Handbook for TXGenWeb
Position: Awards Manager
This is a duty of the State Coordinator that can be managed by a staff member. The Awards Manager is usually recruited from the surfing volunteers by either the SC or current Awards Manager. His goal is to help keep TXGenWeb counties up to standards set by USGenWeb.There are several responsibilities and the Manager is encouraged to recruit other volunteers to work with him. You should have a main assistant who can comfortably manage this position in case you cannot.
- Surf all 254 Counties Each Month
- Recruit volunteers to help with this massive project, you cannot do it alone.
- Ask for surfing volunteers on the Official mail list about once a month. - Assign COM Regions in January and July
- Surfers should not be assigned to regions in which they have a county unless it's in the Hall of Fame.
- New surfers should be assigned to the regions with the fewest counties (they won't be surfing Hall of Famers so both Northeast regions are good ones). - Report Findings
- Notify the SC of any problems with Basic requirements found by surfers. - Manage the Mail List
- You will be subscribed to the TXGenWeb Surfers Mail List.
- You are responsible for adding and removing surfers to and from the list.
- Respond to surfers when they nominate a county. - Report Winners of COM and COYs [HOF COY has been discontinued.]
- You will have access to the official TXGenWeb Mail List for this. - Oversee Dedicated CC Award
- This award should be bestowed on two CCs each month (until each eligible person has been awarded).
- This award is for CCs who have been with TXGenWeb in a coordinator or co-coordinator capacity for at least 10 years.
- Transcription volunteers and webmasters are not eligible.
- Update the Dedicated CC page. - Oversee Service Awards
- Each January, we award service medals to coordinators for the number of years of service in increments of 5.
- Check the dates of each CCs' service records.
- Update the Service Awards page.
- Provide the new graphics to deserving CCs.
Our awards department is the largest subsection of TXGenWeb and the Awards Manager has more duties than anyone else. It isn't up you to do all the work; you're expected to recruit helpers. Each county site that is a member of TXGenWeb should be checked monthly and each county must meet basic requirements.
County of the Month (COM)
Once a month, send a note to the TXGenWeb mail list requesting surfers. Surfers do not have to be CCs but it helps if they have some knowledge of how the XXGenWeb system works.The COM award will take up most of your volunteer time but you must keep in mind that it's a by-product of checking that each county is meeting basic requirements for inclusion in TXGenWeb - even the Hall of Fame (HOF) counties. The task seems daunting at first but becomes much easier as you get familiar with it.
The COM Award alone requires that you check your email daily. From the 1st to the 15th of each month, your surfers will be sending their nominations from their regions and they need to be acknowledged. From the 16th to the 31st, your finalization committee will be voting for COM and they need to be acknowledged.
On the 16th of each month, you will prepare a list of counties that have been nominated for COM. The list will be mailed to the mail list for Surfers with instructions to mail the votes to you and your assistant. The procedure for choosing a TXGenWeb county website for Com has been refined over the years and any changes must be discussed by the committee.
In January and July of each year, you'll need to rotate your surfers to new regions. Surfers get bored looking at the same counties and tend to be less alert after the first three months. New surfers should be assigned to regions with the fewest counties for their first rotation. If the surfer starts in the middle of a rotation, rotate them to another "small" region at the next rotation. Traditionally, we do not assign surfers to regions in which they manage counties but, if their county is already in HOF, they can surf their region.
One of the most important aspects of surfing for COM is noting issues with websites that need to be addressed by the SC. The surfers can and should notify CCs of problems with their sites but they can report them to you to be addressed. If notifying the CC doesn't solve the problem, it should be forwarded to the SC.
Perhaps the easiest part of being the Awards Manager is managing the Surfing mail list. As of this writing, the team is using Google Groups. You will be subscribed to the list for the duration of your service and should be comfortable with adding or removing team members. This is the mail list the team uses for nominations and you will use it to respond to their nominations.
You will also be subscribed to the Official TXGenWeb mail list where you will post the winners of COM each month and both COYs each year. This is also the list for posting volunteer requests.