Webinar Hosting Tips from AEA


The American Evaluation Association has been offering a lot of webinars (long and short) presented by members in remote locations and facilitated by AEA staff. Here is a quick sense of how they handle the prep and periodic technical glitches.


eLearning Update - The Best Laid Plans
From Stephanie Evergreen, AEA's eLearning Initiatives Director 
 
eLearning is a fickle field. If you've attended more than a handful of our Coffee Break webinars, you probably understand what I mean. Most of the time, everything moves along swimmingly. But more often than we'd like, something goes awry. For an occasional attendee, the viewing screen never displays the presenter's slides, for reasons none of us can explain. Once in a while, the presenter trips up when navigating among various open programs. As I write this, just last week the audio line completely snipped off. On those rare Coffee Breaks where something has hit a snag, we do our best to recover and learn from our mishaps. Here's what we do to take preventative care:

1. We rehearse. About two weeks prior to each Coffee Break webinar, we hold a 45-minute rehearsal, where we discuss logistics, check on audio quality, practice handing the screen back and forth, and walk through each step of the presentation.

2. We peer coach. All presenters are offered the option to invite a peer coach onto the rehearsal. Our awesome peer coaches - Nina Potter, Joe Heimlich, John Nash, and Juan Paulo Ramirez - give presentation pointers and insights about how to run the demonstration smoothly.

Even still, nerves and technology do not always cooperate with us when we go live. We're lucky enough to have very poised and graceful presenters who can easily roll through small hangups and give an effective demonstration. When things really go haywire, we have a backup plan:

1. We stop.
2. We cut off the webinar, apologize deeply, and schedule another time to rerecord the demonstration with no audience.
3. We then notify everyone who registered when the recording is available. With more apologies.

Technology is never perfect but we are grateful for an avenue to host amazing, volunteer presenters as they share their know-how with our members.