Community Spotlight: STC Community Competitions

Each year, STC’s communities sponsor competitions through which technical communicators have the opportunity to receive recognition for their work. Entries in the community competitions may receive an Excellence, Distinguished, or Merit Award. Each entry is judged against criteria that measure the degree of technical content, achievement of purpose, and technical execution, whether online or in a printed deliverable.

Distinguished Community Service Awards

The Distinguished Community Service Awards recognize the hard work and commitment of STC’s community leaders. The three awards — the Distinguished Chapter Service Award, Distinguished SIG Service Award, and Distinguished Service Award for Students — recognize an individual’s exemplary effort, energy, and dedication to their community and its activities. This is the highest level of recognition that a member can receive for service to their community.

Using Meetup With Your Community

If you are looking to expand the reach of your community’s activities, consider trying Meetup.com. Meetup is a website where members create profiles listing their interests. Based on their listed interests, various meetup groups are suggested. A Meetup Group is an organization that hosts get-together events on a certain topic. Meetup Groups range from backpacking clubs, to knitting circles, to technical communication groups. If your community creates a Meetup Group, you can potentially draw from a wider audience for your events.

Sharing Award Recognition

When your community presents a member with an award, you are telling the world about the great contributions of that member. However, the world might not be on your community website or newsletter, and you should be certain the award winner’s employers know about the award. One way to do so is to send a message directly to the awardee’s supervisor. Below we present a template for such purposes, originally written with a Distinguished Chapter Service Award in mind.