Social media experiment: BE KNOWN about BEKNOWN

A client recently asked me about a Monster facebook app called beknown, which I’ve had a lot of enquiries on lately.  I had a look at it, and immediately deemed it unworthy and inferior to the JXT social media solution (aka the social media superstar solution aka my solution).

For starters (and trust me, this rant goes on for a while, so strap yourself in), it’s an APPLICATION (not a page) and as such facebook is asking my permission to take the below actions. Personally, I would never agree to any of that because the app can then POST on my facebook wall AS myself. No way! It can also access my Interests, which means pages I like. For instance, I “like” Burnetts Vodka on facebook. Not something to showcase to employers! All around a terrible idea. Apparently, it won an award in the states and has seen great results in talent sourcing, which is fair enough. We came to the conclusion that Americans are just so desperate to find work that they’ll do anything to find a job, even if it means giving potential employers access to their facebook profile! Stupid Americans. Sheesh.

Anyway, where was I? Ah yes, ranting about applications, not Americans. In addition, apps are generally pre-templated by the developer. It costs heaps of money to develop these facebook apps (I probably could but won’t). And with pre-templates comes the difficulty to control & edit. As a facebook developer and by hardcoding the tabs, I (and ultimately my clients) remain in total control of everything: size, font, exact colour, layout, images, click throughs, etc. Don’t get me started on SEO; side tabs allow for integrations with RSS, youtube, twitter, google maps, etc and as such drive traffic to the designated website - apps do no such thing but rather become part of the person’s facebook experience. Once it serves its purpose (finding that person  a job, or so it claims to do), the app will no doubt be uninstalled immediately.

There are dozens more reasons why pages trump apps, but this is just a start. Initially, I wasn’t planning on installing this app.l Why would I waste my time with such incompetent technology? It’s below me, and I’m better than that, damnit! But alas, curiosity got the best of me, and I wanted to see what all this hoo-ha is about. How could it possibly have won an award?!

As such, I went against my better judgement and “allowed” this application to do the above things (hovering over the box..waiting...turning away....eyes closed....cliiiiick? Ah, my facebook profile is still in tact. Phew!) 

Now that I’m in, its time to get an inside look on the world of facebook applications! Here’s what happened: 

Welp, were not off to a very good start here, though I’m not surprised they want me to spread the word. They want to use MY network of friends to promote THEIR application! Nope, NOT spamming my friends with invites to connect. I get enough Farmville invites as it is and I refuse to be THAT facebook friend. Skip....

Hey, look! The app has imported my career details from the “work experience” portion of my facebook profile! Note that it has also invited me to import details from CareerOne. Er...NOT American (coughanymorecough) so nope, I have no profile there. Where is the import from LinkedIn option!? It allows me to edit this info directly, but now I’m confused...will editing this profile through BeKnown change the “work experience” portion of my facebook profile? I might not want my ENTIRE resume on facebook because to be honest, most of my friends don’t care! I’ll go ahead and change a few things....

LinkedIn to the rescue. I copy and paste the Summary portion of my profile as well as a few bullet points:

OK, summary saved. Now what!? There’s no “next” button so I’m sort of stuck. Normally, I’d give up and go back to whatever I was doing before fiddling with this app, but let’s pretend that I live in America, am jobless, desperate and bored at 2 pm on a Wednesday. I have nothing better to do, so I’m going to figure this out, damnit! (Apologies to anyone reading this who is in America, jobless, desperate and bored at 2 pm on a Wednesday. Chin up! You’ll find something soon!)

I started clicking on the tabs on the left hand side (contact information, beknown photo, summary, experience, etc) and filled in the blanks. When I clicked “beknown photo,” I was expecting to upload a professional photo of my choice to act as my “profile picture.” Instead....

Are you serious!??! NO WAY!! I am now officially scared of this application. Why do you want to access my photos? Why do you need more than one? What are your terms of service and privacy policy, and does the size 8 hard-to-read legal jargon slash nonsense policy allow you to store my photos on your database and publish them somewhere? Curiosity wants me to “allow” to see what happens, but common sense tells me to back off. Hey....what happens in college, stays in college, thank you very much! Skipping this step...

(I had to click the “back” button in my browser to get away from this page, and it kept refreshing the above image instead of going back to the edit section. I had to click and hold the BACK button and go back 2-3 pages. Not cool.)

I tried to fill out the details of my job at JXT, and ummm it’s cut off. I don’t implement social medi. I implement social media strategies. So far, I’m not impressed with this app. Instead, I’m very, very angry with it!

For the skills tab, I have to list each of my skills separately and note how many years of experience I have for each. I initially did this the wrong way, as you can see above. I don’t have time nor energy to list every single skill I have and the years of experience in each and jobs in which I utilised those skills. Nope, not going through with this. Skipping this step...

“Interests”  has pulled the interests from my facebook profile. The interests that I display on my facebook profile are NOT the same interests I’ll display to my potential employer! I’m skipping this step because I don’t want to change my facebook profile. Yes, teaching music to little kids makes me the happiest person in the world. My friends know this and I’ve communicated it in a way that I’m happy for my friends to see: passionate, enthusiastic and with lots of exclamation points. NOT the same way I’d list it on a resume. I’d want to say “music education” or “music theory” or something professional. Skipping this step...

Ah, the good ole Notifications Settings. Normally, this is a favourite place to go as it controls which emails you receive. However, I have no idea what a badge is, I’ll never have a job posting because I’m not an employer, not sure what an endorsement is and am weary that a “connection” may be more connected to me than I’d like, based on my experience thus far. Sooo I’ll go ahead and UNtick the twitter boxes (no , I do NOT want you tweeting on my behalf, and facebook knows my twitter handle and therefore beknown probably does, too...).

Right, now I actually have no idea what to do! I clicked on “Profile” at the top (in the purple section, within the app) and it takes me here:

I click on Network, and it takes me here:

No connections available – awesome! NO, I do NOT want to connect with my facebook friends! They would kill me for spamming them.

Then I click “jobs”...

Ding ding ding! Look at all those jobs! Wait, what? Why would I want to be a tennis coach? The word “tennis” isn’t even in my profile, ANYWHERE, and I’m a terrible player and haven’t touched a racquet since high school. Office All rounder? Nope, no desire to answer phones. I see no social media jobs, digital media jobs, communications jobs....NOTHING, in fact, matches up to ANY of the skills or keywords that I purposely used throughout my profile! The one underneath Tennis Coaches was “Security Engineer,” which is pretty much the last job in the world that would suit me. Apparently, my profile is 85% complete, so I click on “complete profile” (reminds me of LinkedIn). Low and behold, it wants me to make connections by inviting my friends. For the 3^rd time..NO!!

I’d also like to note that none of my 1200 facebook friends use it. Yes, it told me so.

OH EM GEE. I just hopped onto my profile and I am APPALLED and terrified and ANGRY at Beknown. Look what it’s done!!! Arghhhhhh. 

That’s it – I’m done. I officially hate you, BeKnown. FOUR TIMES my friends saw a ridiculously useless update about an app that I’m using on THEIR newsfeed. I’ve now risked getting my updates hidden or being unfriended altogether.

I’ve uninstalled the app and will never get the past 30 minutes of my life back.

Let it be known that BeKNOWN is NO GOOD!!

Questions? Comments? Concerns? Compliments, courtesy call or catastrophic calamity? Are you the BeKnown developer and have a few words for me? Whichever the case, you can email me, tweet me, LinkedIn me (perhaps not really a verb, but it is now) or call me. Thanks for reading all the way through! (unless you scrolled to the bottom just to get my contact details, in which case, please don’t be too mean).

Qantas Delays & Travelling Days

Melbourne: SHOPPING!

Hey, NOT my fault that it was on my way to my next meeting. And that I need a new purse. A new season dictates a new bag...duh!

An infamous Melbourne tram.

The tourist in me couldn't help myself. SO MANY UGGS!!!

The adventures of a social media superstar continue! I actually wrote this entry a few weeks ago, in a cab on the way to the airport, but haven’t gotten around to posting it. I’m one fantastic blogger, aren’t I!? So I’ll just copy and paste it below, and you can press the rewind button in your head. Yes, this is a time travelling blog entry; maybe I’m not so bad, after all!

Today, Qantas (the major Australian airline) was on strike for whatever reason Qantas workers go on strike. As such, there’s a chance that the strikes could continue tomorrow. As life goes, I’m meant to be hosting a half day workshop in Melbourne tomorrow morning on social media, and the conference organisers were worried that my morning flight would be cancelled or delayed due to the strikes (the conference starts at 8:45 am so I have the 6 am flight booked). So at the last minute they decided that I need to fly to Melbourne TONIGHT to avoid any such potential drama. Alas, participants paid a fair bit of money to attend and would be pretty upset if it was cancelled at the last minute. So here I am, heading to a 9:15 pm flight (that’s all that was left), landing me in Melbourne at 10:45 tonight only for a 8:45 am start tomorrow. My workshop runs until 1 pm, and then I have meetings at 2, 3:15 and 4:30. My flight back to Sydney tomorrow night (the lady on the phone informed me today) was “downgraded” due to the strikes and thus pushed back from a 6:30 departure to a 8:50 departure. Meaning, of course, that I’ll land in Sydney around 10:15 and will probably get home around 11 (I’ve found that taxi queues on Thursday nights are the worst). On the upside (trick prepositional phrase; there is no upside), they’re putting me up in a nice serviced apartment in the city tonight and I can probably order ridiculously expensive room service and take what I want from the mini bar!!! Then again, I won’t get to the hotel until 11:30 and I can’t drink due to my early workshop tomorrow. See? That’s not an upside at all. Mean.

Alas, there is much travelling to be done in the upcoming weeks. This week I’m in Brisbane to speak at the HRSummit. Next week I’m in Melbourne to conduct some training sessions and to meet with new clients. The week after that I’m in Adelaide & Perth again, to conclude my Australian-wide tour of the “How-To of Social Media: A Hands-On Approach.”

Hopefully, come November, I can stay Sydney-side for a few weeks. November brings my 25^th birthday (sob, gasp, tear..I’m getting old) as well as the end of my lease period. Meaning, of course, that I’ll have to move, which is never an easy task. Finding a place will be difficult enough (Sydney is SO expensive!) and then the process of moving is going to be at the very least mildly annoying. Now that I think about it, I’ve lived in 5 different places in the past 2 years! Coogee (where I fell in love with Australia), Waverley, Randwick, Coogee again, and now Maroubra. Having said that, I never had any furniture to speak of until I moved to Maroubra, so moving hasn't really been that bad. This time around, I’m going to try and live closer to work (North Sydney), because let’s face it: I’m a workaholic. I can sit here and tell myself that I’m not, look around for places in the Eastern Suburbs, close to my favourite pubs and beaches, but at the end of the day it makes most sense to live north of the bridge. Hopefully, more blog entries coming soon as I traverse Australia and endeavour to find an affordable and convenient place in which to reside!

4 cities in 6 days!

^^The Adelaide that I should have seen during my trip...^^

^^The actual Adelaide that I saw on my trip...chucking down rain the whole time^^


Wow. Sure has been a while since my last update! I’ve been super, SUPER busy lately, traversing Australia and trying to make a name for myself whilst trying to find my sanity and keep my head above water with my thousands of projects, conferences, training sessions, case studies, meetings and the like.

I’m writing to you from ADELAIDE, Australia! Wine country, or so they say, but unfortunately I won’t have time to indulge in some pleasures (although I did enjoy a few samples and might have potentially ordered a case of something amazing to be delivered in 2 weeks….oops?)

I’m here to kick off my Australian social media recruitment tour! I’m hosting a series of workshops in conjunction with the RCSA (Recruitment and Consulting Services Association) and will be speaking at breakfast conferences on social media in recruitment in Adelaide, Perth, Canberra, Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane (in that order, I think). More details on the breakfasts can be found here.

So Adelaide’s brekky is tomorrow, and then I fly to Perth in the afternoon for the Perth brekky on Thursday. I’m very excited to see Perth. The most isolated city in the world, Perth is meant to be beautiful and I've heard nothing but good things about that city!

Yesterday, Monday, I spoke at the Health & Productivity Management Conference (in Sydney, for once!). It was only 30 minutes, but it was very well received and I was quite pleased with my presentation. It was recorded and photos were taken, so hopefully multimedia is coming soon. Last week I was in Melbourne for training sessions & meetings, and the weekend before that I was in Melbourne as well, speaking at the HR Summit (I also spoke at the HR Summit Sydney and in October I’ll be presenting once again at the HR Summit in Brisbane).

Suffice to say, JXT Consulting has me racking up those frequent flyer points left and right! It’s tiring, but I love (most times) every minute of it. Flights are usually at 6 am, meaning 4:30 wake up, and often I don’t get home until 10 or 11 at night. Sometimes it can wear me out, but it does make me appreciate a good night’s sleep.

With this week’s trips to Adelaide & Perth and my arrival home from Melbourne on Friday night, I’ll have hit 4 cities in 6 days :-) Woo!

I reckon that’s enough for now. I could say that I’ll write again soon, but who knows?! 

Chou for now.

PS: my most recent pride and joy is the completion and launch of Crown Casino’s Career facebook page – designed and developed by yours truly! Crown Casino is the largest casino complex in the in the southern hemisphere so you can imagine it was a pretty exciting project!

Kiiiinda a Big Deal (in the recruitment world, in Australia)

OK, not really. But this time, instead of writing the articles, I'm featured in them!

Recruitment Extra, April 2011

HR Summit 2011

hehe..that's me!

Luna Park is beautifully situated juuust over the Sydney Bridge

The conference was held at Luna Park - yeah, it made me want cotton candy, too

Jamie, myself and Stuart - terrible lighting, beautiful background!




On 7 April, 2011 I was a main speaker at the HR Summit Sydney 2011 in Luna Park, Sydney. It went fantastically well (I think, anyway) and the feedback I received was all positive. I'd venture to say it was the best presentation I've ever given! I spoke for 45 minutes on the importance of utilising social media in the recruitment space and how HR corporates and recruiters can go about implementing a social media strategy. Overview (see full conference agenda here) below:

12:15pm EXPERT COMMENTARY Understanding, maximising and leveraging social media in recruitment and employer branding
With 9 million Australians using social networks and spending more time on social media than any other country in the world, the importance of forming an online recruitment strategy is essential. Social media has shifted the recruitment landscape by connecting candidates, recruiters and businesses together. Tools such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn are allowing us to be more creative in connecting with people, while candidates are increasingly turning to these tools to learn about organisations and the positions they have available. Explore:
• How to build, manage and maintain a niche online talent community
• Fostering a sense of innovation in your employer branding message
• Social media governance: Understanding the boundaries
• iPad, iPhone and Blackberry: Focusing on mobile recruiting
• Talent management case studies
• How to use metrics to evaluate social media recruitment success
Mariah Gillespie, social media strategist, JXT Consulting Pty Ltd

There were around 250 delegates in attendance, and while I was a bit nervous at first, once I started talking I really just let it all roll off my tongue. To be honest, I could go on for hours on social media, especially facebook, and because I work in the space all day, every day, I knew that I was the expert in the room and that I was the one that had the authority. Obviously using social media is new to a lot of businesses and having an online marketing degree doesn't mean you necessarily know anything about it. I was a little nervous that I would be thrown a question I couldn't answer, but I took on every objection with ease. In fact, mid-way through the preso, I dared someone to object to social media, to give me a reason why it wasn't important...I believe I dared them to "attack" me, but I don't remember the exact wording.

Speaking of exact wording, I'm extremely, extremely disappointed in the HR Summit for not video taping my segment. Every other session was taped, and the guys with cameras were always walking around the conference interviewing people and taping people interacting, networking, eating lunch, whatever. But for my session, the most interesting session, the most provocative session given by the youngest speaker in the most innovative and dynamic space....that session wasn't documented in any way. I couldn't believe it. I was assured that it would all be recorded, and I was planning on uploading it to our company facebook page, tweeting it, embedding it on our website and most certainly putting it up here. But nope. No go. #HRsummitFAIL, for sure. Also, there was no mention of hashtagging on twitter, so there was no online community in which people could share ideas, feedback and support throughout the 2 days. For instance, if someone heard something useful in my session, they could have tweeted "great session by @mariah_onfiah from @jxtconsulting on social media and recruitment #hrsummitsydney. The #hrsummitsydney bit categorises it so that everyone at the event can see what everyone else is saying about it. Also, no mention of wireless internet, though I'd heard from the LinkedIn guys that there actually had been wireless the whole time. ALSO, the computers were antiquated machines, slow and outdated. No macs. Also, because there was no wireless, there was no internet for my powerpoint pres. Everything was done via screenshots, which was annoying, because obviously I would have liked to shown my audience some live facebook feeds or twitter pages. A youtube video would have been nice, too. But nope. And just to top it all off, all of the 300ish delegates were provided with a feeback form on their HR Summit experience. But the main speakers, who, at the end of the time, made the damn thing happen to begin with, were given nothing. No online form, no paper questionnaire, nothing. A lovely thank-you-for-participating email, to be certain, but nothing else. Hence, I'm forced to whinge about it here!

Speaking of here, what a terrible blogger I am hey. I go for six months without a single word, then post some rant about Yamaha Music and now here I am giving full blown presentations on the importance of social media with a blog that hasn't been updated in ages! Terrible, I know, but life has been hectic. Very, very hectic.

In other news (ha, "other" news..I haven't even touched on the most important news yet, regarding work, play, stay, teaching, weather, Australia, friends, fun times, good times, bad times, flatmates, trips to Brissy, Melbourne, Gold Coast, Surfer's Paradise...), I'm officially moving to Melbourne! JXT Consulting is pretttttty much the best thing that's ever happened to me, and I'm starting up my own social media division. I really enjoy working in the Melbourne JXT office (the "engine room") with Jamie (jkill), Wil (with one L), the Cat (Stephen Catley) and Andrew Tan the Finance Man (the key to happiness at JXT is keeping the TanMan happy!). I'm very excited to embark upon this new challenge (moving to a new city, new people, new streets, new beaches, new working environment and new opportunities) and am confident that I can handle it. After all, this American in Oz is still an American, and still in Oz!

Speaking of being an American in Oz, I'm officially sponsored! My 457 visa has finally come through, meaning my visa is valid for another 4 years, as long as an Australian company continues to sponsor me. And with the social media industry taking off the way that it is, trust me, there's no shortage of companies willing to sponsor me. I'm getting job offers left and right, from LinkedIn, linkme, post-presentations, word of mouth..even my own clients are trying to snatch me up! I'm very happy where I am, however, and foresee a lot of really fantastic things happening in the coming months. Stay tuned!

An Open Letter to Yamaha (#yamahafail)

Dear Yamaha Music Education Centre Australia:

As part of the teacher evaluation process last year, I was asked on a questionnaire to describe my 1^st year as teacher. I, with a masters in journalism, struggled for words. Eventually, however, I came up with the following:

I absolutely adore every minute of my teaching experience. Nothing brings me more pleasure than watching a child’s face light up as they discover – all on their own – where “re” is on the keyboard. It feels phenomenal to know that I’m responsible for the sparkle in a three-year-old’s eye when they hear the “ting” of a fairy in the classroom high above us, and it feels even more phenomenal when they proudly announce that “Miss Mariah! The fairy made a high sound!” To march to the rhythm of a drum, to sing do-re-mi and count 1-2-3 with a classroom full of eager young minds is an experience that I never imagined could be so incredibly fulfilling. Above all, knowing that every Saturday morning, I enlighten childrens’ hearts and brings the joys of the classical music tradition to their ears – and to the ears of their parents – is incredible.

Simply put, I love teaching music more than anything in this world. The fact that I am no longer able to teach has effectively broken my heart. As a result, I have resolved that you cannot get rid of me that easily and that I will do anything to restore my teaching abilities with Yamaha Music Education Centre.

I understand that I am not legally able to work for both JXT Consulting and Yamaha Music at the same time. The Temporary Business (Long Stay) Standard Business Visa clearly states that I am to be employed with no more than one company (the nominated company) at one time, and I respect that law. I am in no position tamper with the forces that constitute the Australian Immigration Department, nor do I care to do so.

What I don’t understand, however, is why YMEC is refusing me the privilege of teaching when I have offered my teaching services free of charge. I originally had 7 classes and almost 60 students across two of the three YMEC schools in Sydney. That’s more classes than any other Yamaha teacher in the Sydney region, possibly more than any teacher in the entirety of Australia. Perhaps, YMEC, you fail to understand just how much I love teaching. Allow me to explain.

Unlike many YMEC teachers, I’m not a uni student, or a part time mum, or a part-time worker. I love teaching music so much that I took on seven classes this year, sacrificing my Saturday and Sunday mornings and effectively my Friday and Saturday nights, even though I already have a full time, Monday to Friday, 8:30-5:30 job. That much.

I love teaching music so much that before I had a car, I was up at 5 am on Saturday mornings in order to catch a 5:45 bus to the city, in order to catch a 6:15 train to Jannali, in order to walk from the train station to the YMEC music school, in order to arrive in my classroom with ample time to prepare for the morning’s classes, because I don’t have time to prepare during the week. That much.

I love teaching music so much that now that I have a car, I still leave my flat at 6:30 am and drive 50 minutes south to arrive in Jannali by 7:15, again in order to best prepare for my upcoming classes. Because I work during the week, it’s on Saturday mornings that I warm up my voice, warm up my fingers and go through the songs for the day. That much.

I love teaching music so much that after my classes are over, when the pitter-patter of children running up and the down the halls has disappeared and the energetic singing voices have climbed into cars and faded away, I remain in my classroom, humming to myself the songs of magic carpets and dripping raindrops as I clean up my classroom, erase the dryboard and put all of my teaching materials away. Even after the parking lot is empty, I remain at the music school, preparing lessons plans for the next week and marking my roll. I email homework to all my parents, indicating which songs to practice, track numbers on CDs and what we did well with in class that day and what we need to work on. While others are at the beach or enjoying the beautiful Australia weather, I remain in Jannali, contriving up new ways to help my students remember chord positions and conjuring fun and exciting actions for next week’s keyboard game, because I know that I won’t have any spare time until the following Saturday. That much.

I love teaching music so much that I based the location of my home around YMEC. Working in North Sydney, near Chatswood, though also holding my Jannali school dear to my heart, when moving house I chose specifically to live in a suburb that sits halfway between Chatswood and Jannali, the two schools at which I had planned on teaching this year. That much.

I love teaching music so much that I spent every weekend of my summer planning for the upcoming year. I spent entire days in Jannali, as my RC can attest to, organising attendance charts, lesson planning, hanging up posters, colour coding folders, practicing, playing, singing and writing letters to the soon-to-be parents of my students. That much.

I love teaching music so much that I have spent at least hundreds of dollars on marketing materials and spent dozens upon dozens of hours promoting YMEC without ever asking for anything in return except for the mere privilege and honour of teaching. I have created my own Yamaha business cards, spent entire days at kids’ festivals, created promotion after promotion and glued purple sheet after purple sheet of paper onto cardboard. That muc—wait, I’m not done. I’ve spent my weekends (the only free time that I have) touring downtown Jannali, chatting with shopowners and hanging posters up in windows and on buildings and at bus stops. I’ve spent time writing information on those posters, such as location, class time and my personal mobile number for parents to ring. I’ve taken phone calls, walked parents though Yamha methodologies, encouraged potential parents and students to attend FIS (free information sessions) and successfully converted these fresh faces at FIS to members of the YMEC family. That much.

…this much:

…this much:

…this much:

…this much:

…this much:

this much:

this much:

...this much:

…this much: (The Benefits of Music Education)

I love teaching music so much that when times were really rough for me, when I was struggling to pay rent, working my way through grad school and working the maximum amount of hours during the week that my visa allowed me to work while residing in Australia as a student, when I was working, studying and going to class non-stop and when I only JUST getting by, I spent what little extra money I had on stickers and stamps for my students, on cotton balls for cloud songs and on felt for finger puppets because I love to watch little faces light up when I produce elephants and mice from my fingertips. That much.

I love teaching music so much that the thought of a poorly trained, soft-spoken and unenthusiastic new music teacher taking over my class – especially a class of which I know all of but 2 of the 11 students, a class of which I brought in fresh faces to the FIS from my mini-marketing campaign, a class of which many students had been in my Music Wonderland (the class that precedes Junior Music) class last term and a class of which I see so much potential, musicality and growth – absolutely and positively, without a doubt breaks my heart. Upon observation of the first lesson of this particular class, there was no class control. The teacher commanded no authority in the room and nobody – parent nor child – was listening to her. She did not engage with the kids during songs nor did she employ the correct movements. She did not sing along with the lyric songs (“Friendly Fingers’”) or if she did I could not hear her, and she skipped entirely “Come and Play With Me,” which is the theme song for Junior Music Course and is the song that stresses the importance of the listen, sing play model – the cornerstone of the students’ musical experience for the next two years. She attempted to teach the students far too much solfege, not only for the first lesson but for any lesson in general (do do sol sol la la sol fa fa mi mi re re do) and as a result the children absorbed almost none of it at all. She failed to address the students individually, despite nametags, and did not mark roll. Fortunately, I knew almost every single child in the room from the FIS or from Music Wonderland and was able to confirm their attendance. This particular JMC class is full only because of my personal marketing efforts and because of the turn out at the FIS and importantly, because the parents were under the assumption that I would be their teacher. I would not be surprised if some of the parents decide to remove their children from this music class. The children were disengaged for much of the lesson (some of them even walked away from the piano in the middle of a song) and they would not have been engaged at all had I not been there to take control when needed. I love teaching so much that I had to literally walk out of the room in the middle of this lesson to prevent tears from streaming down my face, because seeing children I had previously witnessed in music class smiling, singing, listening and having fun were now bored, listless and learning little. That’s how much I love teaching music.

I understand that you have multiple concerns with the idea of me teaching music on a volunteer basis. I would like to make it very clear that I am willing to do anything in order to retain my position as music teacher with YMEC. Find below some concerns you may have in regards to my volunteer work and a potential solution to each problem:

1. YMEC does not want to be liable for any personal injury that may result from my teaching.

· I am aware that YMEC does not want to be liable for any actions I take during my music lessons. In this regard, I have made inquiries and found that I can take out the following insurance policy: AON Music and Singing Teacher’s Insurance Package 2010. This policy covers me for public liability and personal accidents. It is specifically designed for music teachers and also extends to volunteers. It protects me in the event of most claims – please see attached policy. I am of course more than willing to pay for this policy and for any policy that YMEC requires I have in order to teach music.

2. YMEC is worried that because I am a volunteer, my classes are at risk that I could not show up for class, may leave in the middle of the term or take off on holiday without any notice.

· See above. Do you really think that I would do that? I’m happy to sign any document that states that if I fail to fulfil my duties as a volunteer, I will no longer be able to teach music at any time in the future and that YMEC has the right to ban me from teaching permanently. I’m also happy to sign any document stating that if I fail to fulfil my duties as a music teacher, I will owe YMEC the total amount of the music lesson fees that each parent paid. I am aware that each student pays up to $550 per term for music lessons.

3. YMEC does not want to give me keys to YMEC property because I will not be an employee of YMEC.

· Fair enough. Instead of doing my teacher preparation in the mornings, I will stay late in the afternoons to prepare for the next week’s class and arrive to the music school when the RC has arrived and unlocked the premises.

Need I remind you that with 7 classes ($25 per hour = $175 per week) and about 53 students ($2.50 per student = $132.50 per week), totalling $307.50 per week, and 40 weeks in the teaching year, I am literally giving YMEC $12,300 a year? I want to make it clear right here and now that money is of no importance to me; if I was in teaching for the money, I would have quit a long time ago. I love teaching so much that I’m not only willing to fork over more than $10,000 a year in the income I would have made but I’m also ready and eager and begging you to allow me to pay YMEC to allow me to teach.

That much.

If you have any additional concerns revolving around my volunteer work with YMEC, I would like to address them. If there are any additional costs involved with extending your insurance policies to cover volunteers, I am ready to pay them. If there is anything that I can do in order to maintain my teaching position with YMEC, I will do it.

Sincerely,

Mariah Gillespie

15 February, 2011

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