Inland Empire .NET Most Valuable Member Awards
Last month I had the privelage of delivering one of four mini presentations at the Inland Empire .NET's special MVM meeting. James Johnson, IE.NET president has really put together an inovative program for getting volunteers involved in the group and recognizing them for their contributions. Members earn points for just about every taks involved in making a user group run smoothly. James got sponsors involved and the whole program took off. It's a great model for other user groups to follow and there is a feature article in INETA's August Newsletter.
2007/2008 Most Valuable Member Awards
It took a while for the idea to catch on, and I had fears it just wouldn't take. Boy was I wrong! The sponsors started to see what was happening, a buzz started developing and more and more members started participating. Points accumulated started to soar. In March, the highest point total was 7,900. When point collection for this year was stopped on July 3, the highest total was 19,400!
Most Valuable Member 2007/2008. 42 entries and total points of 19,400 - Volkan Uzun
Volkan has been coming to the meetings for several years, working in several levels of the group, most recently developing and teaching a 12 week Beginner’s ASP.NET course affiliated with the IEDOTNET, writing several blog postings per month, and recently received two Microsoft Certifications. He must stay up nights, thinking of new ways to give back to the development community.
MVM Runner Up. 21 entries and total points of 17,840 - Michael Roth
Mike has a ton of great ideas, and will someday make his fortune on the interwebs. He is diligent about submitting his points early, and loves to donate a previously won raffle prize to someone else.
MVM Second Runner Up. 23 entries and total points of 16,110 - Paul Chu
Paul makes the trek from San Gabriel every meeting. He is always here early to help setup, stays late to help tear down, actively participates in discussions during the meetings, and offers to help where ever he can.
Congratulations to all!
And a really big "Thanks!" to the sponsors who came through to help me with this. Rachel Hawley at Red Gate, Britt King at JetBrains, Janine Rood at InnerWorkings, Joseph Anderson at telerik, Marsee Henon at O’Reilly, and Woody Pewitt at Microsoft
See pictures of the MVM event on Flickr