By Meg Richards Boeff
Important information about changing our communications! The Grant Park Parents Network (GPPN) has decided to move our primary communications over to Facebook. This is a huge change from previous operations, but the current website has become cumbersome and difficult to navigate. The process of compiling and entering data requires a commitment of several hours per week, leaving no time to update the other features of the website (such as the calendar) and draining time from work on other projects that the GPPN would like to tackle. Additionally, there have been many reports that members are only sporadically receiving the weekly emails and questions about access issues.
Other neighborhood groups (Grant Part Neighborhood Association and Grant Park Farmer’s Market), as well as local businesses, are using Facebook with great success. Did you know that GPNA’s Facebook site is the second largest in the country? Facebook also allows great opportunities to share and cross-post information from these neighborhood groups and businesses, more easily connecting our neighborhood as a whole. Since the goal of GPPN is to build a community network, it only makes sense to utilize the social network to do this in the easiest and least time-consuming way.
GPPN is strongly encouraging all playgroups to move away from Google groups and onto Facebook, but understands that some people may have privacy concerns about the use of Facebook. The East Atlanta Parents Network (EAPN) has used the following method with great success, and GPPN would like to do the same. They list the playgroup details and contacts on their info page, which can be controlled directly by playgroup heads. This would actually provide a greater amount of security control than playgroups currently have. One of the benefits of utilizing Facebook is the ease of control that individuals have over their accounts. The level of individual security offered at Facebook is actually easier to understand and access and offers more control than the current GPPN website.
Lastly, utilizing Facebook offers GPPN members a new opportunity and a platform for its members to openly connect, discuss and comment. The current website does not offer this opportunity for community interaction. Since the GPPN is striving for greater community interaction, Facebook will allow encourage active discussions of posts rather than passively reading them from a weekly. This only works if you participate in the discussion. So please click “like” and comment often. If you have information you would like posted, the method will be the same. Simply send us a message through email or through Facebook.
What about the Weekly? The Weekly will continue in some format for a time. It will be posted whenever time allows, but will be a re-cap of posts from Facebook and will not be as regular. We would like cultivate a GPPN membership that is more connected and involved.
If you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact the GPPN Secretary Paige Teusink at paigeteusink@gmail.com or President Meg Boeff at meg.boeff@gmail.com. We appreciate your cooperation in making this transition as smooth as possible.
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