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TO: General Council

FROM: Bob Bruyn, Chairperson
Special Projects Committee

DATE: June, 1990
SUBJECT: Annual Report

COMMITTEE MEMBERSHIP:

MEMORANDUM

During the 1989-1990 year the Committee has been served by the following members: Tony Finstad, Bothel, Washington; CeCe Forester (secretary), Chicago; Bill Hazen, Dallas; Jim McNelly, St.Cloud, Minnesota; and Mike Wood, Overland Park, Kansas. Adjunct members include: Barbara Kulieke, Bailey's Harbor, Wisconsin and Ken Raveill, Independence, Missouri. Scott Forsythe serves as the Committee's liaison with the central office. Their participation and contribution is greatly appreciated!

RESOURCE GUIDE:

Throughout the past year, the Resource Guide project has continued its historic roller coaster ride. The divorce between our organization and Urantia Foundation first postponed and then fostered the process for implementing the General Council's decision to produce the Resource Guide for Secondary Works of The Urantia Book.

As you may recall from last year's report, submitted materials had already been received at headquarters and entered into the computerized data base. However, progress had come to a complete stop because of the Foundation's failure to proceed with the copyright and trademark review of the works -- one part of the overall review process which was originally agreed upon in cooperation with Urantia Foundation on September 10, 1988.

During the remaining six months of 1989, the Resource Guide project was on hold. In January, 1990, the Executive Committee decided to proceed with the project as soon as possible and to modify the review process, necessitated by the change in our relationship with Urantia Foundation. The recommendation of Special Projects Committee included the following steps for implementation:

To release the Ad Hoc Review Committee of its charge to review secondary works.

To have the office staff review the materials using the established Guidelines as criteria and update the computerized data base.

To make the Resource Guide be as inclusive as possible of the secondary works currently available to readers.

To not involve ourselves in matters of monitoring and enforcing copyright and trademark, for which Urantia Foundation assumes sole responsibility. Any concerns about copyright or trademark are best worked out between Urantia Foundation and each author. (Each contributor was provided Urantia Foundation's Copyright Permission Guidelines pamphlet as well as our pamphlet Copyright Considerations.)

The office staff and Publications Committee has been working diligently with Special Projects Committee toward the goal of having the Resource Guide for Secondary Works of The Urantia Book finished in time for the 1990 International Conference.

RECORD OF DECISIONS:

As reported last year, Phase I of the Record of Decisions project is now complete. Minutes of the General Council, dating from 1955, were manually categorized by Special Projects Committee and the information entered into a computerized data base. The project demonstrated the utility of retrieving information to give a historical record of decisions made. Such a record also seems to have instructional value in orienting new members of the General Council to the history of the organization.

Phase II of the Record of Decisions project consists of developing a computerized text file of General Council and Executive Committee minutes. This will give even greater access to the information documented in the minutes by allowing nearly unlimited ways of sorting the information and presenting the actual text of the minutes desired.

Implementation of Phase II awaits Executive Committee authorization for the purchase of 1) an optical scanner and associated software which will allow us to "read" past minutes into a computerized text file and 2) a software program to index and retrieve text from the minutes. Associated with this capital expenditure is I authorization of the staff time needed to complete the tasks.

ORAL HISTORY RESOLUTION:

Background -- The resolution passed by the 1988 TDA and accepted by the General Council for implementation, provides for the " ... compilation of an oral history from early readers, to the end that a sense of the problems and excitement of those days can be preserved."

Definition -- An Oral History is a narrative of the events and experiences of the people who participated in the activities of the time (and ideally, as reported by these people). This kind of historical information is contrasted to the written documentation found in an organization's records and minutes of meetings.

Participants -- The Committee has accumulated the names and addresses of 34 people who participated in the Forum and Seventy and who are still living. Rather than solicit information from all of them simultaneously (as by questionnaire), the Committee decided to proceed with one person at a time (using personal interviews). This method would allow us to focus on the quality of information (the personal). It also allows us to learn from each interview experience and to apply it to subsequent interviews. Procedures --

1. Initial Contact -- A "Letter of Introduction" for participants has been developed which explains the origin and purpose of the project, solicits their cooperation, provides a list of the general topics to be covered in the interview (so they have some idea of what to expect), provides the list of participants, and asks for help in identifying others that we may have missed. Hopefully, the more information the participants have and the more active their involvement, the less anxiety about the project.

2. Telephone Contact -- The letter is to be followed by a personal telephone call in order to help establish rapport, answer any questions, confirm their participation, and set up a personal interview.

3. Interview

a. Preparation -- A set of "Interview Instructions" for interviewers has been developed in order to: a) confirm among ourselves the project's purpose, goal, philosophy, and interview strategy/procedures, and b) convey this information to those who will assist in conducting some of the interviews. Information adapted from The Life Stories Interview: CREATING A PORTRAIT ON TAPE, a handbook written by Paul G. Friedman, Ph.D., professor in Communications at The University of Kansas, includes suggestions on gaining participant involvement, selecting the time and place, and general preparations.

b. Content -- A set of "Interview Questions" has been developed and grouped into topical or chronological categories. This outline is intended to provide the interviewer and the interview with some structure and an orientation about the kinds of information that the participant may be able to give us.

c. Approach -- We will strive to use the most personal approach available. The order of preferred contact is personal interview, then telephone interview, and finally, questionnaire.

d. Method -- We will strive to use the most comprehensive method of documentation. The order of preferred documentation is videotape recording, then audio recording, and finally, note-taking.

Time Table -- Decisions about when to begin the interviewing and who should be the first participants will be made at the Special Projects Committee meeting to be held during the 1990 International Conference.

cc Special Projects Committee