STC Rochester Chapter

Renew by November 11 for a chance to win a free Kindle Fire!

The 2012 STC membership season is now open, and the Rochester community looks forward to having you as an STC member in the coming year!

The benefits of STC membership are many: access to award-winning publications, programs for  professional development that include webinars and certificate programs, and the opportunity to build your professional network. In the last year, STC has added important new benefits for members, including:

• My STC, the new social network just for technical communicators. Now connecting and collaborating with your colleagues is even easier, with whiteboards, live chat, discussions, and more.
• Access to free archived seminars. STC currently provides access to 38 archived seminars and will be adding more in 2012.
• STC’s  Technical Communication Certification Program.

As a member of the Rochester chapter, you are part of a strong and vibrant community that has been bringing value to upstate New York area technical communicators for six decades. We offer a series of educational and networking programs throughout the year, as well as our popular annual conference, Spectrum, the longest-running regional conference of its type in STC. In 2011, we earned the STC Pacesetter Award, and we were named an STC Community of Excellence.

Renew your STC membership before Friday, November 11, and you’ll be entered into a drawing to win the new Kindle Fire from Amazon. All members who renew for 2012 by 11:59 PM EST (GMT-5) on November 11 will have a chance to win!

If you renew by January 3, 2012, you’ll get a free copy of the 2012 STC Salary Database when it’s published in July 2012.

Dues for STC membership packages remain the same for 2012 — and the STC SIG Value package actually has a lower price ($295, compared with $375 in 2011).

If you have any questions about your STC membership, please don’t hesitate to contact Lori Meyer, chapter membership manager, at membership@stc-rochester.org.

Stay with us and grow with us! We look forward to seeing you as an STC member in 2012!

To renew, go to
http://www.stc.org/membership/join-or-renew-now

Last month, the Society for Technical Communication launched the MySTC network. By June 3rd, over 1400 members had logged in.

Here are a few highlights from the announcement.

MySTC will change the way technical communicators interact online. Combining the knowledge-sharing capabilities of a professional network with the interactivity and user experience of a social network, My STC is an important platform for networking, collaboration, communication, community management, and more.

Once you’re inside, you’ll have the opportunity to personalize your user experience. You can edit your profile, add personal information, upload an image or video, create or view events, and begin participating in discussions. If you’re a member of an STC chapter or SIG, you’ll be automatically added to the corresponding discussion groups when you sign in. If you’re not a member of an STC community, you can participate in open discussion groups or start your own.

Features

One of the highlights of the STC Summit is the opportunity to connect with hundreds of technical communicators–people like you who understand the challenges of taking technical information and contextualizing it for the appropriate audience, who may be information architects or usability experts, instructional designers, technical editors, or any one of the many roles of technical communicators.

MySTC enables you to establish connections with thousands of technical communicators across the entire organization. You can join or start discussions, you can “friend” other members, you can join open groups or start your own.

MySTC also features a really cool “Who’s Online” feature which gives you the ability to chat with others, use a whiteboard, or even share your screen.

If you’re an STC Rochester member, you’ll have immediate access to the Rochester group in MySTC. Login and take some time to check out the Rochester group, “friend” your council and other members, post some pictures and videos, and explore the space to see what you’re interested in. You’ll also want to upload a picture of yourself and complete your profile.

Don’t forget to check out the videos of karaoke at the Summit After Party and the Lightning Talks!

Visit MySTC

Related articles

• Unpacking My Takeaways from #STC11 (benwoelk.wordpress.com)
• STC Rochester 2011-2012 Council (stc-rochester.org)
• Twitter Use at #STC11 Summit (benwoelk.wordpress.com)
• The Future of STC (techuncommon.com)
• My STC Network is Open! (stc.org)

It’s time to choose your leadership for the 2011-2012 chapter year. There’s a great slate of candidates waiting for your votes.

Related articles

• STC Rochester Chapter Leadership Positions, 2011-2012 (stc-rochester.org)

Leading from the first post, STC Rochester has won the Chapter Renewal Challenge. Not only did we have the highest renewal percentage in our size category; we led ALL geographic communities in our category and larger in all of STC.