Good day! I am Susan Kistler, the Evaluation 2013 conference program coordinator and American Evaluation Association Executive Director Emeritus. Today, I’m writing about 4 ways to make the most of the conference even if you cannot attend in person.
Hot Tip #1 – Leverage the Evaluation 2013 Online Conference Program to Build Your Professional Network: The Evaluation 2013 Online Conference Program is searchable by Topical Interest Group Sponsor, speaker, and keyword. If you are attending, researching the conference program and its 700+ sessions in advance of attending is a must-do in order to make the most of your time. The abstracts appear only online – the hardcopy program that you will receive on site has only titles and presenters. Even if you are not attending, you can search the conference program for colleagues working in your area and connect via email to raise a question.
Hot Tip #2 – Check the AEA eLibrary for Handouts and Related Materials: AEA’s online public eLibrary has over 1000 items in its repository and that will grow considerably as the conference nears and immediately following. All speakers are encouraged to post their materials in the eLibrary and anyone may search and download items of interest, whether attending the conference or not.
Hot Tip #3 – Follow Hashtag #Eval13 on Twitter: If you are on twitter and will be in attendance at Evaluation 2013, add your name to the growing online list of #Eval13 Twitter Users and use hashtag #eval13 to tag your conference-related tweets. If you aren’t attending, follow #Eval13 to stay abreast of the conversation and @aeaweb, AEA’s Headlines and Resources Twitter Feed in particular.
Bonus Cool Trick – Get the H&R Compilation: Not up for joining Twitter quite yet, but want to get the field’s headlines and resources for the week nevertheless? You can subscribe to AEA’s Headlines and Resources compilation to arrive via email or RSS once each week. Learn more here.
Hot Tip #4 – Check in Regularly or Subscribe to EvalCentral: Chris Lysy maintains EvalCentral, a compilation of blogs across the field where you can always find the newest posts. Lots of bloggers will be in attendance at Evaluation 2013 and EvalCentral allows you to find them all in one place. The most current post right now, today, Saturday, July 20, 2013, is from Jennifer Morrow on making the most out of the AEA Conference (great minds think alike…. great ideas there and a bit of a conference etiquette lesson as well).
Do you have questions, concerns, kudos, or content to extend this aea365 contribution? Please add them in the comments section for this post on the aea365 webpage so that we may enrich our community of practice. Would you like to submit an aea365 Tip? Please send a note of interest to aea365@eval.org . aea365 is sponsored by the American Evaluation Association and provides a Tip-a-Day by and for evaluators.
Thanks for the Eval Central plug Susan, I have a plan in mind that I think will make following the conference very easy. More to come soon 🙂
-Chris