A few creative ideas... -- Central Oklahoma Mensa

A few creative ideas...

Posted in Local Editor Resources on September 9, 2002

Need an idea to get your newsletter out of a rut? Here’s a couple of things that have worked for other editors: Bad Art Cover Contest & Pet Photo Covers. Click ‘Read More’ below for the details on these great ideas. And be sure to post comments with your own ideas for getting group members involved.

Sara Youngman, editor of Nova (Western Michigan Mensa) came up with the idea to have a Bad Cover Contest. Group members submitted their bad art — and the worst one was picked to be the cover. Says Sara, “We printed some incredibly bad covers. I still think it was a great way to get people involved.”

Dennis Lenahan, editor of HMMmm (High Mountain Mensa) had a series of covers based on member’s pictures of their furry friends. Dennis said it all started when a dog “wrote” an article and they ran his picture on the cover. “That got me 14 more pet photo covers over the next couple years. Best member response of anything I’d tried. And one PRP Judge opined that a pet picture tells more about a Mensan than a profile.”

Comments

Posted by goatgrrl at September 23, 2002 01:25 PM

Peg Shambo, editor of Iowa-Illinois Mensa's newsletter A-Q-Men, recently shared her idea for a Restest Time column. In this column, she relates anecdotes from local members, "questioning their true eligibility to remain in Mensa."

Peg says, "It all came up when the LocSec decided she wanted to step down, realizing
that she was just too busy and unorganized in the rest of her life and was
making dumb mistakes, relating a tale of her own. Another member chimed in
with her own dumb mistake. Sitting around after our ExComm meeting,
several of us came up with more thoughts on the same subject. And let's
face it, 'Retest Time! is a popular theme within Mensa, anyway. :-)"
In its first month, the column has an anecdote about a member who thought she'd lost a sock (when lo-and-behold, there it was on her foot) and a member who went to a luncheon, leaving her oven on in the midst of summer. Peg then added a note at the bottom encouraging members to submit their own retest stories.