All About Activity Councils

When the current Executive Council (EC) starting putting together a plan for formalizing and growing our guild, one objective that we kept in mind was a desire to build a guild that was inclusive and active. We wanted all of our members to feel hands-on and to be able to contribute to our work. 

When we looked at other guilds, both traditional and modern, for inspiration, we found some guilds who were structured so that all members actively participated in guild projects by contributing to an Activity Council. This concept allows members to have a role in steering a part of the guild’s activities that interests them most, or in an area where they may have special skills to contribute. 

Planning our Blocks Of The Month lottery is one of the activities members can help with.

And so, we have decided to follow this concept within SFMQG.  The EC has identified 9 areas which encompass the majority of our activities and goals for the coming year. Each of these Councils will have a mentor from the EC.

A brief overview of the Councils :

• Block of the month lottery
• Choosing appropriate blocks, selecting fabric palettes, putting together fabric bundles, making sample blocks, writing tutorials and giving demos.
• Challenges & swaps
• Choosing projects and themes, creating samples, writing tutorials and giving demos, setting rules and deadlines.
• Community service
• Identifying charities for the guild to work with, selecting projects and leading them through to completion and delivery.
• Education & teaching
• Research, suggest and plan demonstrations and workshops, teaching or finding teachers, looking for community outreach possibilities (schools, libraries, festivals) for modern quilting skills.
• Special events
• Suggest and plan retreats, sewcials, mixers and other special events or meetings.
• Membership
• Enrolling and renewing memberships, coordinate member sign-ins at meetings, promote the guild and looks for ways to increase our membership.
• Historian
• Document the work of the guild by creating online resources like meetings archive, quilt archive, member gallery, and document archives.
• Meetings
• Organize meetings space, secure supplies required, prepare meetings spaces, coordinate refreshments.
• Quilt-a-long
• Suggest modern quilt projects to make together, coordinate demos, tutorials, instructions, prepare blog posts and emails for participants, lead discussions at meetings.

We are asking everyone to indicate a preference for at least one Activity Council when applying for membership in SFMQG.  Members are welcome to serve on as many Activity Councils as they have time for. Members can leave or join an Activity Council at any time, but we will aim to keep Activity Councils going for about a year before playing musical chairs and mixing things up a bit.

Bear in mind that different activities can require different commitments in terms of time and skills. However every Activity Council should be able to adjust to the capabilities and availability of its members. Activity Councils are about having fun and working together! The objective is to enjoy ourselves!

The EC officer responsible for mentoring an Activity Council will reach out to everyone who expresses an interest. Eventually a chairperson will be chosen for the Activity Council and that person will be the main link between the Activity Council and the EC when finalizing plans for all of these amazing activities. 

If you did not indicate your interests when you registered, you can still do so! There are a few ways to do this:

1. Find any of the recent newsletters from SFMQG and locate the “Update your preferences” link at the bottom of the page. This will open up your registration details and allow you to make selections (it’s the last section of the page).
2. Send an email to us, (or use the contact form to the right of this post) and an EC officer will get back to you!
3. Talk to the EC in the Members Facebook Group.

If you are not sure what to sign up for, or have any questions, the Facebook Group is a great place to start.

We are super excited about the activities we are going to be planning! Thanks to everyone for taking part.

Allison
VP of Administration