Rev. Craig Schwalenberg, our UU Ministerial Settlement Representative, came to Canton June 12 – 13 to meet with church council, the congregation and with the search committee. He met with Church Council on Friday afternoon and then led an open meeting with the congregation on Friday evening to talk about the search process outlined by the UUA that we will follow.
The following day, we had our retreat (and first official gathering) from 9:30-4:30. With Craig, we talked in detail about the process of searching for a new minister. By the end of the day, we all had our assigned roles along with quite a few tasks to complete in the coming week.
We held the first of our weekly meetings on June 19. We discussed ways to keep church members informed of our progress. Lots will be on the new website, once that’s up and running. In the meantime, look for our bulletin board in the social room at church, which will be up by the end of June. We’ll also have a question/suggestion box. You can also contact any of us with particular questions or concerns.
We created our search committee covenant. We also created our covenant with the congregation, which appeared in the summer newsletter. Look for a newsletter article from us each month!
Communication Plan was worked on – how can we best get needed information to the congregation?
We end each meeting in possession (by email) of a “task list” of things each of us has to do before the next meeting.
July 2015
We installed a bulletin board in the social room, with lots of information for the congregation.
Each of us made short “bios” and got photos to go along with our contact information.
We started using the Social Hour time to take questions from and have discussion with members of the congregation. We’ll continue to do this approximately twice a month, with 2 Search Committee members on each of the designated Sundays. They’ll be announced in the weekly E-blasts.
We collected lists of useful websites of other UU (and a few non-UU) churches who have recently been through the search process. From those sites, we’re getting ideas about many parts of the process!
Cottage Meeting planning was started.
We added a Google Calendar for our shared use.
August 2015
Cottage Meeting planning was a big part of this month’s activities. After working on meeting format, logistics, and questions for participants, we worked on invitations and sent a mailing. We secured hosts for all of the meetings and then started the Google™ “doodle” poll where members of the congregation can sign up for 1 of 14 Cottage Meetings. We’re also having sign ups after church, starting Aug. 31 and continuing into September.
Our timeline of activities was created. This helps the congregation see “where we are” in the process and when the opportunities for their own involvement are.
Our search committee chair, Jon Montan, met with Church Council to discuss some of the ideas we’d come up with that relate to the search that. Included in that was:
the upcoming “Beyond Categorical Thinking” workshop.
working to secure a person from Church Council to serve on the Negotiating Team. Our representative on that team is our committee treasurer, Pete Wyckoff. (note: Council will talk about their representative at their September meeting.)
We got the September Newsletter submission ready to send in.
Field Trip! Several of us went to Saranac Lake to see Arcadia, the play Kim Bouchard directed with Pendragon Theatre.
Planning is beginning on:
the Congregational Record, part of the packet we submit to interested ministers.
We’ve asked to have all of the notes from the “home meetings” that took place during the 2014 Canvass, since these might be useful in compiling our Congregational Record
pre-candidating weekends. We all need to figure – way ahead – which weekends will be available for us to go to “neutral pulpits” in February and March to observe our 3-4 “pre-candidates.”
