Anyone hear that revving sound in the background? That’s docent motors warming up for the start of the spring tour season including new CAC-based walking tours (Magnificent Architecture of the Magnificent Mile, debuts May 1st) and the return of Big Bus and River Cruise tours. MAMM is finishing up its training sessions that included about 30 docents eager to take visitors around our new ‘hood. Big Bus-ers had a refresher session in preparation for another year of neighborhood visits and branch-trimming as necessary. River Cruise training starts 16 March and current River docents-in-hibernation will be flexing memory muscles starting the 30th, when the season begins.
Our colleagues in volunteerism also trained 25 new Exhibit hosts and plan to launch a round of Education Guide training early next month. The Engineering Fest was a huge hit, even though leader/engineer Kevin Griebenow’s prototype Ferris Wheel (a building project for the students) was such a feat that he used way too many Legos – prompting a last-minute dash to Walmart to refill the stash. Way to go, Kevin!
The Class of 2019 for new docents starts March 30th. Those interviewers did a spectacular job: 40 positions offered, 40 acceptances. Way to go Education Committee members and staff! The EC will be making the syllabus public quite soon, pending a few tweaks. There will be limited room for interested docents to attend, if you want to hear some of these captivating speakers again.
Meanwhile, Docent Council passed a set of guideline for docents who retire and are interested in emeritus status. This falls under the Standards Committee: consult the carousel of news items [CLICK HERE to view] for information on the criteria and how to apply. Every year about 20 docents retire (preferable to resigning, if you are just aging out) but only five (or thereabouts) are granted the honorific of emeritus.
Thanks to Caroline, we also reviewed and appreciated the guidelines set by CAC for handling email. Docents are a communicative bunch and many of us are retired and in the Instant Gratification category. Here are some highlights:
- Indicate timing expectations for the response – answer now, tomorrow, by the end of the week, etc.
- Have appropriate response time expectations; unless you are a CEO, a 24-hour turnaround time is reasonable (not including weekend days)
- Reply to all: use sparingly. Especially when someone is asking a group if they can attend a meeting, just reply to the sender. We have Google Groups for protracted threads.
- Subject: if you are changing the subject in an email string, either update the subject to capture new content or start a new email string with the new subject
- When emailing a group, direct questions to specific people in the body of the email.
AND
- Be thoughtful and polite. Don’t flame in all caps, like I just did there. Be civil and respectful. We are all doing our best.
Does everyone realize DAN is less than two months away? Be sure to submit suggestions for outstandingness as it is lived and practiced by Docents.
Regards, Constance