active, who
aren't
active now."
We're going to lose some people. Do we feel we lost too many? How many
did we
lose? Do we have a list of actives from last spring? We need to get the
people
who actually paid dues to actually be active.
There wasn't really a big drop-off.
What about alumni?
We usually see a lot of alumni at Steak Fry. It being far away made that
weird.
We didn't contact alums really early. People are more likely to come if you
notify earlier.
It's harder to schedule for people with "real lives".
Part of the idea was to do something big and unusual to try to get more
people
to come. Having Chapter Weekend and Steak Fry together might get more
attendance
than either alone. Didn't really work.
-Are we more or less lame than our predecessors?
We're getting worse at advertising for little projects and fellowship
events.
We're getting slightly better with the big events.
-Non-Traditional Study-Breaks?
We did Guy Fawkes day study break, but that was in the office.
"What's wrong with in the office?"
"It doesn't have to be thought about. You can decide at the last minute,
okay,
it's in the office. Then go to Verde's, spend 10 minutes buying snacks, and
you're ready."
We used to do things like, breaks in some of the big elevators (26), or
a party
on the Red Line. Get on, go to Alewife and back, having snacks and
stuff. Even
spontaneous stuff like one time after a meeting, people decided to go to
IHOP.
You can't plan spontaneity. We could also watch a movie. Like, half of
us are
also LSC, so we could have an all LSC and APO movie. (Cross-recruitment :))
Maybe have the LSC members show off the equipment.
We're doing the Scientology study-break sometime in IAP or February.
-The Alumni Database.
It was updated. We get to check something off!
It would be useful to have a list of people with cars.
Brainstorming
_______________________________________________________________________
In a nutshell:
Service
_______
-keep records of what people have done
-competition for # hours
-increase PCs responsibilities
-PCs scheduling
-advanced site visits
-bring SVP binder on projects
-services to MIT community. Effective?
-more visibility
-needed vs. actual hours
Communications
______________
-publish APOc regularly
-especially WUAPO
-keep better records
-service projects
-officer reports
-meetings
-fewer schedule announcements
-Exec vs. Chapter meetings
-review CPPC proposals midterm
-collecting dues
Membership
__________
-Recruiting West Campus
-Recruiting men
-Competing with other Service Programs
-PSC
-who's active?
-wall of pictures in office
-alums & advisors more involved
Fellowship
__________
-non-traditional study break
-better use of office
-eat lunch together
-advance notice of events
Chapter Skills
______________
-train people
-mass training over IAP
Leadership
__________
-send more people to conferences
-host LEADS
-officer elections
-NomComm
-transitions
-apprenticeships
Brainstorming
__________________________________________________________________________
The longer version that no one is going to read:
Service
_______
-keep records of what people have done
The SVP used to have a huge database of everyone in the chapter, and all
the
projects they'd been on. They'd not only look for people to go on projects,
they'd also see who wasn't doing much, and could poke them to do
projects, and
show them new projects that they hadn't done before. More focused on the
chapter and the leadership development of everyone.
-competition for # hours
It would be cool to make a non-corny competition out of it. If we had a
chart
on the wall showing hours, as long as everyone's doing something, if you
start
falling behind, you'll see that and think "I should do another project".
Cornell chapter, instead of saying, you have to do so many hours, says, you
have to get so many points, like you get so many points for going to a
fellowship event, or to a meeting, or to a project.
That seems kind of... gooey. It shouldn't be that I want to win, but I
should
aspire to be like these people.
"It can be a competition of How-hosed-are-you"
It would inspire people to do projects.
They're already willing to go on projects, or they wouldn't be here.
This just
makes them go more.
-increase PCs responsibilities
Regular service projects. Last year, PC responsibility was stressed,
trying to
get PC's to advertise the project, cause poking to happen, organizing...
trying
to get them to be more involved.
In some of the cases, giving the PC more responsibilities made things
bad, since
the PC was lame. So attendance sucked.
If we make this normal, people will get used to always having
responsibilities
when they PC things.
PCs are required to send a list to the APOced of the people who went on the
project, and are encouraged to write up a paragraph about it. About half
the PCs
actually did anything like that.
PCship has become like "maybe that's too hard for a PC to do, so we
should make
it easier."
It should be giving them responsibility. They should be able to do it.
It was suggested that PC take on all the contact and scheduling for a
certain
project. But then there's scheduling conflicts and stuff, and the SVP knows
everything, but the PC doesn't.
PC's now can hardly handle sending emails, let alone calling contacts for
projects.
Maybe we should arange projects, and then have the PC make contact later...
Apparently scheduling all projects in advance doesn't work so well.
From the charity's point of view, it's really confusing to make
arrangements
with one person (SVP) for a long time, and then switch to another person
(PC).
It's useful to have centralization, though.
It creates ownership in a project. Most PCships now boil down to: send
an email,
send another email, use the chmrr website, make people go. It's not
developing
the type of Leadership we want.
The PC should make a site visit, and get a sense of the physical site,
and know
what's going on... "This will take less time than we thought", "We can't do
this", "This should be changed". The PC should know what's going on.
Often, the
charities don't know everything we need to know.
PC information is also useful. They will better be able to tell people
stuff.
Knowledge!
Making projects harder, instead of easier will make things more meaningful.
Better bonds made when you get lost looking for a place, than... help
writing
an email.
Maybe have bigs/littles do stuff together. Better than just eating a meal
together.
The requirements say bigs are supposed to do a project with their little,
but it's not really enforced.
-PCs scheduling
Have PCs get their own project.
Arraigning the date, time, place, is the hard part. You can't just say
"We're doing something here and now" because the place you're going will
only
have two dates all term, and you can either do them, or not.
Getting directions and reporting is about it. Sometimes PCs call in too,
but ...
They get confused when one person is talking to them, aranging stuff, and
someone else is in charge on the day of the project.
You need to tell them "I am in charge of service for this group."
-advanced site visits
You know where it is
You know what you're doing
You can see what you'll need, or what is good/bad
The people don't know what's going on. If we go there and see ahead of
time,
we can help more.
-bring SVP binder on projects
There is a service binder that has lots of useful info and contacts and
stuff...
maybe we should have a little binder that goes on service projects, to be
filled out on the way, or while they're there.
-services to MIT community. Effective?
-more visibility
-needed vs. actual hours
Brothers not talking about what kinds of projects they wanted to go on.
SVP was
confused.
Do people just want projects scheduled for them, or make suggestions.
Discussion would have been useful.
The discussion ended because people didn't know what to talk about.
"Surveys get you the ideal case."
Maybe calculate man hours, and see how many project hours people have.
And whether the average compares to what we need.
If we have 30 members x 20 hours each
13 projects x 4 hours x 7 people/project
300-400 man-hours of work needs doing
600 man-hours of work available
not including bookex/umoc/big stuff
Communications
______________
-publish APOc regularly
-especially WUAPO
It used to be that the APOcrypha used to have actual content, and people
updated it and stuff, even if it took some poking. It used to be cool to
go to
the meeting to read the APOcrypha and see what was going on with other
projects. We used to be the only student group with a good newsletter,
but it
doesn't happen now. It was really cool.
It used to be done every other week.
Then it became every three or four weeks.
Then there was one.
Then there wasn't really one.
Then there were two. Or maybe one. Almost 100% fabricated.
Then there was one.
Then it went online.
Why did it die?
People stopped giving content. APOced got busy. It stopped happening.
It used to be that you dropped an email to the APOced every time something
funny happened.
It used to have minutes, officer reports, wuapo, and articles. And the
amount
of content has slowly decreased over the years.
We should try to publish it very regularly.
We should have people submit things every week.
It shouldn't be that hard to pull a lot of it straight from the website.
WUAPO died because people didn't know athena and LaTeX and stuff.
For people who don't know what WUAPO is, It's What's Up (with) APO, telling
people what's up in the next few weeks.
APOc goes to the National Office.
-keep better records
-service projects
-officer reports
What PCs, pledges, bigs are doing. Record service projects, officer
reports.
So we remember.
Communication is keeping a record of what we've done, and knowing what
we're
going to do in advance.
-meetings
-fewer schedule announcements
-Exec vs. Chapter meetings
-review CPPC proposals midterm
Pledges felt like a lot happened at Exec meetings, and nothing happened at
Chapter meetings.
We have a set schedule every time. Officer Reports, Announcements, etc.
Officer Reports aren't very interesting, and aren't very useful.
What of substance can actually be done at meetings to make them more useful?
Better records to record who went on projects... something... these people
seem to be falling behind, can we have someone poke them? (evil laugh
from past
SVP)
It used to be that Exec Comm was the only time when Exec was together,
and they
could say directly what was happening, and why. Chapter meetings used to be
hours long, regularly.
For the past many years, exec and chapter meetings have been exactly the
same,
with more or less people.
Why do we even separate them? "We've always done it that way." There
used to be
a useful reason, but we don't remember.
Next meeting, I want to schedule a meeting for reviewing the goals we make.
-collecting dues
How are we doing in terms of collecting dues and debtlist and stuff?
"5 brothers owe me dues. Half the pledge class owes me dues."
"Some people at the beginning of the term said they wanted to be active,
but
I've got no response from them."
We don't know how this compares to the past, because we don't have many
treasurer records.
We're doing better this term, because we have records now, and know what's
going on.
"Are we doing okay? Are we leaking money?"
We might be. We're paying Nationals for actives that haven't paid us
dues and
aren't active.
Enforce dues.
Membership
__________
-Recruiting West Campus
We should keep trying. Pretty posters.
-Recruiting men
People don't realize that we're mostly women, and it will be a problem soon.
(People look around and see ~10% men)
APOs in [other place I didn't hear] are very much Asian women, and so now
have a problem recruiting men.
We should do advertising stuff that appeals to men. Lori can help.
-Competing with other Service Programs
-PSC
We have competition in west campus, since Next House has its own Service
Program, which we've lost prospectives to.
ESP is kind of like a service program, and might be competition. It has
a lot
of both sides.
PSC contacted us earlier in the year about working together with stuff like
advertising. We never got on that, but we should have.
-who's active?
-wall of pictures in office
zev really wants a board in the office with names and phone numbers and
pictures
If there's a project in 10 minutes and no one's there, you can start
calling
people.
-alums & advisors more involved
One of the reasons the advisors aren't really involved is because Ellen
does a
really good job. There's not really a reason for the advisors to get more
involved. "If you need something, let us know." If you have a useful reason
for them to come, say something. But it would be useless to have more
advisors
at meetings, if you're kind of wondering why you're having a meeting
anyways.
We should invite advisors to Initiation Ceremonies and stuff.
It's traditional to put advisors through Initiation Ceremonies so they feel
more involved, and it makes the administration more comfortable about what
we're doing during closed ceremonies.
Fellowship
__________
-non-traditional study break
We should totally do the elevator thing.
-better use of office
We should make better use of it. There's a lot of stuff people don't know
about, and a lot of stuff we can use.
Meetings in the office would be more convenient. This time, this place.
Easier to remember.
Schedule all the meetings for the same time and place every week.
W20-400 is close to the office, and big.
-eat lunch together
A lot of people eat lunch in there (the office) every day.
We should schedule a few hours every day where people eat lunch. It's a
nice
place to hang out.
-advance notice of events
Chapter Skills
______________
-train people
-mass training over IAP
We need to train people!!!1!!11!!!!!!!!!!!
Lately, we've only had one person trained to use it, and that's the future
chair of that department
We need other people to know.
We offer the service to other chapters and people, but we don't have enough
knowledgeable people to make use of it.
We have letter press happening in IAP.
Maybe have one day in IAP that is dedicated to learning chapter skills
minus
the letter press
We don't have a sewing machine. We should email the alums and ask for one.
Are the drop poster/letter press useful.
"I will kill you if you try to get rid of the letter press." -holmesmd
"I'm not trying to get rid of the letter press!" -zev
What do we use them for/ how often?
We use them internally, we get paid by LSC, we used to offer free
services to
the theater groups.
It wasn't free, we charged minimal service fees, but we needed advanced
notice
to get stuff done, and the student groups didn't realize this, so they
built up
late fees, and they wanted all sorts of complicated stuff that was
harder. APO
people used to be in these groups and could explain it.
People can see the drop posters (self-advertizing), but they don't see the
letter press stuff.
Leadership
__________
-send more people to conferences
-host LEADS
There are these APO LEADS things, and lots of people don't do these things.
(Apparently true of many chapters) This one time, we hosted a Launch so
everyone could go to Service the next weekend.
We can just call the office and say "Hey, we want to host LEADS", and they
send us an instructor.
If we host one, other nearby chapters can come, since it's convenient.
"Hey cool, an impromptu fellowship event."
"It'd be cool, if only to snark at them." -zev
-officer elections
-NomComm
-transitions
-apprenticeships
In the past, we've had a Nomination Committee that looked for people to run
in each position. Multiple.
Also, current officers can help cultivate new officers, help them become
better at the position, before it's theirs.
People at Regionals were surprised that our officers only run for one year,
and then don't do it again.
"There were a lot of times when I thought, as MVP, this would have been
cool
to do, I wish I would have done that, but now I don't have time."
Help people who now have your previous office.
Apprenticeships.
Training people what to do before they're left with the responsibility.
Give them ideas. Maybe less "Gee, I wish I would have thought of that
earlier."
We're lame. People don't do enough leadership. It would be cool to bring in
new officers each term, instead of just reshuffling the same few
officers in
different positions. People basically run unopposed.
Adjourned by zev at 2021
He didn't break anything this time
