One of our projects in the New Year is to revamp our membership directory to make it more useful to our members.  Before we undertake this task, we’re polling our members to see how they use the directory and what they’d like to see from it.  You can find this brief survey here.

The Canada Revenue Agency is continuing to offer webinars on topics of interest to registered charities, including
• T3010B: Line by Line Review;
• Fundraising, Gifting and Receipting (level I);
• Gifting and Receipting (level II);
• Payroll;
• Registered Charity Information Return Summary, Disbursement Quota and Capital Gain;
• Financial Statements, Books and Records and Foreign Activities; and
• Fundraising Guidance.
Registration is free, and you can learn more and sign up on-line here.

The Toronto-based Maytree Foundation has just announced topics for its winter/spring series of Five Good Ideas free lunch and learn lectures.  Upcoming topics include Employment and Labour Law, Impacting Public Policy, Talking to the Media, and Copyright & Intellectual Property Law.  To learn more and to register, please visit the Maytree Foundation’s on-line registration portal here.

Regular visitors to OC’s website may have noted a brand new tab on our homepage this week.  It’s called “Conference”, and we have posted the first of many updates on the National Orchestras Meeting, scheduled to take place in Winnipeg MB from June 21-23, with a pre-session scheduled for June 20.  You’ll find information about the program, our host hotel, and the arrangements we’ve made for discounted air travel.  Online registration will be up and running by February 28:  check it out, and watch for regular updates, too!

www.orchestrascanada.org

This fall, Orchestras Canada is partnering with the Professional Association of Canadian Theatres to undertake a national compensation study of senior personnel in Canadian theatres and orchestras.  The results will be used to make sector-specific compensation data available to Canadian orchestras and update The Human Resources in the Canadian Theatre Report last published by PACT in 2003.  The survey will capture compensation data for senior artistic and administrative staff and is being administered by the Association Resource Centre, a firm with extensive experience in conducting research for associations.  Individual results are kept confidential:  only summary data will be published.

An invitation to participate was sent to voting members of Orchestras Canada late last week, and the deadline for response is December 4.  If you believe that you should have received an invitation – and didn’t – please let Jennifer Caines at Orchestras Canada know.  You can reach her at info [at] oc.ca

This study is made possible, in part, through the support of the Canada Council’s Flying Squad program.

The Orchestre symphonique de Québec has announced the appointment of one of its executive committee members to the board of the National Arts Centre. M. Claude Gauvin, a chartered accountant and partner at Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton was appointed to the NAC board on October 27. 

In honour of the Canadian Music Centre’s 50th anniversary, the CMC has chosen to publicly recognize 50 outstanding Canadian performers and conductors who have played exceptional roles in shaping the Canadian music scene.  It’s a terrific list that includes many, many stellar figures from the current and past membership of Orchestras Canada, including Mario Bernardi, Robert Cram, Victor Feldbrill, Peter Gardner, Gwen Hoebig, Gary Kulesha, Veronique Lacroix, Eduard Minevich, Alex Pauk, Olga Ranzenhofer, Bramwell Tovey, Alain Trudel and Lorraine Vaillancourt.  Congratulations one and all!  For the complete list, you can visit here.

Orchestras Canada and the Professional Association of Canadian Theatres have announced the appointment of Diann Missal as our (shared) Conference Marketing and Logistics Associate.  Ms Missal is a recent graduate of the Arts Administration – Cultural Management program at Humber College, and she will divide her time between PACT and OC until March 31, 2010.  The position has been made possible through the Youth Internship Program of the Cultural Human Resources Council.  You can reach Diann at OC by phone at 416-366-8834 x223 or by email at diann [at] oc [dot] ca.