[Eg-oversight-board] Outreach business for tomorrow's EOB meeting

[Kathy Lussier]

Hi all!

The Outreach Committee has a number of topics we would like to discuss 
at Thursday's EOB meeting as time allows:

1.Charge for the Outreach Committee - The original charge, approved in a 
proposal submitted to the EOB back in 2015 - 
https://wiki.evergreen-ils.org/doku.php?id=outreach - set an expiration 
date for the committee's work (December 2016) at which time the EOB was 
supposed to determine if the work of the committee should continue. The 
reason for the short-term nature of the committee was that our initial 
focus was on using project funds to rent exhibit space at library 
conference. When we didn't receive many donations for the effort, we 
scaled back our plans, started securing meeting space at ALA to maintain 
a presence without a significant cost to the project, and focused on 
other activities.

Since its establishment, the Outreach Committee has established a 
presence at every ALA Annual Conference and MidWinter meeting, has 
produced two annual reports to feature project highlights of interest to 
Evergreen users and non-users, and has issued press releases when the 
software has a major version release. We are also working on creating a 
central message for the Evergreen project and, when that is done, 
developing conference kits that community members can use when they are 
representing Evergreen at their own local library conferences. The 
merchandise committee has also joined the Outreach Committee as the two 
had similar goals. As such, I think the committee should continue its 
work, even if it's a little different from the original vision of the 
committee.

I have added a link to the agenda with a new proposed charge for the 
committee - 
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1DUTW5cJ6L5CHii8E9HtgqaLgImTogdbb23KLgrI5jJE/edit?usp=sharing. 
The charge does not expire and is a little less wordy than the previous 
charge was. I also would like to point out that in the new charge, the 
Outreach Committee proposes expanding to an internal audience, not just 
the external audience of potential Evergreen users. We already do some 
of this work. The annual report is not just there to promote the project 
to an external audience. It also informs our internal audience about 
highlights from the past year. We also think the Outreach Committee 
would be a good group to focus on supporting and encouraging community 
participation from our current base of users.

2. Proposed budget - 
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Zazk_x3KlrDn0sZmTgdh2rfznL1_I20tJVWavlJGdH0/edit?usp=sharing 
In the past, the Outreach Committee has gone to the EOB with a fund 
request every time they need money. Starting this year, I would like to 
submit an annual budget to the EOB for approval so that we can then 
spend the funds as we need provided that the expenditures fit within the 
approved budget. I'm also noting that the submission of the annual 
budget is included in the proposed charge for the committee.

3. Evergreen logo - The Outreach Committee would like the EOB to 
consider the idea of working with a graphic designer to update the 
current Evergreen logo. The current logo is very difficult to work with 
because it uses a rare font that was customized by removing some 
portions of the letters. As a result, it's difficult to reproduce. In 
addition, we don't have an official square version of the logo that can 
be used when a long logo isn't appropriate. The Evergreen leaf has been 
used unofficially, but it would be nice to have an official square logo 
to use. If we were to work with a graphic designer, we would be looking 
to refresh the existing logo, not do a total redesign.

Kathy


-- 
Kathy Lussier
Project Coordinator
Massachusetts Library Network Cooperative
(508) 343-0128
klussier at masslnc.org
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/kmlussier