Thursday, October 06, 2011

Adding A School to CSATTF Grant Reimbursement Proposal

One of the new tasks I have at the Guild is assisting Mr. Massie in the renewal of the scholastic reimbursement grants offered through CSATTF. TAG participates with a group of locals who annually petition the Fund to provide our members with tuition reimbursement for skills training at approved institutions. This is one of many important functions the Fund is stipulated to manage through the contract between the IATSE and the AMPTP.

This year, I am working to add to the list of schools approved for the partial tuition reimbursement. fxphd is an on-line institution that offers training in cutting edge visual effects software and techniques. They provide this training through downloadable videos, assets and even VPN tunnels to access learning licenses to the latest software packages. Students interact with working industry professionals who design and proctor the courses while using the latest software packages on their own machines at their own pace. The reviews from students have been nothing but glowing.

I see the addition of this facility as a big win for our members. However, in order to get the school added, I need some assistance.

My efforts to petition the Fund Trustees for the school's addition would be greatly aided by testimonials from any IATSE member (not just TAG) who have benefited from taking courses at fxphd. If you've taken a class there, and have the time and interest in writing a glowing report of your experience, it would be an extremely useful addition to my petition.

Please give a call to the Guild (818-845-7500) and ask for Steve Kaplan, or send an email to skaplan@animationguild.org. I'll reply with a breakdown of what would be most helpful to include in your report.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

*sigh*

I'm a huge supporter of the Animation guild, and its efforts to recruit new studios. This is why I've commented before on the less-than-great messaging abilities of TAG.

Steve, if you want people to give you feedback on fxphd, make your giant headline read "HAVE YOU EVER TAKEN A CLASS FROM FXPHD?"

And then immediately follow that with: "If you've had a positive experience from them, could you provide a testimonial to me?"

Then briefly explain why.

Instead, you wrote a huge, dense brick of text, which no one is going to read, and only at the end (beneath the fold!) did you get around to the point. My prediction is you will receive no replies, because you've BURIED THE LEDE!!

Just a helpful suggestion.

Steven Kaplan said...

Damn my art background. Pass me your email anon, I'll send all my post copy to you first.

Anonymous said...

I appreciate your efforts in adding new schools to the grant. I just finished a class at Gnomon and the CSATTF was a great incentive and aid in taking the class. I wish I could help you, but I've never taken a class at fxphd. Thanks for expanding the program.

Anonymous said...

KEEP IT PITHY!!!!

From you know who.

Mental Training said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Steven Kaplan said...

You know who -

I'll print it (and the LEDE comment) and keep it pasted to my monitor.

Anonymous said...

First commenter here.

Re-reading my post the next day, I'm somewhat shocked at my pissy tone. Sorry, must've been my frame-of-mind last night. Apologies.

I guess I have my own attitude-framing lessons to learn.

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