Communications Committee

Communications Committee’s Mission Statement:

Identify various significant Union UMC event-dates and develop an advertising course of action that targets audience, form of media, approximate cost, and timeline to implement.

General Information

The Communications Committee of Union strives to ensure effective communications within the church and between the church and the community at large. In this day and age of instantaneous communications, it is vitally important to keep the church communications up-to-date and functioning properly.

This committee has a wide variety of responsibilities dealing with the tools of communications for the church. Due to the rapid changes in technology, the committee’s role is still evolving within the church. Some of the services provided by the Communications Committee:

• Provides guidance to the Board of Trustees concerning computer hardware/software purchases
• Provides help in maintenance of the church”s computers, including the networks connecting them to each other and to the outside world.
• Providing assistance for the publication and distribution of Union UMC’s newsletter, The Tidings.
• Maintenance of the church’s web site, www.unionumc.org.
• General advertising in local media, including post-cards, yard signs, newspaper and news-related web sites.
• Advertising for special events.

Membership

This committee hosts members with a variety of skills since communications takes many forms. Members are needed who have any of the following:

• Artistic skills
• Computer hardware and software installation and maintenance knowledge
• Computer networking skills
• Web site development and maintenance experience
• News-gathering abilities
• Advertising know-how
• Creative thinking

The Lay Leadership Committee selects five persons each year to serve on the Communications Committee. The members serve three year terms. So at any one time, there are approximately fifteen members on the Communications Committee.

Meetings

This committee normally meets every other month to discuss upcoming communications needs. Meetings can be more frequent depending upon the nature of upcoming communications needs. The Communication Committee makes some of their decisions via email. Union has a mailing list devoted to the Communication Committee and it is used to resolve issues that do not require a physical meeting.