Severity: moderate
Audience: large
Fiscal effect: could be
Policy question: yes
Reported: well, I remember discussing it, and certainly told folks about:
Link: e.g. http://www.aauwnc.org/00About/brochures/
The link above is one state’s attempt to keep up to date with the changes in the Association brochures and marketing collateral. It would seem that it would be better to have this list available on www.aauw.org.
This came up while I was trying to put together a “traveling kit” of brochures to have in the car (or with the branch “booth” display — described at a workshop at 2001 AAUW convention and 2002 AAUW NC summer meeting). It’s hard to know
- What brochures are available
- When the brochures are replaced by updated versions (e.g. the 10/05 LAF brochure is the first to refer to it as a program of the Educational Foundation; the 7/05 membership brochure has $45 as the dues for at-large members until 7/1/06, where earlier brochures said $44)
- Where to get the brochures (e.g. the Associate degree insert for the membership brochure is included when membership brochures are ordered from Shop AAUW!, but the web site doesn’t give that information).
A simple database application that would include a brief description of each brochure (if not a picture) and the above information would be really helpful, particularly for new branch officers, some of whom take office with very little time to learn about the organization.
Severity: moderate
Audience: moderate
Fiscal effect: could be
Policy question: no
Reported: well, I remember discussing it
Link: http://www.aauw.org/member_center/forms/recordchange.cfm
This is probably moot since this whole silly form goes away when the new module comes on line that has direct access to data. But this tries to do too much in one form - change of address, addition of seasonal address, branch transfer, etc. The particular wall I just hit is why in the world is a phone number required? What if the member really doesn’t want to give that info or is in the process of moving and has no new phone number. I ended up putting “0000000000″ in for the day (and evening! it requires two!) phone numbers, and I’m wondering what’s going to happen when that hits the database.
Immediate problem FIXED: as of 12/10; but see notes for comments on error handling.
(more…)
Severity: minor
Audience: moderate
Fiscal effect: no
Policy question: no
Reported: yes, multiple times
Link: http://svc.aauw.org/about/branches.cfm: CA and NC, at least
In some states’ branch listings, some branch names are listed as “AAUW whatever” while most branches are listed without the AAUW. This causes some branches to be listed first in the alphabetical listing, when they’d be more accurately listed somewhere else in the list.
This obviously isn’t a big problem, but it’s an inconsistency that can reflect poorly on our web design. The only real issue has been with “AAUW CA Online” where, when that is listed first it gives the impression of being the “online arm of AAUW CA” instead of just another branch that happens to meet online. [That particular issue was “fixed” last spring, but it’s b-a-a-a-c-k.]
[While we’re on that page, is it possible to change the heading, e.g. “Wyoming AAUW Website,” to “AAUW Wyoming Website”? Or has that policy of always putting the AAUW first been changed? I can’t find it in the current version of the Style Guide. I’ve sent a question to editor@aauw.org about this.]
Severity: moderate
Audience: small
Fiscal effect: probably (folks get inaccurate info and then decide not to join at all)
Policy question: yes
Reported: yes, multiple times
Link: http://svc.aauw.org/about/branches.cfm
It’s not clear to me why this is so hard. There are branches listed (in NC at least) at the address above that haven’t paid dues or sent in any other forms for years. I can understand the Association being very careful about declaring a branch “dead,” but at some point, this gets ridiculous. For instance, according to the 2003 February 1 report, AAUW UNC Pembroke hasn’t paid any Association dues since FY2001, and it actually dropped off the 2005 report. But it is still listed as an NC branch on www.aauw.org.
What’s up? From a computer science point of view this sounds like a “deadlock” problem - maybe the Association is waiting for forms to come back and those responsible for completing the forms won’t/can’t get them sent back. Can’t the policy get changed to handle cases like this and make www.aauw.org more accurate?
[And while we’re looking at those branch listing pages is there any way to change the headings, say “Wyoming AAUW Website” to “AAUW Wyoming Website”? It’s hard enough to get folks to follow the Style Guide and always put the AAUW first without modeling the deprecated practice.]