Laurabelle's Blog

I just realized that other than a very brief mention to note the fact that I was elected ASIS&T Web Deity for this year, I haven't said anything about one of the current major drains on my time. I should do something about that.

How I got to be WD in the first place is a slightly amusing story. I happened to be hanging out in the iSalon when an ASIS&T meeting about electing officers for next year happened, and being present, I kind of participated. Lisa, who evidently interpreted my presence at the meeting as interest, nominated me for the position of WD. She told me this in person, and I wasn't totally opposed to the idea. Well, I'd better become a member then, I thought. So I did, and when I was asked if I accepted the nomination, I said I did. And as I was running unopposed, I was elected. Go me?

Not much happened over the summer, except for a couple of meetings, one in June and another in September I think. We haven't had any meetings since school started, but a lot has been happening, and a lot of emails have flown around. My major ASIS&T-related activity was a Basic CSS workshop that I developed almost from scratch in the two weeks after school started and led last Tuesday (14 Oct). I had a lot of input from Misty and a lot of help from all the labrats who came to help out, and I think it went fairly well. The hardest thing was, as it always is, to balance the needs of everyone in the class. Some people picked it up lightning-fast, and others needed a little bit more time. It's hard to get around that.

I did get an idea, though. I think it would be neat to institute a periodic (maybe bi-weekly) pseudo-workshop where webbish experts hang out in the TE Lab or the computer classroom for a couple of hours and help people who come to work on their web pages. People don't know what questions they have until they start trying to do something, and maybe this would be an incentive for them to start work on their projects.

Oh, and the ASIS&T National Conference is starting this weekend. I'll be at the conference (my first-ever professional conference!) from Sunday morning until Tuesday evening, so I don't know if I'll ever have time to blog or write email, but I'll try.