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Upcoming Meetings

If you have suggestions for subjects or presenters—or if you'd like to give a presentation yourself—please e-mail the EAC-BC Program co-chairs at bcprograms [@] editors.ca.

February Monthly Meeting - Topic TBA

Wednesday, February 15, 2012, 7:30 p.m.

Join us at the YWCA on Hornby at 7:30 p.m. on February 15, 2012, for the next EAC-BC presentation and networking event!

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Past Presentations

2011-2012 Meetings

January 18, 2012 - Tweeting Your Way to Job Leads Freelance editor Pamela Findling will discuss how posting and following tweets using Twitter can result in some interesting job leads!

November 16, 2011 - How to Sell Your Writing and Editing Services to the Government of Canada Did you know there is a market for selling writing and editing services to the federal government? Walker Pautz, from the Office of Small and Medium Enterprises with Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC), will describe how you can register to sell your services to the government, and how to navigate government websites to conduct market research, find key marketing contacts, and bid on opportunities.

October 19, 2011 - The Author/Editor/Publisher Relationship – Battleground or Peace Conference? A presentation by R. David Stephens, Senior Editor for Tradewind Books and an Associate Editor for Granville Island Publishing. David currently teaches courses in Fiction Editing at Simon Fraser University and 'Second Draft' at the University of British Columbia. His children’s book, My Animal Friends was chosen by the BC Ministry of Education to be given to 40,000 pre-school children as part of their Ready, Set, Learn program. He is a published poet and his plays have received productions at The UBC Summer Theatre Festival, The New Ideas Festival, The Ensemble Studio Theatre, and The Fringe of Toronto Festival.

September 21, 2011 - Editing Portfolio Showcase Ever wonder how other editors present their portfolios?Or what exactly they include?And how they use those portfolios to showcase themselves and their editorial skills with potential clients? Join us at the YWCA on Hornby Street for a show-and-tell session with three Vancouver-area editors as they provide a look at some of their work.

2010-2011 Meetings

June 29, 2011 - EAC-BC Elections of the Executive Join us and vote for your new Executive members, or step up and volunteer for one of several committees.  We will also hold a Book Exchange, so bring in your less-used tomes to share with your collegues.

April 20, 2011 - E-Books Are Changing the World (or are they?) What is the impact of e-books on publishing today? And, in particular, what is the impact on editors? Join us for a panel discussion on how new technologies are changing the publishing landscape.  Kathleen Fraser is a Master of Publishing student whose research has focused on the intersection of technological development and editorial practices. Kathleen is the editor at Hur Publishing and works at Caitlin Press.  Robert Mackwood has spent almost 30 years in the book industry.As the owner and principal agent of Seventh Avenue Literary Agency - one of Canada's only non-fiction agencies - he represents over 40 authors with sales to English language publishers and translations rights to over 15 countries for some works. The agency developed Mackwood Publishing Consultants in 2009 to work with self-published authors early in the publishing process providing guidance and insight for their projects.

March 16, 2011- Wearing Two Hats – With Style: Author as Editor. One of the skills of a good editor is being able to wear the author’s shoes. Finding a way to nudge, cajole and encourage authors to write their best can be easier once you’ve appreciated the view from both sides of the fence. Author and editor Rhea Tregebov will give her perspective as author and editor. Rhea has worked with authors at the substantive level on numerous projects in a variety of genres, from YA novels to cookbooks, and from academic articles to literary fiction. As an author, she’s also been edited by some of the best, and is grateful for it. She now leads poetry and literary translation workshops for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students in the Creative Writing Program at UBC, where she finds her editing skills central to teaching. Her website is www.rheatregebov.ca and her debut novel, released in 2009, is The Knife Sharpener’s Bell. For a client’s view of Rhea’s editing, see best-selling author Lilian Nattel’s recent blog at http://liliannattel.wordpress.com/2011/01/18/the-knife-sharpeners-bell/.

FEBRUARY 16, 2011 - Self-Serving Sources.  What do you do when an important source insists on seeing the text of your story or makes other similar requests? This session looks at ways to say no that keep a source feeding you information forever. Other source-related predicaments will be discussed, such as, “This is just background” and “I’ve got to see the questions first.”  Elizabeth Rains has a master of journalism degree from Carleton University, along with a certificate in graphic design from Selkirk College, and certificates in journalism and web publishing from Langara College. She has worked on many publications and freelanced as a book and corporate editor,. She currently publishes Pacific Rim Magazine, is a partner in Ocean Cove Media, which develops business plans, book proposals, and marketing materials, and teaches editing at Langara College, Capilano University, and Simon Fraser University.

JANUARY 19, 2011 - What Are You Worth? How to Price Your Editing Services. Putting a dollar value on your skills, abilities, and experience can be daunting for many of us. Cerina Wheatland joined us in January to help make sense of this puzzle in a practical and entertaining way.  As a seminar speaker, writer, editor and advisor, Cerina is passionate about guiding entrepreneurs through the exciting and challenging process of creating, growing and succeeding in their business. Her website is www.cerinawheatland.com and you can read her Business Planning & Strategy blog at http://www.smallbusinessbc.ca/blogs/p/cerina-wheatland.

NOVEMBER 17, 2010 - Editors' Show and Tell (or These are a few of my favorite things...) Come out and show off your favorite must-haves when you work. See what other editors can't do without. How have the changes in technology affected your toolkit and resources? This will be an evening of discussion and discovery, and hopefully a few surprises along the way!

OCTOBER 2010: Michelle Boulton, EAC President, met with our membership to discuss proposed changes to the structure of the EAC. The document Editing EAC was circulated a few months ago for members to contemplate, and National strongly encourages your input. It can be found on the members section of our website at http://www.editors.ca/files/private/Editing_EAC-Discussion_Paper-2010-05-27-FINAL.pdf. You can also find a discussion of our strategic plan on the members section of the website at http://www.editors.ca/files/private/AGM2010-Strategic_plan_update-20100527.pdf. We're particularly looking for member feedback on these issues. How do you respond to the issues raised in Editing EAC? How would you like your interests to be represented within the organization? (There is a discussion forum for these issues at http://www.editors.ca/bb/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=1322.

SEPTEMBER 2010: Terrence Little talked about meeting the challenges of writing and editing for an online audience in the age of fast-developing communications technology.

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2009-2010 Meetings

APRIL 2010: Melva (Mel) McLean introduced the craft of screenplay editing focusing on clear and concise principles of formatting, structure, and style. Melva edits books, writes screenplays, and works as a script supervisor in the film industry.

JANUARY 2010: Christopher Hatherly, MBA, joined us to discuss the options that editors have when deciding how to structure their small business to suit their needs.

NOVEMBER 2009: Melva McLean presented The TRIUMF Five-Year Plan 2010-2015: Building a Vision for the Future.

OCTOBER 2009: Barbara Tomlin presented Changes Ahead: How the Revised Professional Editorial Standards Will Affect Certification.
Also, read the minutes of the September EAC-BC executive meeting.

SEPTEMBER 2009: 20th Anniversary Celebration.

2008-2009 Meetings

OCTOBER 2008 through MARCH 2009: We have posted audio files from our October (trade magazines), November (from inspiration to publication), January (professional editorial standards), February (photo research), and March (editing for children) meetings to the audio page.

SEPTEMBER 2008: Audio from the September panel on what publishers look for in an editor is available from the audio page.

MAY 2008: Annette Lorek's presentation indexing appears on the audio page.

MARCH 2008: Derek K. Miller's presentation "Life, Death, and the Blog" is also available as an enhanced audio download from his website.

FEBRUARY 2008: Randall Orser spoke to EAC-BC members about bookkeeping and accounting for editors.

2007 Meetings

MAY 2007: Monique Trottier talked about working collaboratively using various online tools.

APRIL 2007: Frances Peck covered the copy editing business.

JANUARY 2007: Linguist Carrie Gillon compared English and Skwxwْ7mesh (Squamish Salish), in which no grammatical article behaves like "the."

2006 Meetings

NOVEMBER 2006: Christine Laurin spoke about finding and working with European clients. She drew on her 12 years of experience living and working in Spain as a freelance academic editor and translator. Audio is available (about an hour long).

OCTOBER 2006: EAC-BC webmaster Derek K. Miller of penmachine.com spoke about writing and editing for the Web and other online and electronic media. Audio is available (about an hour long).

SEPTEMBER 2006: Ruth Wilson talked and answered questions about EAC's inaugural certification exams, coming in November 2006. More detailed information about certification is available on the main EAC Certification page and the Certification FAQ.

MAY 2006: National Chair Maureen Nicholson took us for a fast and informal overview of the national association and its operations. What exactly is the mythic "National"? Who are our members? How are branches funded? Isn't the Toronto branch just huge? Why bother becoming a voting member? What's the link between certification and membership? What are those membership benefits? And more.

APRIL 2006: On April 19, Sam Corea, Manager of Editorial Services for VANOC, talked about what it's like to manage the communications, media relations, and editorial services for an event such as the Winter Games. He described his experiences in Torino and his role in the Torino Main Press Centre.

MARCH 2006: Peter Moskos led an informative session on learning and meeting EAC's editorial standards, in part as preparation for the upcoming certification process. Audio is now available (see above).

FEBRUARY 2006: EAC-BC webmaster, Communications Manager for Navarik Corp., and Vancouver blogger Derek K. Miller told us how to build a website in 15 minutes or less (actually, he managed it in 11 minutes). He has posted:

1. Audio of his 1 hour 23 min talk is available in his personal podcast.
2. The websites we started with Blogger and with WordPress.

You can also read about what a blog or a podcast or a web feed is, Derek's music album, and his wife's upcoming podcast. At Derek's podcast there is audio from a separate Vancouver panel Derek participated in on February 11, about "getting started with blogging."

He's posted more information to penmachine.com/eac.

JANUARY 2006: Freelance speechwriter Colin Moorhouse of Fearless Freelancing gave a funny and wide-ranging talk about getting new clients (focus on the ones that have money!), figuring out what to charge (more than you do now!), and presenting your skills (you help alleviate people's frustrations!). Audio has been removed to save space, but contact us if you want a copy.

2005 Meetings

NOVEMBER 2005: Ruth Wilson, an experienced editor and chair of EAC's certification steering committee, gave an overview of EAC's plans to administer tests to certify editors. She covered background information, as well as specifics about the tests, the way they will be administered, and when they will be offered—plus suggestions for test preparation.

OCTOBER 2005: Do you ever wonder if what you're doing is legal? Our October presentation on media law revealed how the law affects our work as editors. Lawyer David Sutherland responded to questions about access to information, libel, and defamation, and identified the four available defenses against defamation suits in British Columbia.

SEPTEMBER 2005: The September meeting welcomed members back from the summer by introducing the new EAC-BC executive and holding a "show and tell" and networking session where members discussed the work they do.

MAY 2005: The May meeting was our last before the summer break, and included our annual elections for the EAC-BC Executive, which took place at the very beginning of the general meeting, at 7:30. Then Denise Dale and Sandie Bradley of Streamline Information and Organizing Services talked about their handy office and home information management system. The method is detailed in their two books, At Your Fingertips in the Office: Information Management for the Small Business and At Your Fingertips: A Household Filing System that Works for You.

APRIL 2005: Gail Franklin described a top-down, modular approach for "engineering" technical documents, first developed at Hughes Aircraft in the 1960s, but still not well known among editors generally. She showed how it produces very readable proposals and manuals—on budget and schedule.

MARCH 2005: Peter Moskos described his simple rules for estimating editing jobs, and had the audience try them out by preparing quotes for editing sample manuscripts. Technical difficulties prevented us from recording his talk, but an article about it will appear in West Coast Editor.

FEBRUARY 2005: Cathy Stonehouse discussed the joys and challenges of editing an established literary journal. She talked about what the job actually entails and illustrated an assessment of obstacles and opportunities looming in the field of small magazine publishing.

JANUARY 2005: At our January 19th meeting, writer, editor, and EAC member Leigh MacKay presented his insights into corporate documentation, single-source documentation, working with Microsoft Word templates, establishing a company style guide and word list, training casual Microsoft Word users in the office how to get more out of the program, and document quality control through an effective editing process.

2004 Meetings

DECEMBER 2004: Instead of a general meeting, EAC-BC held our annual holiday social at the Water Street Café in Gastown.

NOVEMBER 2004: At our October meeting, Colin Moorhouse spoke about the secrets of finding freelance and full-time writing work, with a focus on his specialty of speechwriting for corporate and government clients. Colin has more than 20 years' communications and related experience with a variety of government agencies. He also has extensive freelance writing experience, having made his living as a speechwriter for corporate clients across Canada for over a decade.

OCTOBER 2004: Former EAC-BC executives Terry-Lynn Stone (editor of Alive magazine), Ricki Ewings (former Hotline co-chair), and Derek Miller (former Programs chair) held a panel discussion at our October meeting about responding to jobs posted to the EAC-BC Hotline, as well as to other advertised contracts and positions.

MP3 audio files of their opinions and subsequent discussion with the audience are available for download.

SEPTEMBER 2004: Our September meeting featured a "Show and Tell" session from members, and was not recorded.

MAY 2004: The branch held elections for the new EAC-BC executive during the first few minutes of the meeting.

Following the election, our guest speaker was Leon Phillips, a Vancouver-based visual artist who is also a book designer. He talked about how he approaches design, how he finds work, and how he interacts with other people during the publishing process. 

APRIL 2004: Literary agent Carolyn Swayze joined us in April to discuss the cutthroat world of modern fiction and non-fiction book publishing, her role as an agent for a number of authors, and her unusual position being based in Vancouver instead of Toronto or New York.

MARCH 2004: At our March meeting, Ramona Montagnes of UBC's Writing Centre took the unusual step of giving the audience written assignments during her presentation. We learned some lessons about editing sentences for style as a result.

FEBRUARY 2004: At our February meeting, our guest was Anne Pepper, who spoke to us about her career as a writer for the Web and other online and electronic media.  Anne has also posted her presentation slides on her site at pepperwriting.com.

JANUARY 2004:  EAC Certification Committee member Ruth Wilson's has provided some further answers and clarifications for questions she received at the meeting:

Q: Will the tests/exam be returned to candidates?

A: The tests won't be returned with the candidates' results. As to whether they will ever be returned, a draft CSC document from Oct. 2002 says that this is a question that we may not resolve until a year or two into certification. That's because there's a possibility that some sections of some tests may get recycled into future exams a few years later.

There's been no decision on whether candidates will be able to see their marked tests. That's a very good question, one which the Certification Committee should probably raise at our next meeting. We may need to develop a policy that allows candidates to sit with someone and review their papers.

Q: There was also some question and debate over whether certification should encompass some form of continuing upgrading. (I told them that was not a requirement—some members felt it should be; some didn't. But I wasn't able to provide a rationale for that decision.)

A: Formal recertification isn't a requirement. But Policy 11 states "Holders of CPEs may, however, be required to show ongoing maintenance of skills." I think there's a fair amount of support for some kind of upgrading. There's been talk in the past (captured in that same Oct. 2002 document) about options like "some form of upgrading, continuing education, adherence to a code of ethics, or demonstration of continued attachment to the profession."

Q: Will there be a limit to the time you could wait before rewriting a test if you failed? (I said no, but that I would check to be sure on that one.)

A: Policy 10 just says "Any candidate who fails a test may retake it in a subsequent administration. A candidate may not take a test more than three times." Policy 6 states that there is a 10-year window that's open to people pursuing the full CPE designation, but we haven't hammered out the question if the same policy would apply to those seeking a single specialty.

2003 Meetings

NOVEMBER 2003: Derek Miller has posted an audio transcript (in MP3 format) from his November 2003 talk about backing up your computer data. You can find the audio files at the EAC page on his site, or directly here:

• Part 1 - about 47 min (5.3 MB MP3 file)
• Part 2 - about 17 min (2 MB MP3 file)

OCTOBER 2003: As in September, our October recording had technical problems, so while we do have audio from Gary Chomyn's talk about selling your editing services better, it is of poor quality. It has been removed from this site to make room for the latest files.

SEPTEMBER 2003: Despite our best efforts, technical difficulties with the recording equipment mean that we do not have an audio transcript of Jim Sutherland's fascinating September 2003 presentation on magazine and newspaper editing. Jim gave an excellent, informal talk to a full house of more than 60 editors, and fielded many questions. An online copy of West Coast Editor, which includes an article summarizing his talk, is available (PDF file).

MAY 2003: John-Paul F. Bogden, of the law firm Lawson Lundell, practices corporate and commercial law with a particular emphasis on the technology sector. He was Editor-in-Chief of the Manitoba Law Journal from 1996 to 1997. His May 2003 presentation on copyright and editing garnered a good crowd and a great response on May 21, 2003.

MAY 2003:  Lorraine Murphy's presentation was about her book on the missing women of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside.

APRIL 2003: The April meeting was a discussion on the restructuring of EAC.

FEBRUARY 2003: You may download Microsoft Word-format handouts from Faith Gildenhuys's February 2003 presentation on "Fixing Your Price": Hourly Rates Compared and Rate Calculations. Size constraints mean we have had to remove the downloadable audio transcript of Dr. Gildenhuys's talk.

Here are some time billing and invoicing software programs that were suggested by members at the February branch meeting:

iBiz (formerly iWork) for Mac OS X
http://www.iggsoftware.com/ibiz/
This nifty little program integrates with iCal and Address Book for scheduling meetings and work time, and has a built-in timer, customizable job events, invoice creator and project manager. (UPDATE: The program was renamed prior to Apple's release of an entirely different program called iWork in January 2005.)

Project Timer for Windows and Mac
http://www.scriptsoftware.com/projecttimer/

Billing Tracker Lite 1.0 for Windows
http://download.com.com/3000-2066-10181252.html?tag=lst-0-3

BTS Track and Bill 1.0
http://download.com.com/3000-2074-10130493.html?tag=lst-3-8

To find more, search for "time billing" or "invoicing" on sites such as versiontracker.com or download.com.

JANUARY 2003: Derek Miller has posted some additional material and links, as well as his original slides and an audio transcript of his talk in January 2003 on "Making an Editor's Web Site Worth the Work It Takes." You can view them at: http://www.penmachine.com/eac/

Earlier Meetings

Maureen Nicholson, one of the panellists at the September 2001 meeting on Getting Started as a Freelancer, has kindly made available her handout on the labour market for editors she provided that evening. The huge turnout meant that there were not enough copies for everyone.

Michael Hayward provided these notes as part of his presentation on Dreamweaver at the November 2001 meeting.

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