154 – Getting and Keeping Volunteers
This week the WELSTech Podcast is again focusing on the work of the church and school office, particularly the job of managing and motivating volunteers.
Podcast: Download (41.1MB)
The discussion:
Happy to help – Continuing the focus on the church and school office, Martin and Sallie share ideas for recruiting volunteers and motivating them to come back for future service.
- The Seven Deadly Sins of Recruiting Volunteers from Volunteer Power
- Volunteer Spot
- Great Ideas for Saying Thank You to Your Volunteers: Recognition from A-Z
- MailChimp – professional mass e-mail
- More …
The interview:
(17:33) Volunteering for missions – Imagine managing 3,000 volunteers per year. The staff of WELS Kingdom Workers (WKW) including Communication Manager, Neil Hankwitz, do just that. Neil joins Martin and Sallie to share stories from his 18+ years of experience coordinating home and world mission volunteers. Hear how WKW is planning to “go social” on their updated web site, connecting like-mined volunteers with stories of service in missions.
- WELSKingdomWorkers.org
- Mission Information Center – request mission display materials
Ministry resources:
(30:24) Installment 1 of Martin’s “Facebook for Churches” journey
Picks of the week:
- (32:34) The Radio Adventures of Dr. Floyd – Eight seasons of family friendly podcast available for free download
- Maximizing productivity with multiple monitors
- How-to Guide from Epinions
- Use two of the same monitors or at least use the same screen size and resolution – Example HP 20″ Monitor
- Laptops need …
- VGA + DVI or PCMCIA
- OR a Matrox box
- Desktops need …
- A graphics card with two VGA heads
WELS.net feature:
(43:02) Lectionary on Google Calendar
Community feedback:
- (45:32) Martin shared a link to a YouTube video by Office Casual – Make Better PowerPoint Presentations
- Gail Potratz from Emanuel in New London, WI shared a link to a blog post on PBS Kids Cyberchase Games
- Jason Schmidt from Gethsemane in Omaha, NE shared a couple of links
- 100 Ways Google Can Make You a Better Educator
- The Stock Market Game
- The WELSTech Listserve was hopping with HTML editor recommendations
- Code Lobster
- The SeaMonkey Project with Composer
- Kompozer
- Eclipse
- Crimson Editor
- Mark Heilman from Pilgrim Lutheran School in Minneapolis, MN shared a link to the blog journal of their student trip to the Czech Republic
- Teacher Ryan Rosenthal from Faith in Fond du Lac, WI shared a link to WE Energies resources for educators
Coming up on WELSTech:
(55:33) Episode 155 – Gail Potratz joins Martin and Sallie to discuss highlights from the Minnesota and Wisconsin teachers’ conferences. (Release date 10/27/10)
The featured artist:
(56:35) This week we close with the beautiful piano music of Dawn Gehlhar – All through the Night from her CD titled ”Inspirations”
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(13:20) A chat with the author – Lynne Schrum, author of the current WELSTech book selection, joins Martin and Sallie with tips for leaders to help them identify where they are in terms of technology integration and work within the various comfort levels of all types of teachers to provide “just in time” training on the tech tools of today.
What kind of e-mailer are you? – Is your electronic correspondence short and to the point, prompt, respectful and without error? Martin and Sallie talk about e-mail best practices and share new ways to use the tool effectively.
(21:12) Information Literacy – 
(15:05) Design Elements – Diahann Lohr, owner of 
(16:45) Managing the school office – Joanne Nemmers, school secretary for Calvary in Dallas, TX talks with Martin and Sallie about life in the school office. Find out about her favorite piece of office equipment, the challenges of after-school-care accounting and more.
A new book selection – 
Reliving the trip – Coming off of an 11-week virtual tour of the synod, Martin and Sallie revisit each stop and reflect on the lessons learned. From managing the church office to integrating technology in the classroom, from video conferencing for counseling and Bible class to video closed captioning, from Bible study software to pastoral blogging, the Road Trip highlighted creative uses of technology to assist with and further gospel ministry.
