Preeti Mathur, Viqui Dill Receive STC Distinguished SIG Service Award

We are proud to announce that two of our SIG leaders, Preeti Mathur and Viqui Dill, have received the STC Distinguished SIG Service Award (DSSA). The DSSA, Distinguished Chapter Service Awards, and Distinguished Community Service for Students Awards are given annually by STC to members who have offered extensive service and exemplary commitment to their communities. Each community nominates one or more of its members for an award. The nominations are submitted to STC and evaluated, and nominee recommendations are presented to the STC board of directors for approval.

Preeti served two years as co-manager of our SIG. She was instrumental in redeveloping the training evaluation program that we offer as a SIG membership benefit, acting as the subject matter expert. She played a key role in getting our IDL web site moved over to the STC host in a time when much of her work and home life were anything but settled.

Preeti’s citation reads:

In recognition of your exemplary patience, dedication, and diplomacy in co-managing the SIG, while simultaneously overseeing the training evaluation program, and porting the web site to a new hosting service.

Viqui has been an active volunteer in the IDL SIG throughout her entire membership. She currently serves in two critical roles in the SIG – webmaster and program manager.

As webmaster, Viqui put her considerable web development skills to work to refine our SIG’s design and layout after our migration to the STC host. Viqui serves as our principal site administrator, layout expert, and troubleshooter, helping other volunteers get up and running as site contributors. Thanks to Viqui’s work, we have a technically sound, informative site.

As program manager, Viqui recruits excellent presenters for SIG webinars, and seeks opportunities to offer quality programs in partnership with other STC communities. Recently, Viqui coordinated a program on usability in partnership with the Usability and User Experience SIG. In addition, Viqui manages all of our program registration details.

Viqui’s citation reads:

For her superpowers, used in our SIG to lead both Programs and the Web site teams, that she expresses with grace and good humor.

Our deepest thanks to Preeti and Viqui for their service to the IDL SIG — and heartiest congratulations on your well-deserved DSSA awards!

February 2, 2016 STC Multi-Chapter Techcomm Showcase

Recording

The event recording is available free at
http://stc.adobeconnect.com/p1gvk7pdxrg/

Tuesday, February 2, 2016

16:00 PST, 17:00 MST, 18:00 CST, 19:00 EST

Join several STC communities for a multi-chapter Techcomm Showcase.

Register on Eventbrite and plan to join us online February 2nd.
Register on Eventbrite

This multi-chapter STC educational event is offered virtually as well as in person. (Remote attendees will receive access information during the week before the presentation.) We encourage you to host a viewing party to provide opportunities for networking. Note that all times are Eastern Standard.

Join us on Feb. 2nd for our Multi-Chapter Techcomm Showcase, brought to you by the Rochester, New England, and Southeastern Michigan Chapters of the Society for Technical Communication.

Each chapter is providing a speaker for the event who will provide a brief presentation and a question and answer period.

Lineup

Audience-specific Content using FrameMaker by Bernard Aschwanden

Bernard Aschwanden

Bernard Aschwanden, STC President, works with clients to improve content creation, management and distribution workflows to improve quality and increase productivity. He is the founder of Publishing Smarter, an Associate Fellow of the Society for Technical Communication, and President of the STC, Bernard has helped hundreds of companies implement successful publishing solutions. Bernard is focused on publishing better, publishing faster and publishing smarter. 

https://ca.linkedin.com/in/bernardaschwanden

Know Your Users: Improving Learning Content by Connecting with User by Patty Gale

Patty Gale

As a learning content developer for a technical writing team at Autodesk, Patty Gale is involved in many aspects of the design, development, and production of learning content for 3D modeling software. A technical communicator for over 25 years, Patty has worked at businesses all sizes, from small start-ups to large corporations. Whether the sole writer or part of a larger team, Patty enjoys learning new technologies and determining the most effective way to share important information with users. She has received multiple awards from her employers and STC competitions, including an International Award of Distinguished Technical Communication. Patty holds Bachelor’s degrees in Computer Science and Business Management.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/patty-gale-9774461

Best Practices in Using Social Media for Your Business by Angel Bedford

Angel Bedford

Angel Belford is a communications professional with over 10 years of experience in writing, editing and content management.
Currently, Angel is the Web Content Administrator at Lourdes University managing all online content and the company Intranet. 
Prior to her current position she worked at FOX Toledo, a local news media organization, overseeing the Internet department, social media and the internal content management system. Angel was a technical writer at La-Z-Boy, holding this position for several years while creating documentation including user and administrator manuals, quick reference cards, and online manuals.
She has developed/maintained several types of digital and print documentation including: quick reference cards, websites, forms, user guides, training manuals, diagrams and newsletters.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/angelbelford

Meeting
6-7 PM Networking
7-8:30 PM Presentations
8:30 PM Wrap-up

Virtual Attendance Option
If you’re not able to attend in person, you are welcome to attend virtually through Adobe Connect.

RSVP: Register by Friday noon, January 29th. For questions or late registration, please contact Ben Woelk at programs@stc-rochester.org.

Register on Eventbrite and plan to join us online February 2nd.
Register on Eventbrite

Update: Instructional Design issue of Intercom articles needed by April 1st

After the Summit last year, we were all fired up to conquer the world and arranged with Liz Pohland to guest edit an issue of Intercom. We need articles supplied by you by April 1st.

These articles can be on any aspect of Instructional Design and Learning. Two questions we were asked at the Summit were: “How does ID differ from regular ‘technical writing’?” and “How do I break into ID?”

This is your honest-to-goodness chance to be PUBLISHED in a magazine that reaches an international audience. Pick one of the ideas above or your own area of expertise and let me know that you will commit to getting an article to me in the next couple of weeks. Be honest with yourself… had you been given 3 months’ notice (and really, you were) you’d still just be sitting down to write this weekend. So it’s not totally crazy to ask you to have something ready so quickly.

Everything you need to know about writing for Intercom is on http://intercom.stc.org/author-guidelines/ and there are no onerous requirements. In fact, you can re-use a previously-published article according to these notes from that page: An article should be accompanied by a note stating whether the article has appeared in another publication and whether you plan to submit it to another publication. At the end of the article, please include a brief biography of the author(s) and email addresses, or other contact information for the reader.

Publishing Rights
Authors retain copyright to their work in Intercom. The Society for Technical Communication requires that author(s) grant STC print rights to articles appearing in Intercom. The Society also requires that author(s) grant STC permission to reproduce the article for an indefinite period of time in any media. We also ask authors to wait six months before re-publishing an Intercom article elsewhere (such as on a personal blog). Once an article has been accepted for publication, authors will be asked to sign a licensing agreement. (this link works on the STC site).

So please leap into action, grab your pens, and save our rep for promising to help out and delivering on that promise.
Mellissa & Robert