The Year of the Young Organist
Chapter Recruitment Contest
Win $1000 for Your Chapter!
Who’s in the Lead?
Small Chapters: Hong Kong chapter is in the lead with a net growth of 10 new young organists.
Medium Chapter: Denver Rocky Mountain is in the lead with a net growth of 16 new young organists.
Large Chapters: Los Angeles is in the lead with a net growth of 14 new young organists.
View here to see how your chapter is doing:
Year of the Young Organist by Chapter Growth as of April 1
The game is on! Starting July 1, 2021, and ending June 30, 2022, how many young organists can you recruit?
At the end of the Year of the Young Organist, we will run a report to see how many new members you have recruited over the past twelve months. The AGO will award one small (up to 60 members), one medium (61–125 members), and one large (126+ members) chapter with $1000, each, based on the net increase of primary young organists they have recruited (dual memberships will not be counted, so no double dipping)! The number of members you have recruited will be based on the net gain. This means that if you recruited fifteen young organists but lost five, your net gain would be ten, so keeping your current young organists as members is equally important!
Each month, we will be sending you a new recruitment tip to help your chapter recruit as many young organists as possible.
July 2021, Tip #1: Contact the teachers in your area to let them know about the Year of the Young Organist and the free membership that is being offered. In your emails or phone conversations, refer them to https://www.yearoftheyoungorganist.com/, where detailed program information has been posted, new young organists are featured, and articles written by young organists will appear. Young organists can join or renew here: https://www.agohq.org/free-membership/. Ask them to let you know when one of their students has joined, and at the end of each month, be sure to access your membership roster report from ONCARD, which will show the new organists you have recruited by their “join” date.
August 2021, Tip #2: To help you promote the Year of the Young Organist we have created a QR code that takes one directly to the registration page https://www.agohq.org/free-membership/ where young organists can join or renew. Feel free to add this QR code to your website and Facebook pages, or take a photo of it on your smart phone, so that you can easily share it with prospective members.
September 2021, Tip #3: We’ve created a promotional flyer for you to send digitally to students, teachers and colleagues. It can also be used as a handout at in-person programs.
Year of the Young Organist Flyer with QR Code.
October 2021, Tip #4: Please share this link https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMRxoUVQ5/ to a fun video created by Wesley Hall, sub-dean of the Worcester chapter, that is now on TikTok!
November 2021, Tip #5: During this holiday season, encourage teachers to give the gift of free membership to their students. We’ve created a festive flyer for you to distribute or email as an attachment Give Your Student the Gift of Free Membership with the American Guild of Organists.
December 2021, Tip #6: Start promoting AGO’s Organ Scholar Program. Send this flyer to your students and colleagues, urging them to join the AGO so that they can take advantage of this wonderful opportunity.
January, 2022, Tip #7:
Include this link https://www.yearoftheyoungorganist.com/program-year that takes one directly to the recordings of webinars that have been produced over the past few months. A special series of videos focused on Recording the Pipe Organ, presented November 28–December 5, can be accessed here. These young organist webinars provide a great “sales pitch” for recruiting new members, so please include this information in your newsletters and in your recruitment emails.
February, 2022, Tip #8: The Young Organist Steering Committee of the Seattle convention is offering $10,000 in scholarships for AGO young organists to attend the convention. Details can be found here, along with the application form. Be sure to include this promotion on your Facebook page, website and newsletter, and share the link when contacting local teachers and colleagues.
March, 2022, Tip #9: Young Organists attending our 2022 convention in Seattle are in for a treat. The AGOYO committee will be hosting a private young organist reception and has planned some special off-site excursions. In addition to the $10,000 that Seattle has offered to assist young organist members with costs associated in attending the convention, young organists can also apply for the Suzanne and Mark Anderson Housing Scholarship. Housing Scholarship
April, 2022, Tip #10: You may not realize it, but you could be sitting on a gold mine! When you access your monthly membership reports on ONCARD, how many of you review young organists whose memberships were canceled over the past couple of years? They may still be eligible for a free year of membership! In sales, this is what we call “low hanging fruit.” Instructions for retrieving the report and sorting it to see those lapsed members, can be accessed here: How to Find Lapsed Young Organists.
May, 2022: Help promote this upcoming workshop to teachers and colleagues in the Baltimore metropolitan area:
