[Gatesedge] What does it take to put on an Event?

[D. Vandever]

Greetings!

I had the incredible pleasure of being named as the volunteer coordinator for the war point at the Ravensmarch event held this last weekend. I tried to model it after the way that the volunteers are coordinated at Gulf War in an effort to make people more aware of how very important it is to volunteer. I gave tokens for time given volunteering and many worthy folk participated in the raffle pull at the end of the day for prizes for their time given. This also happens at Gulf War and is a very popular activity since people can get some very nice prizes for their service. I had a lot of fun and I think the folks who played also had a good time.

What I didn't expect was the eye-opener *I* got on the time and effort for putting an event together. I've worked on probably a hundred or more events and autocrated my fair share and still the numbers are impressive.

Not everyone played the game. I estimate that for every person who came and signed in at the volunteer area there was at least one other person who did not. And this estimate is probably generous.

Yet the people who did come to me tallied up nearly *500* hours of service from Friday afternoon to Saturday afternoon. If my estimate of 1 of 2 is correct, then the actual number of hours of service would be closer to *1000* !!!  Wow. 

As I spoke of these numbers, Sir Kief av Kierstead told me of a spreadsheet that Mistress Lorraine Deerslayer has done wherein her estimate of the number of volunteer hours to put on a single weekend event from the opening bid to the debriefing meeting is approximately 4,000 to 5,000 hours of service by all involved.

The point of this missive is to help all of us understand why it is so important to volunteer to help at an event, whether it be your own or someone else's. It especially is to help everyone who attends Gulf War in March to understand why it is so vitally important to volunteer some of your time there. Think about it. If it took 1,000 volunteer hours to make Ravensmarch happen this last weekend then Gulf War is a magnitude of 10.  That's 10,000 volunteer hours to put on a big war. Wow. Double Wow.

Last year, for the first time, Ansteorra lost the war point for volunteer hours at Gulf War. When you get there, make volunteering a part of your plans for the fun at the War.
Look on the map or ask someone where volunteer point is and go sign up. After all, it takes a village to win a war. :-)

In Service,
HL Annes Clotilde von Bamburg
Kingdom Historian  
You are not an archeologist trying to construct a society that has been lost. You are a historian who is preserving what is now for the future to learn about us.The only SCA historians who will be SCA archeologists will be our heirs if we, as historians today, fail to do our jobs properly.
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