Understanding your JFW email system

Want to know how the AJFWA email system works, and how you can use it to help your club communicate better?  Read on!

Let’s use a fictitious club and its members as a “case study”.  Barry White and Mary Black are members of the Canberra Wallabies JFW Club.  Their personal email addresses, barryw@gmail.com and maryb@hotmail.com,  were entered into the membership database when they joined.  These addresses, along with the other club members’ email addresses, were exported into the club’s member group, club.members.wallabies@ajfwa.ca.  Now, when someone sends an email to the group address (club.members.wallabies@ajfwa.ca) Mary, Barry and everyone else in the club receives it.  Their personal email addresses are protected from potential spammers, because no one sees their addresses, except for the people who manage the list.

So, the Wallabies’ club coordinator can send a message to club.members.wallabies@ajfwa.ca, and it will reach all the club members who have email.  Club members can reply to emails, or post their own messages to the group. The club coordinator can manage the email group according to the preferences of the club’s members.

The Canberra Wallabies are part of the Australia Region of the AJFWA.  The Wallabies’ email group is itself a member of the regional group, region.members.australia@ajfwa.ca, along with those of all the other clubs in Australia.  So, the Australia Regional Council’s secretary can send an email to region.members.australia@ajfwa.ca, and all of the members of all the clubs in the region will receive it.

The Australia region’s email group is a member of the “big list”, club.members.all@ajfwa.ca.  Using this address, messages can be sent to all JFW members, everywhere, including Barry and Mary in Canberra.  (Only the admin assistant and the executive of the AJFWA can post messages to this address!)

So, the email system mirrors the structure of the organisation:  Members belong to a club, clubs are grouped into regions, and regions are grouped together to form the AJFWA.

There are many such email groups: each committee, each council, and certain specific roles have their own email groups.  These provide a way for communication to be consistent and uninterrupted, even though individual people come and go.

Some clubs and regions have their own system that they use on a day-to-day basis, and of course, they are welcome to use the system of their choice.  However, the AJFWA’s system ensures that messages from the association can reach all members, regardless of local system.  If a club or region is using google groups, those groups can easily be plugged into the AJFWA’s system.  For example, the Hawaii JFW Society has been using google groups for its internal communication and wants to stick with that for now.  So, the club.members.all@ajfwa.ca group can include the HJFWSmembers@googlegroups.com address, and the functionality is much the same.

This very long tale illustrates how our simple but robust email system functions.  (Any resemblance to real names and email addresses are purely coincidental!)

Understanding Access to Online JFW Resources

The email groups described above are more than a handy email delivery system.  These groups regulate who has access to the various websites, calendars, documents and other resources available to JFW members and alumni.  First, though, a note of explanation: The AJFWA system is built on the Google Apps for Non-Profits platform, which is accessible only by using google accounts.

Barry White’s email address, barryw@gmail.com, is a google account.  By virtue of Barry’s membership in the club.members.wallabies group, Barry has access to all of the AJFWA’s member resources on its intranet, and also has access to the Wallabies club’s private web pages, documents and email forum.

Mary Black’s HotMail account, on the other hand, does not give her access, as it is not a google account.  So, Mary has been assigned a google account to use to log into the intranet, mary.black@ajfwa.ca.  This is not an email address, just a login (although members can have ajfwa email accounts if they really need them.. but that’s another story).

Now, Mary and Barry both have view-only access to all of the member resources available at ajfwa.ca.  Being committed members, though, they want to do more.  Barry is handy with technology and wants to help manage the club web pages, documents, calendar and member mailing list.  His club coordinator adds him to the club.admin.wallabies@ajfwa.ca group, which gives him editing permission to the club’s online property.  Mary wants to help organise the next International Camp, and so becomes a member of the committee.internationalcamp@ajfwa.ca group.  She now receives all of that committee’s email correspondence and has access to the planning documents, archives, etc.   Barry’s brother Bob is a member of the ARC council (region.council.australia@ajfwa.ca) and is elected to the International Board of Directors, ajfwa.board@ajfwa.ca.  Bob receives the emails of the council and the board and has access to the meeting archives, reports and so on.  Being somewhat of an overachiever, he has also signed onto several committees, and is now a member of the committee.it@ajfwa.ca and  committee.governance@ajfwa.ca groups, and receives plenty of emails to keep him busy.

So you see, it’s all about groups!  Are you interested in computer technology, and want to help out?   Send a note to webhelp@ajfwa.ca and we’ll get you started!