Conclave?

[James]

So how was it? Something came up pretty last minute and I wasn't able to escape from work.

[KSigkid]

Conclave was great - Memphis is really a cool location, Beale Street was absolutely amazing. The sessions were pretty informative - a lot of stuff about recruitment, some sessions on history and the ritual that were extremely interesting, and individual sessions to work on seperate committees (Constitution, Recruitment, etc.). Kevin Kaplan gave a really good motivational speech on the first day, and there was a session on hazing where a mother of a hazing victim spoke - probably one of the top sessions of the whole thing. Overall, a really good time - a lot of fun, and it was good to actually meet some of the faces that go with the names on the listserve. The stuff about the Memorial Foundation and Tau ended up being kinda anti-climactic - no one from Tau or the Memorial Foundation stood up and spoke. Definitely a good time - what did everyone else think?

[James]

I went to the Phoenix one as the chapter GM, had a Great time and met some Great people, found the workshops to be bit unproffessional but oh well.

I'm not suprised that no one from MF or Tau stood up, it would have been a bad move had the tried it.

Originally posted by KSigkid:
Conclave was great - Memphis is really a cool location, Beale Street was absolutely amazing. The sessions were pretty informative - a lot of stuff about recruitment, some sessions on history and the ritual that were extremely interesting, and individual sessions to work on seperate committees (Constitution, Recruitment, etc.). Kevin Kaplan gave a really good motivational speech on the first day, and there was a session on hazing where a mother of a hazing victim spoke - probably one of the top sessions of the whole thing. Overall, a really good time - a lot of fun, and it was good to actually meet some of the faces that go with the names on the listserve. The stuff about the Memorial Foundation and Tau ended up being kinda anti-climactic - no one from Tau or the Memorial Foundation stood up and spoke. Definitely a good time - what did everyone else think?

[Kapsig1]

Too bad James, I was looking fwd to meeting you! I agree with your assesment of many of the workshops, but then again we are fraternity volunteers, not professionals.

AEKDB
Brad


[QUOTE]Originally posted by James:
[B]I went to the Phoenix one as the chapter GM, had a Great time and met some Great people, found the workshops to be bit unproffessional but oh well.

[James]

Sometimes I sound a bit overly critical . . . I get on my own nerves at times. What I meant in this context of unproffessionalism was that a workshop should be set up with basic objectives.

It should present a framework or perspective that examines a situation and gives a way to look at it. It should then provide a tool or tools to the people/consumers. The next phase creates excercises that allow the consumers to practice (role-play etc) using their new tool in the Context they will need it at home. The last phase is to provide an objective tool of evaluation as well as where to find more resources and who to go to for follow-up.

I am not sure if any of the workshops I have attended (student goverment, business, leadership, business etc.) did this very well.

*shrug* If you read guides to presenting that is pretty much what they say. And if you work backwards from the needs of the audience that is pretty much what we need to do.

Its kind of just a format to tailor your presentations, like the basic 5 paragraph essay or something similar.

I don't really expect volunteers to "know" this stuff going in. I would definitely expect volunteers to pick up a book or two before or after they are in to learn this stuff. Take probably a weekend to pick a lot of the stuff up, the rest being practice.

I will say that it shows that the National Fraternity may not being taking a very sophisticated approach in training its National Volunteer Officer staff. And if we don't expect much of our National Officers who are volunteers, dare we expect all that much from our undergrads who are likewise volunteers? And not only do the undergrads not get paid, we pay for the privelage.

Also, this type of training is the ONLY training that many of our members will recieve, if its not very good in places or unfocused then the results we expect to see from the attendees can be expected to not be very good in places and unfocused

End of observation . . . if you are in the NE we could always get together for dinner or something.

[This message has been edited by James (edited August 08, 2001).]