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Volunteer Nation's Latest News

 

Stay in the know with your fellow volunteers and learn about current events happening in the Volunteer Nation

 

    

 

 

 

Volunteer Nation Blog

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Stay in the know with your fellow volunteers, read the latest volunteer spotlight, and learn about current events happening in the Volunteer Nation.


Resources Tab at the Volunteer Portal: An Overview

 

man sitting at computer writing down information on a piece of paper

 

You’re reading along, either as a Narrator/Reader or a Listener/Checker, and suddenly you run into something you’re not sure about, something that doesn’t seem to be covered in your Project Guidelines.  It’s 10:00 Saturday night and you’re pretty sure all the staff are off-duty. What should you do?

 

  1. Write a long rant in the Hangout or Google Group, complaining about the ridiculous state of education in our country.

  2. Just make a guess; you’re pretty smart, anyway.

  3. Check out the Resources Tab at the Volunteer Portal.

  4. Quit and never respond to any communications from staff ever again.


 

Well, you probably ARE pretty smart...but if you are, you will choose C.  The Resources Tab at the Volunteer Portal can be your best friend in tricky situations.  So, let’s take a look at it together; we’ll give a brief overview of each section. NOTE: you do not need to be a member of any specific community to explore that community’s links.  You never know what useful information you’ll find!



 

Image of Textbook Community set of links     Stack of college textbooks, ranging from Cellular Biology and Sociology to a Latin textbook



 

The Textbook Community section includes a variety of very useful documents, ranging from conventions and helpful guides to forms:


 

  • Computer and Code Guidelines:  directions for computer-related items like reading code, how to announce various symbols within code, etc.

 

 

  • Famous Names and Places:  great tips on how to research the pronunciations of famous names and places; this document includes all kinds of helpful links to sites specific to occupations and locations around the world.

 

 

  • Foreign Language Wiki:  TWO SECTIONS: (1) conventions for the Foreign Language Community;  and (2) resources for pronunciations of words in many different foreign languages, ranging from Amharic and Punjabi to Lithuanian and Lang Belta, as well as a section on science terminology (because science is a language of its own).

 

  • Law Links: hints for learning how to say all those convoluted abbreviations used in legalese.

 

  • Math Reading Guidelines: does your history book suddenly, bizarrely, have a math equation in it?  Try this document to learn how to read that unholy aberration.

 

  • Science Terms and Conventions: Did the authors of the writing style guide you’re reading use examples from a science text?  Go to this document for help with that situation.

 

 

  • Checking Instructions: examples of good versus bad wave forms and instructions for leaving kind yet informative notes to Narrators/Readers.

 

 

 




 

Image of Lit Community list of links      Bookcases packed full of literature books, titles not legible


 

The Literature Community also has some useful links:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 






 

Image of Software and Apps list of links         Image of various Google links on a computer screen

 

Software & Apps:  just what you think it would be

 

 

  • webEB Reference Guide: place to go to access directions and links for using our new web-based software: no more worry about what type of computer you use, or all the files building up on your device!

 

 

  • EasyBooks (PC):  instructions for EasyBooks for PC; includes link to latest version

 

 

 





 

Explorer in a pith helmet, hiding in a bush as he looks into the distance through a set of binoculars     Image of the General section's links

 

General: a catch-all for some items that didn’t fit in the other categories:


 

 

 

  • Try out LAABS!:  directions for using the Learning Ally Audio Book Solution--check out the user experience on the books you’ve worked on

 

 

 

  • Hangouts: document with links to various Hangouts for meeting other volunteers and staff




 

poster reads               Image of Volunteer Nation Live! Events section start

 

Volunteer Nation Live! Events:  links to the all the VNL webinars





 

Image of happy female weight trainer             Image of Training Resources section links

 

Training Resources:  Links to a variety of Mini-Lesson, Videos, and Documents; in the top paragraph there is a link to the Virtual Training Center





 

So, as you can see: even when staff are off-duty, you’re never far from a source of help!  Dive into this tab full of great resources, and see what you find.


 

Archimedes next to his bathtub, shouting


Tech Tips: Literature Portal login

You may have noticed that we use a lot of Google products: Google login, Hangouts chat, Google Groups, Google Drive cloud storage of audio files, Chrome browser (recommended), etc. It is a ubiquitous platform that offers a lot of flexibility and is very low-cost for nonprofits. We understand that others have a preference for other browsers or email clients for whatever reason, but using Google makes it much easier for us to develop and maintain our production systems. Almost everyone has a Google account these days and you can create one or easily tie a different email account to a Google account as well. 

 

We use Google login for the Training Site, EasyBooks, and the Literature Portal. However, we see some common issues with login in the Literature Portal that we'd like to cover today. Here are the troubleshooting steps we recommend if you're not seeing what you expect in the portal, i.e., missing PDF Download button or Google Group, or nothing in the My Projects tab when you have assigned projects:

  1. Be sure you're logging in at top right with the Google account we added to the Literature community;
     
  2. Try logging out and back in
     
  3. Try using an incognito window to login and see if that helps (in Chrome PC Ctrl-Shift-N or Mac Cmd-Shift-N); if that does help, try logging out by left-clicking the profile image picture at google.com; select Sign Out and then sign in just the account you want to use;
     
  4. If third-party cookies are blocked in your browser, you may be able to log in and download the PDF, but the Google Group will fail to display:
    To fix this, you need to allow third-party cookies from Google Groups:
    In Chrome, open the More action menu (3 vertical dots) at the top right of the screen and:
    - Select Settings in the drop-down menu;
    - Scroll down and press Advanced;
    - Open the Content Settings;
    - Open the Cookies Settings;
    - Under Allow, press Add; 
    - Enter groups.google.com and click Add; and
    - Go back to the project site in the portal and refresh the screen
 
We hope this helps those who have had these issues...here's an instruction sheet with more information and screenshots if you need it.