OVERVIEW
You'll find it easy to maintain a list of activities requiring volunteer assistance, allowing community members to view the task list and calendar in various ways simply by signing in to the community using their web browser. Community members can easily sign up for tasks, and the system automatically sends out confirmation emails to the appropriate people, as well as automatic email reminders one month, one week, and one day prior to any specific commitment.
The left-hand side of your home page, which is always available by clicking on the Home tab, also contains links to different community Sections that have been created especially for your community. Every community automatically includes sections for Announcements, a Photo Gallery, special Resources, a community Message Board, and a Well Wishes message board. Additional custom sections may be created by the coordinators of your community to post such things as recipes, memory book, other photo galleries, and journals and blogs.
As a coordinator, you have an additional tab, Administration, where you can
- add and remove community members
- designate other members as coordinators
- easily add activities to the calendar using the provided templates
- modify the existing community sections, or
- create new sections that fit the needs of your community.
Step 1: Adding Members
To get started, you need to add members to your community so they can sign in and learn about all the ways in which the community functions, from the task list, to the current announcements, discussions, and well wishes board. To do this, go to the People tab and click Add a new member. Minimally, you'll need to add first name, last name, and email address.
After you've added members to your community, set up some activities (see below), and/or set up some Community section options, it's probably a good time to notify new members that this community exists. To do this, click on the Administration tab and then click Notify members. From there you can have the system send a "Welcome" email to new members with instructions for signing in to the community.
Step 2: Creating Activities
What's the use of a community with nothing to do? That's where Activities come in. An activity is a set of tasks that requires volunteers, such as deliverying meals, or providing rides to a medical appointment. An Activity can be a one-time event, or a recurring set of Tasks. To add an Activity, click on Create a new activity on the Home page, the Calendar, or the Administration tab. After creating an activity, you can choose to send an email notificatoin to all community members alerting them of this new volunteer opportunity. As a coordinator, you can sign up for any activity task, or assign a specific member to a particular task.
Step 3: Working with Community Sections
You can also begin using the various community Sections. Click on any of the Section buttons from the Home page and then click on the Add or Create button to post a new Announcement, Photo, Resource document or link, community discussion Message, or Well Wish. For most Sections the coordinators may set permissions whether to allow all members to view, post, and/or comment on items in that Section. From the Administration tab, click on 'Sections, Announcements, Emails' to edit or deactivate exisitng Sections or to create all new Sections including additional photo galleries, community message boards and blogs, and resource sections for posting anything from recipes and memory books to relevant links and documents.
Step 4: Explore!
Those are the basics. Explore the site to discover more of what you can do. (In particular, you might want to adjust some of the Community options such as the picture displayed on the Home page, or the text used on the About tab. To do this, click on the Administration tab and then click on Site options.)
See also: Activities & Tasks, Community Announcements, Community Sections, Customizing your Community Site, Adding Members to your Community
For more help, look for help links with a yellow dot
, see the complete list of Help Topics, or contact a Coordinator (listed at the left on your Home Page).
