Recruitment & Retention

Contact: Emily Jacobs, CDM Membership Director jacobse@macollegedems.org

November | 2011

New member recruitment: we all have to do it and many of us probably do not really know if we are doing it in the most effective way. CDM wanted to put together a quick guide to let you know what a few other chapters are doing and to hopefully get you thinking. Please let us know if you have a creative recruitment technique that we didnt include! As always, if you need any help with attracting new members or holding on to the members youve already got, contact CDM Membership Director Emily Jacobs at jacobse@ macollegedems.org. First steps
--Tabling 101: Set up a table on your campus in an area that gets a lot of foot traffic. Have a sign-up sheet and a couple of current members at the table to talk to prospective members. Try to be there during lunch and between classes, when the most students will be walking around. --Build your online presence. A Facebook page and a Twitter account are great ways to let people know you exist. Make sure that you keep the page updated with contact info for a chapter leader and the normal meeting time and location. Remember to create Facebook events for big meetings and events. --Does your school have an Activities Expo or Student Activities Fair? You should be there! There are always tons of confused first-year students wandering around, and this is your opportunity to show them that all the cool kids join College Democrats. Dont forget to print flyers or quartersheets with contact information, the time and date of your next meeting, and the address of your website or Facebook page. --Hang flyers up around your campus. Be sure to include your meeting place and time. CDM has flyers already designed and we would be happy to send them to you! Just email board@ macollegedems.org.

College Democrats of Massachusetts 77 Summer St, 10th Floor Boston, MA 02110 www.macollegedems.org board@macollegedems.org

professors if you can stand up in front of their classes, especially large lectures, and briefly promote your next meeting. --Work with other student groups on campus. Some suggestions: Students for Choice, Student Government Association, Political Science Honors Society, MassPIRG, or any other progressive groups your campus might have. Try cosponsoring events to help get your name out there, or asking if you can come to a meeting to talk up the College Democrats. --Reg Rumble: You probably just registered tons of new voters on your campus. Keep track of the people who registered as Democrats! Its perfectly legal to photocopy voter reg forms and the registered voters list is public information, so theres no reason not to use this information to invite your new registered voters to a meeting.

Next Steps
--Tabling 201: Ok, so you already have a table. Now its time to get advanced. Try getting out in front of the table and engaging passersby. Make your table a party! Play some music or a video (or get really fancy and try setting one of President Obamas speeches to music). --Work with your political science department. If they send out a newsletter, ask them to mention when your next meeting is. Ask

Retention
Now that weve got all these great new members...

How do we keep them?

--Hold some social events, just for members to get to know each other better. Movie screenings, trivia nights, and club trips are all great ways to make everyone feel like theyre part of the group. ----Listen to members when planning events. Do they like to discuss current events? Will you do a lot of campaign work? Is there a desire to focus on issue advocacy on campus or locally? Look at what other progressive organizations do, and note what works best for them, taking advantage of the unique strengths of College Dems chapters, like contacts with campaigns and the ability to attract elected officials to campus. Make sure that your meetings are something students on your campus want to attend. It is hard to generalize this point, as every campus is different and there is no cookie-cutter meeting format. If youre struggling, please dont hesitate to ask Membership Director Emily Jacobs for help by emailing jacobse@macollegedems.org --Similarly, hold different types of events to attract different types of members. Some people like to canvass & phonebank, others like to have discussions and hear lectures on different subjects. --Work to get to know new members and build relationships with them quickly. At the Tufts Democrats kick-off meeting, they make sure that the Executive Board members sit scattered throughout the room, rather than all together. This way, they can get to know the new people in the room and make them feel like they are part of a group. New members will stick around if theyre friends with people in the chapter.

Spotlight:

First-Year Leadership Programs

Brandeis Democrats:
Freshman Leadership Initiative Program (FLIP)
At Brandeis, the College Democrats chapter sought to figure out how to involve members who werent on the Executive Board in group decision-making. The Brandeis College Democrats created a program to give first-years a greater stake in the organization. Those interested in being a part of FLIP could fill out a brief application, asking fairly standard questions (for example, What did you do in high school? Describe an issue that is important to you, and Why are you a good fit for this position? What can you bring to the group?). Once accepted to the program, members of FLIP are responsible for planning one major event per semester as a group, typically a voter registration drive. This program is a good way of recognizing who would be a good addition to the Executive Board in the future. Last year, the programs inaugural year, there were four members in FLIP. Now, all four serve on the Executive Board.
Questions about FLIP? Contact Deis Dems President Jake Weiner.

College Democrats of Boston College:

Progressive Exchange Committee (PXC)
In the fall of 2009, CDBC accepted its inaugural class of first-year students into the newly formed PXC. That year, well over 20 students applied for spots in the program, and 10 were ultimately selected based on a written application and an in-person interview with chapter officers. PXCers were paired with members of the Executive Board who served for the length of the academic year as mentors to the first-year students who, over that time, gained tremendous insight into effective student organizing and political activism. Mentors collaborated individually with mentees to plan and execute a range of programs on campus, including panel discussions, campaign activities and general meetings. This fall, CDBC accepted its third PXC class, now composed of 13 first-year students. This year, every single member of the CDBC Executive Board is a graduate of the PXC.