This might be long, so I apologize in advance!
First, I owe you all a response regarding my search for an additional Assistant State
Coordinator. I received two responses from folks interested in the position and selected
Nola Duffy to join the NCGenWeb state team as ASC. She will be joining Angie Rayfield and
Paul Buckley.
**Angie is currently on the USGenWeb advisory board and will continue to keep us updated
on board business.
**Paul is taking over the management of the "lists" including the ncgenweb and
ncgenweb-discuss lists and the lists that are turned in to the election committee
preceding an election. If you change your email address, please be sure to get that
information to Paul and I both!
**Nola will assist me in the day to day activities. In the past, Nola has been a great
help in babysitting counties while new coordinators are identified and things such as
that.
**I am taking responsibility for NCGenWeb website maintenance, so if you see any issues,
or if your web address changes, don't hesitate to get that information to me.
Running NCGenWeb is not a big task, so you might ask why 4 people are needed - they
aren't - one could do it all, but I like the idea of sharing the responsibility and
involving more people in the process. Plus I like the idea of having a great team of
folks to bounce ideas off of when decisions do need to be made.
NEXT - Our county websites . . . .
If you are anything like me, then you know that our genealogy fire sometimes comes and
goes. Sometimes we have more time than others. Sometimes we focus our energies in other
directions. But I know we all desire to have great NCGenWeb county sites. My site,
Sampson County, is far from great. I tend to recognize a great county when I'm doing
research in that county. I recently had need to research in Marshall County, WV
(
http://www.rootsweb.com/~wvmarsha/marsh.htm) and I tell you what . . . I went WOW!!
Everything I needed, plus info that I hadn't thought about was on that page. It was
wonderful. I know we have wonderful projects in NCGenWeb as well, but I wanted to share
that one because you really get to know a site when you are using it.
In NCGenWeb, we have county websites that are stagnate. Mine is included in this. Some
of you though have wonderful sites, and I'd love for you to take the time to help the
rest of us. I, like many of you, do not live in North Carolina and I have not ever been
to the county where my site is. Although this is a barrier, I know that this does not
make it impossible to have a great site.
---->What processes have you found to improve your sites when you live out of the
county?
I ask that you please reply to this question with your ideas to the
ncgenweb-discuss-l(a)rootsweb.com mailing list.
COUNTY SITE MINIMUMS:
**Our state volunteer guidelines page (
http://www.rootsweb.com/%7Encgenweb/volunteer.html)
requests that updates to the site be made every 6 to 8 weeks. I know when I look at the
index page of a site, I like to see a "last updated date" no older than 6 months
ago. The other guidelines are listed on this page as well.
**Site search capabilities - This is not listed on the volunteer page, but with the
readily available site search tools, there is no reason not to include this on your page.
If this is something you've not dealt with before, don't hesitate to ask for help.
I've used freefind successfully for years. This is a great asset to anyone trying to
do research in your county.
PERSONAL QUESTION:
**I am not very familiar with the NC State Archives and I would like to learn more about
them. If one of you feels you are an expert . . or close . . . at working with the
Archives, I'd love to hear from you. Especially anyone that has worked with the
Archives without going there in person to do research. I'm thinking there might be
some helpful tips we can put together and post on the state site to help our researchers.
SITE RECOGNITION:
**I'd like to know what you think about having some sort of site recognition award.
Site of the month/Quarter? I think our state site need to advertise new additions that
have been made to some of the county sites to give you more publicity.
ROLL CALL:
**I'm going to ask for a roll call separately.
I am sure there were other things that I wanted to share or talk about, but if we get a
discussion going on ncgenweb-discuss-l(a)rootsweb.com, I'm sure I'll remember it
then. I really appreciate each and every one of you and can't wait to learn more from
you and to be inspired by you!
Thanks for listening,
Denise