ASSOCIATION UPDATES

Church Volunteer Central is planning a number of new events next year, but we wanted to give you advance notice of our two national conferences. Start planning now to be at our home in Loveland, Colorado, March 16-18 for Launching a Volunteer Revolution led by Bill Hybels. Spaces are limited, and special advance registration is only available to members of Church Volunteer Central! You’ll want to come back to Loveland October 4-6 as Sue Mallory leads our conference on The Equipping Church. Keep an eye on the Church Volunteer Central Web site for more details.

Another part of our expanded training ministry is our partnership with the International Network of Children's Ministry, the hosts of the Children's Pastors' Conferences. Church Volunteer Central will be conducting a series of workshops at every Children's Pastors' Conference in 2005!

We hinted last month about big changes to the feel of our Web site. On December 6, we will unveil this new look. Those comfortable with our old navigation buttons will find their familiar links, such as Tools, Training, and Idea Depot, in the left column. But our members told us that when they went to the site, it was usually for help on a specific topic. So you’ll find a new set of buttons at the top for the five key areas of volunteer leadership. Each of those has a set of more specific topics that appear underneath it. When you select a topic, you’ll see all types of resources that apply to that topic. That might include forms, articles, online classes, and books—anything that would help on that subject.

Even more exciting is the new Search box. Entering a word or phrase there starts a search of the entire Church Volunteer Central Web site for resources containing that word. (Caution: please don’t do a search on the word “the.” You won’t believe how many hits you get!)