Valentine 's Dayby Nancy Ward, Coordinator of Committees

LOVE is everywhere in our February Committee Reports. The committee chairs share what they LOVE about CWG committees, but first, here’s what they would LOVE to have from you:

  • Blog ideas? Contact Kathryn Cunningham.
  • Can you moderate for the Online Conference or edit the video? Contact Karina or Laura.
  • Want to schedule CWG tweets along with your own? Karina needs a tweet scheduler for our Facebook group.
  • Love to cut and paste info for the CBN and email? Dawn Witzke needs a backup person who can do prep and get the Catholic Book News out when she cannot.
  • Could you help with Seal of Approval forms or train to evaluate books? Contact Erin McCole Cupp.
  • Do you read the Blog? Dennis McGeehan would love to have another person to help select articles for Zenit.
  • Like to network with CWG members? We need a new chairperson for the Volunteer Committee. Contact Nancy Ward.

Every committee chair would love to have your prayers and support.

Blog: Kathryn Cunningham and Dennis McGeehanLOVE the excitement and enthusiasm of our guest bloggers. We’ve had two in the last couple of months who were very well received. Love the idea of together we are more powerful than one. Anyone, send me any brainstorming about encouraging Guest Bloggers and members. Had lunch with our “wunderkind” Mary Woods during the holiday. She is a smashing success at Wyoming Catholic College and still loves CWG. The feeling is mutual!
Dennis McGeehan: The SOA Committee’s new tutorials will be soon be linked on the CWG blog’s SOA page. Erin is joining the Blog Team and will be doing SOA-related posting. Dennis is updating the blog’s CWG Contact Info page, with new Board members and also the new SOA Committee members on that page.

CALA (Catholic Arts and Letters Award): Carol Ann Chybowski  – I love being part of the revival of Catholic literature. We’re a quiet little committee, not much to do after we send out the author invitations and confirm the judges. (I am still waiting to confirm one judge.}
But then, it’s my first year, so I’m sure you have some publicity duties coming our way!

Catholic Book News – Dawn Witzke I love that Gloria Winn has got my back on proofing. I’m sometimes in a rush to get the newsletter out and don’t always catch errors. Book News for Jan 20 featured Edgewater by Poet Arthur Powers and True Radiance: Finding Grace in the Second Half of Life by Lisa Mladinich in the categories of Women’s Issues, Spiritual Growth and Inspiration.
In 2016, I plan to update the current template to something mobile ready. Would love to get a backup person on my committee who can do prep and get the CBN sent if I can’t.

CWCO: Ann Lewis, Karina Fabian and Laura Lowder –
From Laura:
The 2016 Writers Conference Online is shaping up rapidly now. We have a nearly full schedule of wonderful presenters on topics ranging from elements of the writing craft to legal issues for writers to a look at the very noble challenge of our motto: The Rebirth of Catholic Arts and Letters.
We’re soliciting volunteers to help with moderating presentations. Karina is scheduling times for presenters to learn the webinar program and to practice on it. We’ve also opened registration for attendees. We are charging $40/person for the conference, $25 for CWG members
I LOVE being part of the Guild and working with such wonderful people as Karina and Ann Lewis and others I’ve met through these conferences!
From Karina: Let me start with what I hate: I hate dealing with technology. Every day, I note the irony that my day job is testing and reviewing software, yet I am not comfortable using anything past Office. Why do I tell you this? We are using a webinar platform for the CWCO. This is new technology for a lot of people. However, I – a 21st-century Luddite – have tested this software and found it the easiest platform for coordinators, presenters and attendees to use (yes, including Google Hangouts and Skype). Plus, I am going through all the behind-the-scenes hassle so it’s easy for the attendees as well.
Second, I’m doing it because I love the online conference. I love that we can reach people who cannot attend a live conference. We have so many talented writers, and I love watching them come alive during presentations and side conversations as they learn new skills, make connections, or just chat about their latest work in progress. (We have scheduled time in between each session for free chat, BTW.) I love that people come away inspired to write more, market their books better and approach publishers. And each time we have the conference, we end up with a new book out in the world. It really does foster a rebirth of Catholic Arts & Letters!
Finally, I love the people. Laura Lowder is a joy to work with, as has been Ann Lewis when we collaborate. Presenters and volunteers have been giving and fun to work with, and I always learn so much.
What do we need? As Laura said, we’re calling for volunteer moderators. It looks like we also need someone to edit the recordings. In order to make this easier on attendees and still deal with the software, we need to have five multi-hour presentations, which means the recordings will have about 6 hours for conference, with 5 or 6 presentations. The editing will be simple – just cut it into the five or six one-hour presentations – but we need someone who can handle that large a recording and can cut it up and save it as separate presentations we can then post online.

CWCL – Ann Lewis – More details of the Life Conference  July 22-25 in Chicago will be out after the Online Conferenc.

Facebook/Social Media – Karina Fabian  – What I love: I recommended the CWG FB group when we had so much trouble getting people to gather and communicate on the website. I love, love, love that it has taken off. We have formed the community we’d hoped for. I’m sorry that non-FB-using members are not getting the benefits, but it has been wonderful for the many who participate. I also love that even though I’ve not been posting, people seem to be sparking conversations and basically adhering to the rules. (At least no one has come complaining to me about excessive sales-y or “Read MY Blog!!!” posts.)
I’m also grateful for Gina Marinello-Sweeny and Michael Fraley for taking on the two big FB group tasks – approving members and running the Book Blast. (Side note: Michael has had some trouble with the book blast getting edited and posted on the blog, but we’re keeping a closer eye on it.)
What we need: Jane Lebak and Carolyn Astfalk rewrote the regular tweets and FB posts for our social media posting. I’ve been on sabbatical from the social media, but will be programming these in soon. However, I could use a volunteer to help me load them into Buffer once a month. As a bennie, I don’t mind letting the person using my buffer account to schedule posts for their own social media as well.

Membership: Maureen Smith -Current active members number 473.

Retreat: Ann Lewis and Margaret Rose Realy –  This is held every other year. Stay tuned!

SOA: Erin Cupp – It’s a new year, and the SOA Committee is in LOVE! We LOVE the sense of adventure that comes with putting together our new, convenient online training modules for our evaluators. We think our evaluators will LOVE these tutorials and quizzes when they roll out in early February, and we are in LOVE with the hope that this new training will help our evaluators to be more confident what they do for the SOA Committee. Even more so, we LOVE how patient our authors and publishers are being as we take 1st Quarter 2016 off to prepare and administer this training. We also LOVE Ann Seeton for volunteering to protect evaluator confidentiality in her new role as our Hard Copy Coordinator. We furthermore LOVE Laura Nelson and miss having her as our Forms Coordinator, and we’d LOVE to have you, yes you, sign on to fill the gaping hole she left in our hearts–as long as you have some familiarity with Google Forms and Docs, that is. Would you LOVE to help us with our forms? Or are you thinking about becoming an SOA Evaluator? We’d LOVE to have you! Contact the committee at SOA@catholicwritersguild.com.

Speakers Bureau/Educational Outreach:  Dennis McGeehan I can add your name when requested.

Volunteer Committee: We would LOVE a new CHAIR! We thank Nichole Latif for organizing this new committee last year. She set up a system to match the needs of the committee chairs with the talents of the CWG members.

Zenit: Dennis McGeehan  – I would love to have one more person on the Zenit committee to help select CWG Blog posts to submit to Zenit.com

Fiction Critique Group; Contact Don Mulcare

CWG Non-Fiction Critique Group: Contact Nancy Ward or Connie Rossini.

For other concerns and suggestions about our fabulous committees, contact Nancy Ward, Coordinator of Committees.

Nancy Ward, convert, journalist, author, and speaker, writes from Texas about Catholicism, conversion and Christian community at NancyHCWard.com, JOYAlive.net, and other websites and magazines. Through her Sharing Your Catholic Faith Story workshops, retreats and DVD, she shares her conversion story in Catholic parishes and at conferences, equipping others to share their stories. She contributed to the award-winning The Catholic Mom's Prayer Companion, facilitates two Catholic Writers Guild critique groups, serves on the Guild’s Board, and speaks at national writers conferences.