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The Center for Association Leadership is Preparing to Launch ‘Learning Communities’ Initiative in 2005
The Center for Association Leadership will launch its new “Learning Communities” initiative in January 2005 to give ASAE members an opportunity to come together on an ongoing basis, both in person and online, to share information, best practices, and solutions to common problems.
Organized around six specific knowledge domains, the “Learning Communities” will provide participants with a forum to collaborate with their peers to develop effective practices and new ideas in association management and leadership, to share critical knowledge, and discover solutions to common problems around their particular domain. The community will be a shared space for on-going collaboration around real work that cannot be offered through traditional structured educational programs. The combination of relationships, interactions with other members (in large groups, small groups, and one-on-one), and the sharing of resources and ideas will enable community members to tap into the distributed intelligence of the association community as a whole.
The first six “Learning Communities” are organized into “matched pairs” to help better evaluate their success. Two communities will be based on the demographics of staff size (large associations and small associations); two will be oriented around functional areas (technology and professional development); and two will be oriented around organizational tenure or level of experience (emerging leaders and senior staff).
“The purpose of each ‘Learning Community’ is to generate and share learning and knowledge around a particular domain,” said Susan Sarfati, CAE, president and CEO of The Center for Association Leadership and executive vice president of ASAE. “Organizations that have staff members who participate in these new communities will benefit greatly from the resources and knowledge developed by the groups. If you want instant access to the collective intelligence of the association community, ‘Learning Communities’ are for you.”
Each “Learning Community” will be engaged in a variety of activities, including face-to-face meetings of the community as a whole or subgroups within the community; ongoing discussions on topics within the community’s domain; sharing of documents or work products among community members; and specific, time-limited projects developed and organized by community members.
Individuals within a “Learning Community” can participate at different levels. There will be no size limit, but the greater the participation, the more robust and productive the community will be. Those interested in being members of any of the first six communities should complete the online Member Interest Form at http://shop.asaenet.org/forms/misc/lc_memberinterest.html.
For a more detailed overview of the “Learning Community” initiative, its goals and its structure, visit http://www.asaenet.org/asae/cda/index/1,1584,ETI20715_MEN3_NID4960,00.html, or contact Megan Arzt, manager of learning and community, at marzt@centeronline.org or 202-326-9549.
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