Ringing Forums

can’t easily email all members unless it’s about renewal of membership, unless we also use MailChimp or equivalent — Lucy Chandhial

Are you sure? We did a trial with MemberMojo and set up some rudimentary email lists with it. There were several shortcomings with the management and naming but it was definitely possible.

there are several. LoveAdmin is used by D&N (and maybe others). When I investigated it it seemed a better match (in terms of managing communication networks) for an organisation with many branches. Others are WebCollect and HiveBrite.

I don't see the link between Member Mojo and the distribution of a grass roots newsletter. Guilds such as my own already have effective email distribution and communication mechanisms in place, at Guild and Branch level (in our case based on MailMan).

Does any one person actually know how many copies of the keys actually exist for your tower? — Mike Shelley

Yes. We have a list and the wardens periodically ask me to conduct a muster for their records. There is onen set per officer plus one set in the church safe. Some sets don't have every key, based on need. Each officer is responsible for his/her set and the wardens are responsible for the set in the safe, which is used for non-ringing access such as fire inspections, roof access, fitting Christmas lights on the tower, etc.

ISTR that the Hawkear recommendation is to be central above the bells, which seems sensible.
It assumes the microphone can handle very high sound levels without distortion. Many years ago using a less robust microphone I found that on the stairs outside the ringing room worked quite well. That might have been helped by the louder bells being further from the door though.

a reasonable guess. Reading again what Tina said I think it is more than that though. The existing mechanisms do their best but one hears criticicisms that they don't always point people in the best direction.
It's not just a matter of pointing to the nearest tower or the nearest ART teacher or whatever. There are lots of factors to consider to make the system work effectively for all parties involved. I did some exploration of the topic back in 2012, see Here
One thing I didn't consider then, but which Tina mentioned explicitly, is the capacity to take on new recruits. Assuming that any tower can at any time take on unlimited recruits is naive, and designing a system on that assumption would be like designing an online shop with no idea of who has what in stock - a recipe for disgruntled customers and harassed shopkeepers.
When Tina says it's a chunky project I assume she is thinking that it will rely on a lot of that knowledge, and quite possibly distributed decision making. Getting that to work will be chunky.

flying the Union Flag upside down being a sign of distress. — Susan Hall

Or incompetence!

Which sorts of place are most at risk? Is is small country parishes with disappearing congregations but strong local community support for the building? Or big Victorian piles built in times of urban expansion where there is n — Simon Linford

That's a good question, pointing to an obvious answer. Now ask which of them is surrounded by a large enough population to be likely to provide a band of ringers? It might not be the one that has enough support to keep the building.

I think it's fairly obvious that 'most' ringers are not the solution to a lot of things. Only a minority have the drive to make things happen, and in fact a lot probably ring more out of duty or habit than being driven by a love of ringing itself. But that's probably true of most things.
In my teens I never thought about the future of ringing, I was just hooked on it and wanted to do as much as I could. In that sense I could be described as selfish and parasitic on what already existed. But my 'selfish' enthusiasm included motivating and teaching lots of other kids to ring, so we had a viable band, and organising lots of quarters and outings that kept the band active.
If we can get people hooked on ringing they will find ways to do things that collectively contribute to the future, even if their motivation is more short term. So the question is how to get enough people hooked on ringing in an expansive way.

l

the biggest draw to our tower website is a page entitled FAMOUS BELLS — Peter Sotheran

Having drawn them to that page do you know how many look at any of the rest of the website - the bits I assume you would like them to look at?

. check them out at: https://sotherans.wixsite.com/stmarks-bellringers . If — Peter Sotheran

That's difficult since it refuses to run on my iPad :-(

On our website we don't mention ag — Phillip George

The fact that ringing is an all age activity is one of its attractions so it's definitely worth mentioning. And the way I mentioned it was quite positive taken on context of the preceding and following sentences. The only problem was the search engine pulling it out of context.

is that comparing like for like? Tristan was talking about towers becoming unavailable for ringing because the church authorities either didn't want it or couldn't support it. From your previous comments I got the Themeside problems were down to failings of the ringing community rather than lack of available towers.

when our church was closed for just over a year for refurbishment, with services decamped to the adjacent hall we were encouraged to continue ringing for services, and practices. The contractors were required to ensure safe access for us except when unavoidable so we only lost a handful of ringing sessions. A good relationship with the church ensured we were consulted at all stages.

Perhaps you are fortunate to ring in an area where it isn't an issue. But that's certainly not the case elsewhere — John de Overa

We certainly have issues in this area but I'm not aware of ageism being one of them.

ageism is pervasive throughout ringing and now seems to be official CCCBR policy — John de Overa

Is it? I don't see the evidence.

Youth recruitment is important for all the reasons you give, but believing that that it's the cure for ringing's current problems is ridiculous — John de Overa

Is anyone saying it is the cure for all problems? As far as I can see that line comes mainly from people objecting to it.
One of the problems we have is a gross distortion of the age profile, which has developed over several decades. It seems obvious that we need far more effective youth recruitment than we currently have if we want to restore some sort of balance.

I think 'missing the point' is not quite right, but confusing different points definitely seems to cause polarisation.
If you are looking at demographics and long term trends then age is very important - young people will be around for longer than old people.
But that's not the whole picture. To sustain the ringing community we need people to be ringing, not just 'around'. A 50 year old who rings for 20 years can ring more than a 15 year old who gives up after 5. So what matters is length of service, which will be determined by both the individual's match to ringing and the quality of the ringing experience offered, and that's true at any age so obhsessing about the quality of teaching, development, tower environment, organisation, etc is more important than obsessing about age.
The other popular argument is that younger people learn better than older ones (whether you draw the line at 20, 30 or 40 varies), and it's well established that most of the best tower captains are under 40. But at the coal face we deal with individual people, not demographic averages, and it would be silly to reject or accept people because of a stereotype.

Survivorship bias may come into play here, given you made it through — Tristan Lockheart

Obviously the fact that 60+ years later I am still ringing and still learning new things marks me out - biases my thoughts if you like to put it that way - but 'survivor' gives the wrong impression. I did not manage to come through a bad expereince on top. In my teens I was cycling every week to practices and most Saturdays to ringing meetings within a 30 mile radius, being made welcome and supported in all cases. I was also running a tower and teaching other youngsters without adult interference, which enabled us not only to get practices going again but to become a leading band in the area. Those opportunities obviously had an effect on me (but didn't stop me giving up ringing for a decade in my 20s/30s). I'm not sure how relevant that is to my views on sensible ways t develop ringers though.

I find it very helpful to be reminded which place I'm supposed to be in and/or what comes next, — John de Overa

Knowing where you are supposed to be is certainly useful, but to make use of it you need to know where you currently are, which some people don't. If you are a long way out, eg still in 2nds when you should be in 5ths, whether your next blow should be in 6th or 7th is academic because you won't get there. The most urgent advice is to get UP (or slower, or whatever). Only when you are somewhere near can you make use of knowing the actual place you should be in.