Hello friends,
Welcome to the August 2021 edition of the Meetup Organizer newsletter! We have some exciting updates for you in this edition of our newsletter – read on to find out more!
Newsletter contents:
- Returning to safe in-person WordCamps
- Learn.WordPress.Org needs your feedback
- Celebrate WordPress 5.8 with your Meetup Group
- Online event updates
- Tuesday Trainings
- News from the WordPress world
🔙⛺️ Returning to safe in-person WordCamps
The Community Team has published a proposal to discuss how the WordPress community can return to in-person WordCamps. The proposal shares ideas on organizing small in-person events in areas that meet the in-person meetup safety checklist or with vaccination or testing freely available, following local safety guidelines with additional recommendations for organizing safe events. Please share your thoughts in the comments on that post.
👩🏫👩🎓Learn.WordPress.Org needs your feedback
The Training Team wishes to find what learners and potential learners would like to see in the learn.wordpress.org platform. To contribute, please fill out an anonymous survey (by August 13) OR join a short video call to share feedback.
❤️ Celebrate WordPress 5.8 with your Meetup Group
The latest and greatest WordPress release – WordPress 5.8, came out on July 20, 2021! This major release offers features like block-based widgets, a host of new blocks and patterns, a template editor, a duotone feature to stylize images, theme.json, and support for webP images, to name a few. Read more in the release post and the field guide.
Celebrate the launch of this exciting release by organizing a local meetup for your meetup group or by generating buzz in social media. Check out this blog post on talking points for WordPress 5.8, along with the release field guide. You can also help by sharing release updates on social media using our social media pack. A slides template to adapt is also available on GitHub.
Looking for inspiration? Several meetups are planning or have organized meetup events on WordPress 5.8. Check them out:
- WordPress Meetup San José: Conversemos sobre las novedades de WordPress 5.8 [Spanish][Upcoming]
- WordPress Meetup Jena: Neuerungen in WordPress 5.8 [German][Upcoming]
- The Triad WordPress Meetup: What’s new in WordPress 5.8 [English][Past]
- Cambridge WordPress: WordPress 5.8 [English][Past]
- Hartford WordPress Meetup: WordPress 5.8 Deep Dive [English][Past]
- San Salvador WordPress Meetup: Lo nuevo en WordPress 5.8 [Spanish][Past]
🌍🎪 Online event updates
Reminder: You can organize in-person meetups for your group if your region meets guidelines in our safety checklist OR if your location has vaccinations or testing freely available – all you need to do is to fill out the safety checklist. You will find more details in our handbook. If it is not safe in your region or if you simply do not wish to organize in-person events, you can continue organizing online meetups for your group. You can make use of community Zoom accounts for your online meetups! Stay updated on online WordPress meetups worldwide by following the Marketing Team’s WordPress Meetup roundup every Monday.
Don’t miss WordCamp US on October 1!
One of the most exciting WordPress events – WordCamp US, is back as a single-day online event on October 1, 2021. Organizers of the event have several exciting plans in the pipeline, including networking opportunities, speaker sessions, workshops, and more. Call for speaker nominations is already open – and calls for volunteers and sponsors will be out soon. Follow the Camp website to stay updated on the latest event news.
Gear up for WordPress Translation Day Celebrations in September 2021!
The Polyglots Team is planning a month-long translation day celebration in September 2021, with two weeks of “core events” from September 17 to 30. The WordPress Translation Day team will announce more details on the event shortly, and you can follow all the latest updates on the Polyglots blog too. Want to participate? Join the celebrations by organizing a local Translation event for your meetup in September!
Upcoming WordPress events
The following WordCamps are already on the calendar. Don’t miss these events!
- 🇧🇷 WordCamp Floripa 2021 (August 11-12, 2021)
- 🇪🇸 WordCamp Galicia Spain 2021 (September 30 – October 2, 2021)
- 🇺🇸 WordCamp US 2021 (October 1, 2021)
- 🇳🇮 WordCamp Nicaragua 2021 (October 8-9, 2021)
Check out these WP Diversity speaker workshops for AMER/EMEA in August!
The Diverse Speaker Training group of the Community Team announced three new programs for Meetup and WordCamp organizers – including a new Diverse Speaker Support program and an Allyship program. The team has some exciting workshops in the pipeline for August! Please share about these
- Check out the inaugural allyship workshop on August 19, 2021, at 5:00 – 7:00 pm UTC! The workshop will offer a supportive space to talk through sensitive real-life challenges. Sign up for it now! and help promote the event on Twitter and on LinkedIn.
- Don’t miss the workshop on How to Own Your Expertise & Start Speaking at WordPress on August 27 at 5:00 to 7:00 PM UTC! The workshop is being held in an Interactive, Transformational Watch Party” for people from underrepresented groups in WordPress and for participants in our Allyship program.
🛠 Tuesday Trainings
Through Tuesday Trainings (#TuesdayTrainings), the Community Team publishes a different topic on the WordPress Community Blog to help organizers and interested community members learn various skills. Don’t forget to check out our other Tuesday Training posts this month:
🗞 News from the WordPress world
- Don’t miss the latest WP Briefing podcast episode on The Art and Science of accessibility.
- Learn about Widgets in WP 5.8 and building themes with theme.json!
- The Core Team released Gutenberg Version 11.1 and Version 11.2.
- Check out the new WordPress Pattern Directory that was launched alongside WordPress 5.8!
If you have any questions, Community Team deputies are available to help. Please send an email to [email protected] or join the #community-events Slack channel. Thanks for everything you do to grow the WordPress community. Let’s keep sharing knowledge and inspiring each other with our contributions!
We will see you online soon!
The following people contributed to August’s Meetup newsletter: @evarlese @eidolonnight @meher and @webcommsat