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I'm sorry that I have to begin yet another issue of WEB with an apology for running late. This is only the first edition for September, which should have come out a week or more ago according to the promised schedule of two issues per month - let alone one every two weeks. |
The principal cause of increasingly frequent delays in getting the Bulletin out is that its production is essentially a one-man operation. Repeated calls to members asking them to send in items about online education forums or other activities they have engaged in, to give feedback on items included in WEB, or to make any other contribution, have been largely unproductive. It takes considerable time surfing the World Wide Web, monitoring various lists and discussion groups, sending and vetting correspondence, etc etc, looking for items that are relevant to the work of the Association and likely to interest members. And then a solid working day at least is needed to cull and re-work whatever material has been collected and to pull appropriate items together into the basic WEB format. Consequently, as soon as the pressure of other responsibilities mounts, preparation of WEB simply has to take a back seat, and so publication falls behind the normal deadlines.
This time-management problem is not unique, of course. Being volunteers, all WAOE Officers have to fit the work they do for the Association in and around their already busy professional (let alone personal) lives. And members have their own priorities to address before they can give any time to the affairs of WAOE. Par for the course, no doubt, for any under-resourced organisation, particularly in its first struggling year or so of foundation and growth. The point is not to complain about an understood reality, but to question what can be done to improve the situation.
A rather obvious option would be to change the production schedule for WEB from two issues per month to one. I am very reluctant to go this way, however, because WEB is the most public face of WAOE - apart from the still rather rudimentary Website and the heavily under-subscribed WAOE-Views - and its more or less regular appearance is arguably the most concrete and broadly valuable service that the Association provides to its members. I'd like to exhaust all other options first.
With less than 100 so far out of about 1,000 having paid membership renewal fee for 1999/2000, or obtained waiver from it, it seems clear that the majority of currently registered members will be in contravention of the Association's rules by the final deadline of October 1. The resulting lack of hard cash will certainly hamper efforts to consolidate database management, improve Web-based communications, and address other key operational needs. But WAOE depends on the sheer involvement of members at least as much as it needs financial support to meet running expenses - perhaps even more. If only a small fraction of the as yet uncommitted members sought waiver and undertook to provide service to WAOE instead of paying dues, this would make a substantial difference to our capacity to maintain existing activities and to grow.
In order to assist the regular production of WEB, for example, an individual could provide vital service by undertaking to monitor and report on just one ongoing discussion group relevant to online education, or by attending and writing up an online or face-to-face conference or workshop, or by setting up a local network of WAOE members and keeping others informed about their activities, or simply by keeping eyes and ears open to what is happening in the politics and management of online education in their own part of the world.
I'm sure members themselves can think up many other feasible ways in which they could contribute not only to WEB but to the Association at large, if they are unable or unwilling to pay the membership renewal fee.
One sort of contribution is absolutely vital to the continuing wellbeing of WAOE. Instead or - or at least in healthy addition to - the basically Australian/American/Western outlook that tends by default to dominate the Bulletin (and even the Association), we need to understand more and more about what is happening with online teaching and learning in Finland, India, Israel, Pakistan, Russia, Peru, South Africa, Venezuela, ... anywhere, in fact, outside the United States, Canada, Australia. What are the issues? What are the needs? Let's hear from members living in the wider world!
David Wyatt, WAOE Membership Officer and WEB Editor