Growing Your Astronomy Club |
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More Tips for Welcoming Visitors
Signage
Help visitors find you!
Do you have a sign (or signs) that directs people to your meeting location? This is particularly important if you meet in a location that has multiple buildings or rooms, like a school campus, museum, or community center.
Quality Refreshments
Provide a table with quality refreshments. Serving food is a time-honored tradition at social gatherings and contributes to a welcoming atmosphere. Many clubs provide a budget for refreshments and have a member who is responsible for bringing them. Some clubs put out a refreshment donation jar that the refreshment person uses to purchase goodies, beverages, and supplies.
Make it easy for everyone to become a club member
Are you driving away younger adults before they even have a chance to join?
Do prospective members need to print out an application, write a check, locate an envelope and a postage stamp and mail it in? For many people, and particularly younger adults, writing a check and mailing it is considered outdated and inconvenient.
How to streamline becoming a club member:
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Apply for membership online: It’s OK to provide a paper application a visitor can complete at the club meeting, but for added convenience and to attract younger members, many clubs now use the customizable Night Sky Network online application form. (Example: http://nightsky.jpl.nasa.gov/club-apply.cfm?Club_ID=51) You can link to the application right from your club website.
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Pay dues online: Many clubs have set up PayPal or other online payment services for dues, donations, and club materials like jackets and hats. Ask one of your web-savvy members to set up Paypal or a similar service for your club, if you don’t already have one. Your members (and your treasurer) will thank you for it.
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Sharing the Universe videos are produced by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific (ASP) from research conducted by the Institute for Learning Innovation, the ASP, and from astronomy clubs like yours. www.astrosociety.org/SharingTheUniverse
The Sharing the Universe project is funded by the National
Science Foundation and is supported by the Division of Research on Learning in Formal and Informal Settings (DRL) of the National Science Foundation under Grant Number DRL 0638873. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in the material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
Video production by Flying Moose Pictures