Synopsis of the 2020 Virtual Volunteer Fair

Synopsis of the 2020 Virtual Volunteer Fair

Synopsis of the 2020 Virtual Volunteer Fair 

(thank you Sheila Endres, who attended and took notes!)

The link to sign up for any of these projects is through this link –

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/TMNVolunteerFair

For more information please see the corresponding page number in the catalog:

https://txmn.tamu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/TMN-Virtual-Volunteer-Fair-Full-Catalog-Program.pdf

  • Video Interview Transcription (page 5 of catalog) 1-2 people, Sept through May
  • Redesign Texas Wildscapes Website (page 7), ~10 hours/week, Dec-Feb 1-3 volunteers
  • iNaturalist social media collection and sharing (page 9) 1-2 vols, 10-12 hrs/month, ongoing. Search for info about a specific species, for example, and share images, etc., through social media; also research and gain permissions for copyrighted images is big part of this
  • Pollinator Citizen Science Project (page 8 in catalog), requires 1.5 hr training and needs to be able to watch 2 ft by 2ft flowering area of commercially available plants, 2-3 minutes a week minimum, ongoing participation, encourages a lot of participation. To get started go to sixleggedaggie.com/pollinatorproject, take quiz, then start
  • Aligning TPWD videos to Tx Education Knowledge Standards (TEKS)  (page 9) great for people with teaching background, minimum of 2 hours/wk. Go through TPWD YouTube videos and look for links to TEKS, ongoing project
  • Armchair Botanist, digitizing specimen labels (page 10), almost 1.4 million TX specimens, totally virtual, over 100 volunteers needed, open to anyone. Training available if you sign up. 5 mins to 5 hrs/week, four year project, weekly zoom meetings on Thursdays at 2 pm. Volunteers can gain advanced training hours too. www.brit.org/armchairbotanist
  • AquaPlant Website Review (page 11) Created to help landowners identify and manage plants in their fresh and saltwater ponds. Flexible hours, need to identify complete list of pages (what do we have), identify accuracy of information, Identify grammatical errors or broken links, add info for where it grows, etc., provide review/suggestions for each page. 2-3 volunteers, meet once monthly, review ideally 20 pgs/month. Goal to complete project within next year. Don’t need to be expert, just be able to find out correct info.
  • Measuring public perception about pesticides (page 12) Currently no data on what the public uses for pest control. This project works with specialists and agents to develop info for residential pest management. Volunteers will be trained. Ongoing, 1-5 hours per week. (Lost connection to speaker, perhaps will get her back on at end of day.)
  • Plants of Texas Rangelands Virtual Herbarium (pages 21-22), trying to build more info about plants that grow in TX. Provide short description and pics of plants in different stages. Also need pics added to existing pages. Submittals will be reviewed before going up on website. Statewide. Need 12-20 volunteers. 1 hr training (advanced training) when convenient, all training online. If someone wants to manage their website, will train that person too. All website work done online. Pic would be outside anywhere in state as long as you have permission for any pics from private lands. iPhone pics OK. iNaturalist pics (with permission) are OK too. No collecting specimens.
  • Texas Aquatic Science Teacher Guide (page 23) for formal or informal educators, great opportunity for people with teaching experience, especially important for these days when so much teaching is done online. Looking at TAS Teacher Guide website for errors, duplicates, layout, etc. Also, enhancing website with info from teachers (worksheets, activities, etc.) 2-10 hours/month, project up to one year. Looking for about 20 volunteers, all virtual. More hours available if wanted. Will get name as editor, aquatic certification, etc.
  • Adopt-a-loop Great Texas Wildlife Trails (page 24)  New program. (GreatTx Coastal Birding, Heart of Texas, Pnhandle Plains, Far West TX, Prairies and Pineywoods). Over 920 viewing sites. Originally intended for tourists driving over loop 1-2 days stopping at each site. Inviting chapters to adopt a loop that fits within  their area. Also iNaturalist project and other citizen science opportunities. Chapter adopts loop and individual within chapter is point of contact plus other members adopt sites within that loop. Objective: update info along trails, create more awareness and conservation (esp with sites bordering private land. Hours flexible. Initial plan is site visit four times a year. Long term project. 124 loops and over 920 sites. Needs hundreds of volunteers! Supplies will be provided to chapter. Camera or smartphone for iNaturalist submissions. Can offer training for iNaturalist.
  • Nature Rocks Texas (page 31) Ongoing project, headquartered in Austin. Serve 8 regions, provide website, help communicate where people can go to enjoy nature. Need updates about green spaces as well as new website for Houston area. Remote working, about 10 hours/month. Try to add updates twice a month. Whenever a new park or playscape is put up, we want that on the website. One hour training on software. Need approx 10 volunteers spread out all over Texas.
  • Texas Ecological Analytical Mapper User Testing (page 32) 100 volunteers, 1-10/month, review website and improve current mapping. Training will be given about grasslands and for providing citizen science for mapping. Improve accuracy of mapped grasslands. Don’t need specialized knowledge of GIS. Prefer this be done in your backyard, on public areas, etc, urban or rural. They will provide map of areas we need improving.
  • Texas Children in Nature Stories (page 33) Another project headquartered in Austin. Looking for volunteers to record and transcribe stories of how people are dealing with their COVID experience, positive and negative, in any language. Abt 10 volunteers all across the state about 10 hours a month. Generally interviews are between 5 and 15 minutes. Training will be provided. Uses StoryCorps app, phone or computer or tablet. Showed storycorps.org/participate/storycorps.app.                                   
  • Curation Assistance of Texas Nature Trackers Projects (page 35). Tx Nature Projects involves 12 collections on iNaturalist program. Only two paid employees (including our advisor Tania Homayoun). The curation of the thousands of observations is more than possible to be done by just two people. Want special focus on species of greatest concern. Number of volunteers targeted to about 25, starting about October then ongoing. Minimum time commitment  2 hour time block for at least 6 months but that is flexible. Need to confidently use platform (they will provide some training) and be able to positively identify observation and work independently.  Also need help identifying missing information and reaching out to user to provide more info. Sometimes identifying info that should not be in the observation. Sometimes that happens in iNaturalist. Training Sept 29 10am-noon. https://tpwd.texas.gov/huntwild/wild/wildlife_diversity/texas_nature_trackers
  • Writing for Texas Parks and Wildlife Magazines (page 37-39) need 10 short articles each for flora and fauna, seasonally appropriate. Word count 350-400 words. Lively, casual writing but scientifically accurate. Like to do thing about things the audience can typically see, nothing exceptionally rare. Start small, can grow into longer-term relationship.
  • Wildlife and Natural Resource Education Trunks Review and Update (page 42)  They have very popular trunks of hands-on activity bins for formal and informal educators that are loaned out from their office in NW San Antonio. Volunteers would review and update items in the trunks. Would be helpful if you have education background. 1-5 volunteers working from home, hours flexible. Can live anywhere but you need to be willing to drive to pick up materials. Want to finish project by Jan 2021.
  • Project Wild (pg 34) provides best practices for educators to teach specifically about conservation and using outdoor learning spaces. Become facilitator for Project WILD, need about 100 volunteers, ongoing, facilitator a program at least once a year anywhere in Texas. 12 hours for facilitator training (fee $50). On average 18 hours per workshop. For advanced training, need to attend at least one Project WILD workshop plus facilitator certification.
  • Measuring the public perception about pesticides (page 12). Educating public about how to exclude pests, use pesticides properly, etc. Currently there is no baseline data nationwide about how the public does this. There is a survey to send out by email to gather data. Presenter would work with you to develop a holistic program that is effective for you to present in your area. They have a course for TXMN chapters which is free; for other members of the public, there is a fee.