Call to Order/Introductions
The meeting was called to order by Chair Ron Brooks at 9:04 PM on November 1, 2016.
Members Present: Ron Brooks, Chair; Susan Glass; Paul Edwards; Deb Lewis; Doug Powell.
ACB Employees and Contractors Present: Sharon Lovering
Ex Officio members present: Kim Charlson, President; Bob Hachey, Email List Moderator; Katie Frederick, Board Liaison; Denise Colley, past BOP Chair.
Other Participants: Michael Malver; John McCann; Sue Ammeter; Ken Stewart; Patricia Lipovsky.
Adoption of Agenda:
Ron reviewed the Agenda.
Motion: Doug moved and Susan seconded adoption of the Agenda. Motion passed.
Approval of October 4 Minutes:
Motion: Paul moved and Doug seconded adoption of the October 4, 2016 Minutes. Motion passed.
Public Comment:
Michael Malver: Every year the Board of Publications makes several awards at the ACB convention. These are acknowledged at the time by the membership but are probably quickly forgotten because there is no ongoing commemoration. Michael stated there should be a page on the web site linking to those winning articles within their originating publications. This would allow people to see in posterity those articles that were valued as the best writing of the year, and if done correctly would result in publicity for affiliate publications. There was general agreement that this was an excellent idea and Kim offered to consult with the new web management group on how to implement this.
John McCann: Expressed concern that the 300 word limit for candidate statements was too limiting and should be reconsidered.
Ron explained that this is reviewed every year and will be considered at that time.
John also suggested that we track hits on the Candidates Forum page. It was agreed that this could be looked into and could probably be done.
Reports:
BOP Chair: Ron Brooks
Ron appreciated that many reports were turned in prior to the meeting.
• ACB Braille Forum Production Contracts
o The following firms were selected to assist with the production of the ACB Braille Forum:
Braille – Clovernook Center for the Blind
Large Print – United Book Press
Audio File Recording and Cassette Duplication – National Audio Company
o All contracts are for two years with the option to extend for an additional year.
o Cassette -- All firms were notified and all contracts have been finalized and transmitted to the selected firms for approval.
• Large Print Reader Preference Survey
o Appointed Deb Cook-Lewis to lead the joint BOP-CCLVI task force that will help to design and execute the Large Print Reader Preference Survey. Deb’s background includes standards development, and she has not been involved in some of the prior discussions on this topic, so she will be able to lead this effort from a position of knowledge and objectivity.
o Invited Leslie Spoone, CCLVI President, to designate two CCLVI members to participate on the joint BOP-CCLVI task force which will be developing the draft survey.
o Hope is for the BOP-CCLVI Task Force to have a draft survey for BOP comment prior to our January call.
• October Board Meeting
o Attended the Fall Board Meeting which was held on October 21 and 22 in Reno, NV.
o Drafted a Board Meeting Report which is now with Sharon for inclusion in the December ACB Braille Forum.
• Progress on 2016-2017 BOP Work Plan
o Redistributed the adopted Work Plan on October 31. Will distribute the updated Work Plan prior to each month’s BOP call.
o ACB Braille Forum Production Contracts – Complete
o 2017 BOP Budget – Comments submitted to Eric Bridges on 10/14/2016.
o Develop BOP KPIs Tracking Tool – Draft tool distributed to BOP for comment.
- Large Print Reader Survey – In Process. Task Force Leader has been appointed. Invitations have gone out to BOP and CCLVI President for additional representation.
Brief discussion followed regarding the cassette contract where it was clarified that the contractor will both record and produce the cassettes.
Editor: Sharon Lovering
- December’s E-Forum was ready on Tuesday, Nov. 1.
- Sharon continues to receive new members, information about people who have passed away, format changes, address changes, and the occasional name change. Kansas has been particularly active; Georgia, Nebraska, Nevada, Oregon, Texas, and several other affiliates have jumped on the bandwagon.
- Sharon will be out of the office Nov. 4-7, attending the regional martial arts championships in Myrtle Beach.
- Doug asked for clarification that Sharon can accurately associate Braille Forum returns with the correct month, and she says she definitely can do this.
- Several people noted that they did not receive the Braille Forum email. There may be something wrong with the list and it will be investigated.
October 2016 Returns
Large Print: 7; Braille: 3; Cassette: 12; CD-ROM: 1; Miscellaneous: 1
November 2016: Issue type: hard copy; Print Page Count: 48
- Large Print: 3,040; Date Mailed: 10/26/2016
- Braille Issues: 745; Date Mailed: 10/21/2016
- Cassette Issues: 1,110; Date Mailed: not yet
- CD-ROM Issues: 157; Date Mailed: 10/28/2016
- Date Posted to Website: 10/28/2016
- E-mail issues: 3,160; Date sent: 10/31/2016
ACB Radio: Larry Turnbull
Larry was unavailable for the call.
ACB Email List Moderator: Bob Hachey
ACB-L Number of members: 305; Messages posted: 181
ACB-Chat Number of Members: 139; Messages Posted: 5
Leadership list: 226 members; 88 Messages
Social Media: Carla Ruschival
Carla was unavailable for the call. John McCann commented that the scholarship application has gone live and was actively posted to social media. Katie said that PR as working with affiliates to make sure they will also transmit information about the application on their local feeds and pages.
Public Relations: Katie Frederick and Paul Edwards
The PR Committee continues to publicize the parenting video and look for distribution venues. There is also discussion about how to keep affiliate pages on the ACB site updated.
During the PR Committee meeting held on October 16, the committee brainstormed more ideas to assist the scholarship committee with promotion of the 2017-2018 scholarships. Note: the application’s now online; as chair of the PR committee, Katie encourage folks to share the information on their social media feeds and affiliate websites.
She is hopeful to have some good news to share concerning ACB’s work with Greyhound's website in November.
The next meeting of the pr committee is Sunday, November 20, 2016 at 9:00 PM eastern.
Large Print Reader Preference Survey
Deb Cook Lewis will lead the joint working group from the BOP and CCLVI charged with developing survey content. Paul and Doug will serve on behalf of the BOP and Ron has reached out to Leslie Spoone to identify CCLVI members. Sharon has also agreed to participate.
Deb has started reviewing the literature on large print standards and she believes these will positively contribute to the body of information for consideration by the work group.
KPI Update
Prior to the meeting, Ron sent out the latest version of the KPI for review and comment. It will be nice to have tracked data in one place and to see over time the impact of various activities. What should we be counting?
There was discussion about the columns and how they apply to the different formats for the Braille Forum. It was agreed that the column for “accessed” would be changed to “received” for clarity. NFB Newsline will be added to tracked Forum data.
There was discussion about whether any data associated with distribution to Radio Reading Services could be track but this seemed difficult since we do not know for certain which services actually air the content. Ron will check with Mike Duke about this.
Web hits of particular pages associated with various media content or programs will be added to the tracking after the site revisions are implemented by the new contractor.
There was also discussion about whether or not to track podcasts since only new subscriptions can be tracked. There was interest in tracking number of downloads of ACB Link which should be available from Jeff Bishop.
Interactive, phone and Special Event need to be added to ACB Radio. Ron will discuss with Larry what can be measured effectively in terms of creative content and listener numbers.
For ACB email lists, Kim will provide tracking data for Leadership each month. Kim announced that the Leadership list would soon be opened to other Board members of affiliates to expand the coverage of this list. ACB Announce will be added.
Ron will make the changes and send out the next draft of the tool. We will begin populating it for the next meeting to see if we are tracking the right items to meet our needs. The tool will be officially launched to track data in 2017.
Topics for the Presidents Meeting
Paul, Doug and Susan plan to be at the Presidents meeting. Paul suggested that the large print survey would be a good topic of interest. Data collection and analysis is also a good topic as an example of how the BOP plans to use information over time. It was decided that we will look at the work plan and make a brief presentation on the highlights and progress to date.
Ron thought an update on the work plan in the Braille Forum would also be useful.
Ron will put together some bullet points for consideration related to a Midyear presentation.
Other Business:
Doug asked about review of the Editorial Policy Manual. This will be included on the December BOP meeting agenda.
Feedback on the program and newspaper for the Convention Committee will also be a topic for the December agenda.
Conflict of Interest documents: everyone is reminded to return these to the Minneapolis office.
Next Meeting:
Tuesday, December 6, 2016 – 9:00 PM Eastern
Adjourn
Paul moved and Doug seconded adjournment. Motion passed and the meeting adjourned at 10:28 PM.
Respectfully Submitted,
Deb Lewis, Secretary