Bi-Weekly Communication for VMN Volunteers

B-weekly Email for September 19

9/19/2023

Hello, VMNs. Beautiful days as we start the slow roll into autumn. Our 2023 VMN Conference is in less than two weeks. If you’re not able to join us, use the time to get outdoors and then catch up on the Bi-weekly emails.

This email includes:

Conference Updates
Continuing Education Opportunities
City Nature Challenge
DOF Acorn Collection

Conference Updates - State Office closure
The VMN State Office will be closed September 28-October 1, 2023 while the staff is in Abingdon for the conference. If you’re joining us, we’ll see you soon!

Continuing Education Opportunities
VMN Continuing Education Webinar: Segregation in Virginia’s National Parks, 1916–1965
Date/Time: October 12, 2023, 12:00-1:00 pm
Description: In the early twentieth century, national parks developed within the state of Virginia were racially segregated. This presentation will address the development of NPS segregation policy, its impact on visitors, and how it shaped cultural landscapes and visitor facilities in the parks.
Presenter: Erin Krutko Devlin is an Associate Professor of History and American Studies, and the director of the American Studies Program, at the University of Mary Washington. Her recently released historic resource study, “Segregation in Virginia’s National Parks: 1916-1965,” was completed under a cooperative agreement between the National Park Service and the Organization of American Historians.
Pre-registration required; find more information and the registration link on our website at http://www.virginiamasternaturalist.org/continuing-education-webinar-series.html

Be a Tester of a Citizen Science Curriculum - Free Online Training
Improve your Citizen Science skills by testing the “Certified Citizen Science” program.
This is five weekly meetings on Tuesdays from 7:00-8:30pm EST starting September 26, 2023.
Register by emailing Tess Moody, Doctoral Candidate at NC State, tmoody2@ncsu.edu

City Nature Challenge Organizational Meetings
VMN volunteers in several parts of the state have been participating in and leading public programs for the annual City Nature Challenge for several years. If you are a VMN volunteer interested in getting the City Nature Challenge started in a NEW location, there are organizational meetings happening this week. See the announcement below from the organizers. Note that the VMN state office is not the organizer; we just pass along information and encourage participation.

“A quick reminder that the informational meetings for new City Nature Challenge organizers are happening next week, starting Tuesday! If you are a NEW organizer (you haven't organized a city for the CNC before), please attend one of these informational meetings. We’ll cover: what the City Nature Challenge is; how the CNC is run/organized; what being an organizer entails; guidelines you'll need to follow and milestones you'll need to complete. Bring your questions for the Q&A at the end!

These meetings will help you make an informed decision whether or not there is time and people-power to organize your city for the City Nature Challenge. We'll ask for a final decision by mid November. We’ve now also added a meeting that will be in Spanish, held by our amazing regional CNC organizer for Argentina, Ana Plos! All the meetings cover the same information so you only need to attend one. These NEW organizer meetings will be (note that they are on Pacific Daylight Time!):

Tuesday, 19 September at 1pm PDT
Wednesday, 20 September at 8 AM PDT
Thursday, 21 September at 4pm PDT
SPANISH: Thursday, 21 September at 2pm PDT

Please see this PDF for the Zoom links, meeting agendas, registration information, and other important information.

DOF Acorn Collecting
The acorn collecting information is now available from the Virginia Department of Forestry at https://dof.virginia.gov/forest-management-health/seedling-nurseries/acorn-and-nut-collection/. Please check out the resources on that page for details on when and how to collect and deliver seed.

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Bi-weekly Email for September 5

9/5/2023

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Hello, VMNs. We hope everyone was able to enjoy their holiday weekend. Only three more weekends until the VMN Conference! Between now and then, you can always catch up on the Bi-weekly emails.

This email includes:

Conference Updates
DOF Acorn Collecting
Continuing Education Opportunities

Conference Updates
Four weeks until the 2023 VMN Conference. The countdown has begun!

Registration will close on September 11. If you haven’t already, please register by then!

Acorn Collecting - Coming Soon!
It’s acorn collecting time! The Virginia Department of Forestry is gathering the final necessary information, such as the species list, for 2023. We’ll send it out to all of you in a separate email as soon as it is available - almost certainly later this week. Meanwhile, here’s a great article about how valuable your seed collecting work has been for DOF reforestation projects.

Continuing Education Opportunities

Interpretation Class for VMN Volunteers, October 21
Title: From Passion to Interpretation- How to Create an Interpretive Program
Description: Everyone has a subject they are passionate about, but not everyone is comfortable sharing that passion with others. How do you refine all that information into an easy to present program or talk? How do you get other people to care about it as much as you do? This class will help you explore those skills. We will explore the tools that state park interpretive staff use to create and present programs to hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. During the class we will:

Identify audiences
Identify a topic
Develop goals and objectives
Explore tangible/intangible/Universal Concepts and how others see your topic
Develop a draft program theme
Develop a sketch of an outline for a program tailored to your topic

Date: Saturday, October 21, 8:00 am - 2:00 pm
Location: Powhatan State Park, 4616 Powhatan State Park Rd., Powhatan, VA 23139
Cost: Free
What to bring:

Bring an object related to your topic (photo, tool, mount, recording). You will use this object as part of developing your program.
Bring lunch, snacks, and drinks. The group will take a short break for lunch.
Dress for the weather. The group will be in a picnic shelter near the playground, so it could be windy or damp.

Class size: limited to the first 40 registrations
Registration: https://forms.office.com/g/e3bemay4LW
Instructor bio: Sammy Zambon is the Eastern Visitor Experience Specialist for Virginia State Parks. He is a Certified Interpretive Trainer with the National Association for Interpretation and has over 20 years experience training interpreters and developing programs. He was an advisor for the Central Rappahannock Chapter of the VMN program when they founded. He continues to teach interpretation and mammalogy for chapters across VA.
Questions? Please contact Sammy Zambon, 804-624-7064, sammy.zambon@dcr.virginia.gov

Virginia Forest Landowner Education Program Upcoming Events

VFLEP is now accepting registrations for the Fall Forestry and Wildlife Field Tours, which will take place October 6 (Bland), 11 (Essex and King & Queen), 12 (Mecklenburg), and 20 (Warren). Please see the VFLEP website for itineraries and registration information.
VFLEP’s Fifteen Minutes in the Forest series returns in September. Join Virginia Tech and Virginia Cooperative Extension Foresters from across Virginia for a 15 minute video on a timely topic every other Friday at 12:15 on Facebook Live or YouTube Premier. All videos can be viewed on the Virginia Forest Landowner Update YouTube Channel any time (subscribe to be notified when new videos are added). Check out the upcoming schedule of videos, which includes topics such as chiggers, hardwood management, hellbender habitat, and more.

Virginia Natural History Society Meeting
Description: Radford University is hosting the annual meeting of the Virginia Natural History Society on Saturday September 23, from 10-4. They welcome participation and presentations by Virginia Master Naturalist volunteers.
Cost: Conference fees (student: $ 10; regular VNHS member: $15; non-member regular: $25) include a deli lunch buffet and 2 coffee breaks.
More information and registration: https://virginianaturalhistorysociety.com/vnhs-general-meeting-2023/
Notes: If you’d like to pay for registration with a check, please make it payable to “Virginia Natural History Society Conference Registration” and mail it to Nancy Moncrief, VMNH, 21 Starling Avenue, Martinsville, Virginia 24112. If you must cancel after submitting payment, you will be refunded the full amount, minus a $5 administration fee, prior to September 18 at 11:59 EDT. VNHS reserves the right to cancel the conference, if necessary, in which case you will be refunded the full amount.

Other Opportunities
Generation NEXT workshops with Virginia Cooperative Extension and Virginia Department of Forestry, which focus on land succession planning, will be held in several locations across Virginia beginning in September. Please see this flyer for more details.

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Bi-weekly Email for August 22

8/22/2023

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Hello, VMNs. Happy First Day of School! If that doesn’t apply to you, take a moment to remember school days… Or your VMN Basic Training days! For homework, you can catch up on the Bi-weekly emails.

This email includes:

Volunteer Policy Handbook - updated version released
Conference Updates
VMN Continuing Education Webinars
Virginia Association for Environmental Education Conference

Volunteer Policy Handbook
The new version of the VMN Volunteer Policy Handbook (VPH) has officially been released and is effective as of today. You can find it on the Program Policies page of the VMN website and on your MyImpactPage under Files.

It has been seven years since we updated the VPH so this version has some very significant updates in terms of formatting and use. Here is what you need to know:
1. This version of the VPH is meant to be used electronically.
--The Table of Contents is clickable as are all the links in the document.
--While you can print a copy of the VPH, it is important to know that none of the links have the URL typed out.

2. Whether you are new to the program or have been a VMN volunteer for many years, we encourage you to look through the handbook and be familiar with the contents. Sometimes volunteers may have developed wrong understandings of program policies and procedures that then get passed down to new volunteers over time. Here’s a chance to get reacquainted with what is expected of you as a VMN volunteer so that you can fill that role successfully!

From now on, the VMN State Office will update the VPH on an annual basis around the first of each year.

Conference Updates

Registration - Register now to join us and your fellow VMN volunteers from across the state in Abingdon. Our Holston Rivers and High Knob chapters have planned an excellent program, and we’ve got plenty of space in on-site sessions as well as quite a few field sessions. Plus, only attendees will have access to our conference app, where you can connect virtually with other attendees and even set up in-person meetups!

Waitlists - Check your email! If you are on a waitlist for a session and you get bumped into a slot, the registration system will send you an email with a link to accept the change. You will have 72 hours to accept this new spot! If you miss that window, your chance to accept will expire and the system will remove you from the waitlist entirely. That is how it works with this system. We have already had a lot of movement on the waitlists so this is important!

Lodging - If you have not secured lodging, we encourage you to do so ASAP. Our room blocks for the conference are full but that is ok because none of the conference events are at a hotel. We recommend doing an internet search of hotels in Abingdon, Virginia. You can find rooms at various price points on any of the travel booking sites. If you cannot find what you want in Abingdon, check Bristol, Virginia. Bristol is only a 15-minute drive from Abingdon.

Elk - While we were not able to arrange for a conference session to see the elk population of SW Virginia due to timing constraints, DWR is offering a public tour on Thursday, September 28, 5:00-8:00 pm, leaving from Grundy, VA (about 1.5 hours from Abingdon.) This could be a nice opportunity for those who want to come early. Please be aware that arrangements for that tour are completely separate from the conference and made through DWR, not VMN. See https://dwr.virginia.gov/wildlife-watching/elk-tours/ for the details. Registration is limited to 25, so we recommend acting quickly if you want to take advantage of the opportunity.

VMN Continuing Education Webinars
Our VMN CE Webinar series will take a disco nap in September as we prepare for our big CE event - the conference in Abingdon!

Meanwhile, if you did not attend the August webinar with Dr. Emmanuel Frimpong (“Chubs are selfish, and that’s good for everyone”), you missed a really good one! It’s a fascinating ecological story and Dr. Frimpong tells it well. And the video footage of bluehead chub nests is so cool! You can still enjoy the presentation by watching the video, available now on the CE Webinar Series page of the VMN website.

The VMN CE Webinar series will return October 12 with Dr. Erin Devlin from the University of Mary Washington discussing her study of Segregation in Virginia’s National Parks, 1916–1965. It will be a focus on human history rather than natural history, helping us to learn about barriers to accessing outdoors spaces that may still have impacts today.

Virginia Association for Environmental Education Conference
The Virginia Association for Environmental Education is now accepting proposals for presentations for their 2024 conference, which will take place February 22-24 at George Mason University. Proposals are due October 15. See the VAEE website for details.

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Bi-weekly for August 8

8/8/2023

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Hello, VMNs. Summer is starting to wind down, school supplies can be found on every store shelf, and our VMN Conference preparations are in full swing. As you look towards fall, be sure to catch up on the Bi-weekly emails.

This email includes:

Conference Updates
Updated version of Volunteer Policy Handbook coming soon!
Continuing Education Opportunities
Reminder: Recert pin artwork submissions due August 18

Conference Updates
Registration opens in 2 days! Very exciting! Here are some Steps to Prep and Five Tips for Success.

Steps to Prep:

Check to see if you already have a VCE account - details on how to do this can be found on the conference web page under Registration
Look over the sessions and note your first and second choices for each time slot
Note about new waitlist process - must accept within 72 hours

Five Tips for Success:

Be open to a diversity of topics and sessions. You might find that a topic that you thought was less interesting turns out to be a fantastic, engaging session (we hope they all are!) Yes, some sessions will be more popular than others and those will fill up faster and have longer waiting lists, but, in total, there are more than enough sessions to accommodate the anticipated number of conference participants. Don’t overlook the on-site classroom sessions—especially if you don’t want to spend your conference time traveling back and forth to the field session sites.
Thoroughly read the session information on our website before registration. Pay particular attention to the transportation information for the field sessions. Some of our field sessions are quite far away. Some field sessions require participants to get themselves there, while others require participants to travel in a van or bus. For some, you must depart from the SW Virginia Higher Education Center with the group, and for others, you just meet at the field session location. If these details affect your decision-making about a session, we recommend you read them ahead of time.
Be aware that we have a keynote, plenary presentation first thing Saturday morning, followed by on-site concurrent sessions in the later morning. Participants aren’t required to attend the keynote session, but it is the only session available for that time block.
If you are able, plan on registering for the Full Conference. This gives you the best chance for getting into at least one field session.
This year we are using a new registration system. This means we are all learning together! This new system is administered by Virginia Cooperative Extension and not the VMN State Office so there may be a little bit of a delay in getting help or working out kinks. Please be kind to those who are trying to help and we will do our best to make sure everyone gets registered!

Updated version of Volunteer Policy Handbook will be released August 15
This is a highly-anticipated event! We will send everyone a link to the new document on August 15. We have made several updates and the format is quite different but we think both are for the best.

This new version is meant to be used electronically and the table of contents lets you click a topic and go straight to that section. We also include direct links to documents on our website when appropriate. We hope it will be easy to navigate and understand.

We are very excited to make this version available and have committed to making annual updates from now on!

Continuing Education Opportunities
Reminder: VMN CE Webinar, August 8
Come learn all about the fascinating ecology of the river chub at our next VMN CE Webinar, “Chubs are selfish, and that's good for everyone” with Dr. Emmanuel Frimpong. Wednesday, August 8, 12:00 pm. See the CE Webinar Series page of the VMN website for more information and registration.

Blue Ridge PRISM Summer Brown Bag Webinar
Thursday, August 17: "A Deep Dive Into Aquatic Invasive Plants"
12:00 pm to 1:00 pm, via Zoom
Register: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/640685396267
Blue Ridge PRISM will be joined by a panel of experts who will discuss aquatic invasive plants. Aquatic invasive plants are plants that have been introduced into the United States from other parts of the world and have adapted to growing in, around, or near water. They are a growing concern in Virginia and beyond, on both private and public lands. Our guest panel will provide some background about aquatic invasives, how they are a problem, and methods for managing them. The panel will then take questions from the audience. If you are able, please submit your questions beforehand during registration. We will also answer some questions live from the audience.
This is a free online webinar. Those who register will receive a copy of the recording. Please contact Blue Ridge PRISM with questions; this webinar is not put on by the VMN office.

Reminder: Artwork Due August 18 for Recertification Pin Contest
Put your artistic talent to use with our 2024 VMN recertification pin artwork contest! Submissions are due August 18. Check out the complete guidelines and link to submit on our website, and submit your rendering of Virginia-creeper or poison ivy. All submissions will be featured in our fall newsletter, and we will announce the winner around the same time.

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B-weekly Email for September 19

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