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Students for the Best Georgia New Chapter Guide

2 Students for the Best Georgia

Contents. Checklist 3 Get your group 4 Get an audience 5 Get organized 9 Get informed 10 Get chartered 11

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Checklist. ! Form a team

- President - Vice President - Treasurer - Director of Social Media - Director of Photography - Volunteer Coordinator - Secretary - Faculty Advisor

! Facebook Group ! Facebook Page ! Twitter ! Google Drive ! Charter

- Constitution - Faculty Advisor - Membership list - Minutes from meetings - Application - Student government meeting


Get your group. 1) Find a small group of people you know and trust. They should be

passionate about what you are doing and willing to put in the work to get your organization off the ground.

2) Create a centralized platform for communicating with your members. Start a Facebook group and add anyone who expresses interest in what you are doing. Make sure you, and your directors, keep everyone in the group up to date as your chapter makes progress.

3) Determine the structure of your organization. The more clearly defined the roles of each team and director position, the easier it will be to delegate work and hold people accountable. A simple structure to get you started could consist of the following positions:

a. President b. Vice President c. Treasurer d. Director of Social Media e. Director of Photography f. Volunteer Coordinator g. Secretary

4) As your group grows, you can appoint additional people to director positions to ease the workload and make sure you have the most competent people in the right places. Divide up your members into teams (i.e. Social Media Team, Volunteer Organization Team, Event Planning Team, etc.) and assign directors to make sure each team keeps moving forward.

a. Pro Tip: The more positions, the better! College students are always trying to build up their resumes, so if you can give someone a position—as opposed to simply working on a team—they will be more likely to work hard and stay committed.

5) Find a board of advisors to assist with any problems you might have or to suggest new directions you can go. Advisors should be faculty members or professionals who have experience directing student organizations or campaign efforts. Communicate with them regularly about what you are doing and ask for their input—even if you don’t choose to take it. The more personal a relationship you can establish with them, the more willing they will be to help you.

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Get an audience. 1) The sooner you set up social media pages, the better. Create a

Facebook and Twitter and send us a link to your pages at [email protected].

2) We will appoint a member from SBG’s Social Media Team to serve as a Content Creator for your social media outlets. This makes your job much easier—we will conduct regular analytics analyses using the data from your pages and produce high quality content tailored to your audience. Of course, you can still post whenever you like, but you won’t have to worry about posting the right content at the right times.

a. Pro Tip: The following instructions are guaranteed to grow your page likes incredibly fast. The important part is that you have your team members (and anyone else) actually invite all of their friends, as opposed to just the select few they might choose otherwise.

i. Click "See All" in the “Invite Your Friends to Like This Page” box.

ii. In the dropdown next to the search box, make sure “Search

All Friends” is selected.


iii. Scroll all the way down until names stop loading names.

(You can click the first name and then hold down the spacebar or Page Down button.)

iv. Copy this code: javascript:var inputs = document.getElementsByClassName('uiButton _1sm'); for(var i=0; i<inputs.length;i++) { inputs[i].click(); }

For Chrome: v. Press (CTRL+Shift+J) for Windows or (Command+

Option+J) for Mac on your keyboard. vi. Paste the code into the box at the bottom and press enter

(next to the blue ">")

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vii. For large friends list, this may utilize all your resources and

will cause the page to freeze and be unresponsive. Just wait a few minutes until all the names get selected.

For Firefox: v. Press (CTRL+Shift+K) for Windows or

(Command+Option+K) for Mac on your keyboard. vi. Paste the code into the box at the bottom and press

enter (next to the blue ">>"). vii. For large friends list, this may utilize all your resources

and will cause the page to freeze and be unresponsive. Just wait a few minutes until all the names get selected.

For Safari: v. Go to Preferences - Advanced - check "Show Develop

menu in menu bar" and close the preferences window. vi. Go to Develop - Show Error Console (or Command +

Option + C). vii. Paste the code into the box at the bottom and press

enter (next to the blue ">"). viii. For large friends list, this may utilize all your resources

and will cause the page to freeze and be unresponsive. Just wait a few minutes until all the names get selected.

3) Take down as many emails as you can. While Facebook groups are a

great way to communicate with established members, it will be easier to


reach new and potential members if you ask for their emails. In addition, some people may not want to actively participate, but wouldn’t mind receiving a weekly newsletter summarizing what your chapter is doing and what opportunities to get involved are coming up.

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Get organized. 1) Time to get all of your information in one place! Begin by setting up a

Google Drive account (ideally under a new email just for your group, such as [email protected]) and give your executive members access to it.

2) Set up folders for each of your teams. Have your directors keep all of your documents up to date and online. If you ever need something at the last minute—and you will—you will know where to look without having to rely on someone else to send it to you.

3) Create a spreadsheet for all of your contact information. Use separate columns for first and last name, class year, email, phone number, position and team; this way you can easily import the document into MailChimp or another messaging platform.


Get informed. 1)

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Get chartered. This is optional, depending on your school’s policies.

1) Do your research and speak with your advisor(s) to make sure that your school permits political organizations advocating a particular candidate to become chartered under your student government.

2) If it is permitted, there are a few requirements you are likely to have: A constitution, faculty advisor, significant membership body, minutes from a few meetings, brief application, and a meeting with your student government to approve your request.

3) Write your constitution according to the guidelines provided by your school. If it is unclear, refer to this simple guide: http://bit.ly/ConstitutionGuide

4) To find a faculty advisor, speak with professors in relevant departments (i.e. political science, sociology, law, economics, etc.). If those that you speak to are unable to help, they will likely be able to direct you to others who can.

5) To prove you have a significant amount of students interested in your organization (usually a requirement of around 10), record the student ID’s, emails, and names of everyone in support.

6) Keep a record of the minutes from your first few meetings. You might also be required to have a member of your student government association sit in on a meeting or two.

7) Submit your application to be chartered. This will probably consist of a few brief questions to make sure that you know what you are doing and will use your school’s resources effectively. Be clear and concise about what your organization plans to do and explain why there is a demand for your cause.

8) Finally, attend the hearing with members from your student government to approve your charter. You will need to have a few members of your executive board present and will be asked a series of questions to determine your organization’s legitimacy.

a. Pro Tip: If your school already has a Young Democrats group, it is possible that members of your student government association will find establishing a chapter of SBG redundant. Make it clear that your organization exists solely to support Jason Carter, while Young Democrats support the Democratic Party of Georgia as a whole. Explain that you will be working very closely with the Young Democrats to coordinate all efforts and will make it easier


for them to have an effective presence on campus. As long as you have a decent membership list, this should not be a problem.

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