AWWA Summer Workshop

AWWA Summer Workshop
Monica Hoyt, Advocacy & Outreach Council Chair

This year’s AWWA Summer Workshop training for staff and board members was well worth the time and effort to attend.  Several staff and board members were in attendance.  The purpose of the workshop was to help sections understand how they fit into the larger picture of AWWA.

The workshop kicked off with a great presentation by Melanie Goete.  If you have not read her AWWA Journal articles and read her book Communicating Water’s Value: Talking Points, Tips and Strategies login to AWWA and download her articles right now.  She discussed how to communicate to the pubic during a crisis.  Her best advice is to have a crisis plan now, before you need it.  Make certain that you have the correct phone numbers to contact the correct people in a crisis.  She also suggested that fostering relationships with the media and other agencies before a crisis is the best way to survive an actual crisis.

Our own Alane Boyd gave a wonderful presentation on Total Water Solutions.  We teach our children about the water cycle, but somehow as water professionals we tend to segregate raw water, drinking water and waste water as totally separate cycles.  All water is connected.  Alane lead a great discussion on how we can bring all water treatment and delivery together.

One of the concluding speakers talked about training and how to get beyond PowerPoint discussions.  As we prepare for our own IMS AWWA Annual Conference in September, here are a few points that were brought up at the Summer Workshop.

1.        10/2 Rule – For every 10 minutes of lecture have 2 minutes of engagement.

2.        The Learning Pyramid – This shows how well people retain knowledge given each type of teaching tool.

Hopefully everyone who is preparing presentations of IMS-AWWA Annual Conference can take a new look at their lecturing style and help us have an even better conference than we have ever had.