General Category > General Discussion
Clubs restarting?
turningal:
Hi Folks
Our club meets at a small conference room (we are a relatively small club 35 - 40 members), in fact we recently featured in Revolutions magazine,Derwent Woodturning Club.
Our committee is meeting by zoom and we are contacting our members by email.
The major concern for our committee is members safety, the venue that we meet in is unlikely to welcome visitors before September, the way things are moving at the moment, we will be either ‘back to normal’ whatever that is by then or lockdown because of a second spike of the virus.
We run hands on nights which would be very difficult to manage, as well as demo nights.
So the whole situation is very fluid and unknown, like many clubs some of our members are vulnerable as far as Covid-19 is concerned and have been in isolation and I’m sure will be reluctant to venture into a gathering.
We may well end up writing this year off as far as Woodturning meetings go, our pro demos have been cancelled, but personally I think that is a small price to pay for the health and safety of our members, if members are ‘tech savvy’ there is a great deal of Woodturning available on the internet, so we have not yet considered remote demonstrations, although we may have to, depending on how life takes shape,
and how soon a vaccine is discovered.
I hope this post doesn’t sound too negative, but in reality we have no firm plans to restart ............
Bill21:
That all sounds very sensible. We have quite a lot of members over 70 at my club so I suspect many if not most have been shielding. How keen they will be to restart meetings is unknown at present as far as I’m aware. The venue itself has an online presence but have not broached the subject of reopening at all yet. I too suspect that this year is probably a washout and perhaps the situation can be revisited in the new year provided there isn’t a second wave of Covid 19.
As said there is a huge amount of information and should I say inspiration online but a few folks I have spoken to seem reluctant to take advantage of it. Social media is one such source but the tin foil hats come out at the mere mention of FaceBook which is a shame.
The Bowler Hatted Turner:
I think many club members will not be in a hurry to go back to club meetings.There is of course the unknown element of Corovid-19 and even with the reduction in social distancing many of the venues that I have demonstrated at will struggle to fit all of their members in. But on the other side of the coin do the (generally aged) club members want to go back to sitting in a draughty village hall when in fact they could watch a demonstration from the comfort of their own arm chair at home?
I admit to being a bit sceptical at first but the more I see of remote demonstrations the more I realise that this is now the way forward. No chairs to put out or go away afterwards,no sweeping up and no chilly nights out what more could you want? I do think the face of clubs will change.
Twisted Trees:
I have been watching a few of the "circuit demonstrators" develop their web presence and remote demonstration abilities. there are a lot of advantages, not only the obvious benefits to the demonstrator of using their own usually larger lathe, plus full tool / stock availability, and a front and centre seat from the audience point of view.
Add the lower cost of demonstrations due to removing the travel cost, and the opening up of a potential global list of available demonstrators and clubs, and I think that things are going to change.
There is still a social contact need that will bring people to gather in draughty halls when possible, but I think you are right to say that permanent change will result, and the longer the physical club is closed the bigger that change will be.
I know Paul and the AWGB generally are supporting people to go onto Zoom style meetings, and that some demonstrators are collaborating to get online presentation and teaching organised. The problem as I see it is getting the non internet savvy club members up to speed perhaps Revolutions needs a new section on internet provision to the workshop, camera placement, mic manners etc. and general internet skills to bring woodturners up to a level where virtual club meetings can continue without losing the "local people" element that the old club system provided.
While it is great that I can take a lesson or watch a demonstration with Jeff over in the USA, I have a two camera rig over my lathe so he can see me turn without standing on my foot and I have a screen so I can see him work too, and I am now a member of a club getting monthly meetings and demonstrations with members all around the world, but I can't pop round to Texas to see how your hollowing system works compared to mine like I could when all members were in or around my town.
turningal:
Hi Folks
I think an article in Revolutions to try and bring our members up to speed and more tech savvy sounds like a very good idea, because of but regardless of COVID -19. The magazine has the advantage over the rest of us contacting our members, and giving them the correct way to become more tech savvy, cos I’m no expert.
Regarding clubs reopening and remote demonstrations, I have to say that particularly on our hands on nights, many of our members use this evening as a social event as much as a Woodturning evening, this social contact is something that appears to be just as important to our members as anything else we do, and our committee is more than happy to facilitate this, if that’s what’s important to our members. But obviously at the moment this is not possible, and as I type this, just over the border in Leicester, there is going to be an interruption in return to ‘normal’ because of an apparent spike in the number of victims to the virus which will no doubt effect the decisions of our members.
Stay safe everybody.
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