When Three Halves Make a Whole

Without her, you wouldn’t be reading this post. Why? Because this website wouldn’t exist. And, since the vast majority of those of you reading these words found your way here through Facebook or Twitter, we should mention that without her, those wouldn’t exist either. Okay, let’s back up. No, we aren’t talking about Mark Zuckerburg, and yes, without her Facebook and Twitter would admittedly still ‘exist’, but From Stone to Screen’s presence would be sorely, deeply, devastatingly (too much?) missed from those two platforms. Who are we talking about? Our Media Director superstar, Kat Solberg, of course!

Today’s post is the third in a series where we highlight the members of our From Stone to Screen team, and since the first two (about us, Chelsea and Lisa) were written BY Kat, it was time for the directors to step up and show off our own social media skills in honour OF Kat, an indispensable member of our team.

Kat’s ‘Where are you Wednesday’ photo!

Kat became a part of the From Stone to Screen team during the second year of her MA in Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology, when she was hired as our TA for the Fall semester. We’re pretty flexible with the way that our TAs spend their hours – after all, we want them to enjoy their employment and get as much out of their positions as possible – and Kat took it upon herself to improve our social media presence right off the bat. She created our Facebook and Twitter accounts in the same semester that she and Lisa upgraded our website to the marvel of modern internet digitalia you now behold. Ready for some statistics to brighten up your day? Here you go:

“The project’s initial WordPress blog was launched in June 2013 and has since had 9,464 hits from 4,865 visitors.  In November 2014, the project upgraded to its own domain, www.fromstonetoscreen.com, which has had 7,345 hits from 3,263 visitors from 88 countries in the 10 months since its launch, a 38% increase from the hits of 2014. The site receives the most hits from Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Greece.”

Are you reading this from one of those countries? Awesome! Are you reading this from a different country? Even better! We love the fact that From Stone to Screen reaches people from around the globe and, largely due to Kat’s efforts, we are always looking to expand that core audience. During the tenure of her TAship with From Stone to Screen, Kat was ‘supervised’ by Gwynaeth (we use that term loosely, since most of our awesome team members are incredibly driven and, if anything, need ‘supervision’ to make sure they don’t work TOO much!), who had this to say:

“Kat is the one responsible for bringing our project to the masses.  Her witty Twitter and Facebook posts really highlight FSTS’s passion for bringing the ancient world to life and encouraging everyone to explore what the past can teach us. I could always count on Kat to come up with some new and exciting way to showcase our work.”

Vessel sherds mug – our bestseller!

Brand new – FSTS water bottles

Super cute Maspero Frères pocket journal

An FSTS magnet!

Another mug! With MORE sherds!

Funerary stele postcard, just in time for Halloween

Epigraphic chart canvas print – for the true fan

Lisa’s favourite part about working with Kat is handing her some creative task and sitting back, knowing that she’s going to knock it out of the park. Whether it’s a logo (something she’d never done before, but taught herself the basic design principles), promo folder for one of our many fundraisers, or a cohesive theme for an academic poster, Kat always manages to come up with something that hits the perfect blend of professional and fun that we’re looking for. Not to mention the fact that she makes this all look effortless. Kat has a natural talent for design and communication that has become essential to how FSTS presents itself and engages with its audience.

We're a digitizations project claiming 21st century tech knowledge – but does anything beat post-it's for planning? pic.twitter.com/vY0WxIDY3D

— From Stone to Screen (@CNRS_Squeezes) March 4, 2015

The ‘After’ Shot – a result of post-it planning!

To give you a sense of the huge contribution that Kat has made to this project, here is the initial list I drafted of her accomplishments (complete with clever name….they don’t let you into graduate school without that kind of sharp mind):

Things that Kat has done:

1. Be awesome
2. Zazzle products – buy some!
   

   Kat’s Beautiful Logo design!

3. the FSTS logo
4. From Stone to Screen on Twitter
5. From Stone to Screen on Facebook
6. FSTS Website design
7. Squeeze Mapping Project
8. Instructional Skills Workshops Promotion
9. Blogs – including the most popular post we’ve had to-date, and featured on WordPress’ Freshly Pressed – ‘Cleaning Dirt off Dirt’ -When Archaeological Students Learn What Archaeology Actually Is
10. Various academic things:
    1. Gardner, C.A.M., G. McIntyre, K. Solberg, and L. Tweten. “Looks Like We Made It: But Are We Sustaining Digital Scholarship?” in Making Humanities Matter (Debates in Digital Humanities Series, Vol. II). University of Minnesota Press, Forthcoming 2016.
    2. Tweten, L., K. Solberg,  & C.A.M. Gardner. “The Writing’s on the Wall: Open Access Tutorials for Epigraphic Studies.” PKP Scholarly Publishing Conference 2015, August 11 – 14, Vancouver, BC.  
    3. Solberg, K. & C.A.M. Gardner.  “From Stone to Screen: Ancient Words in a Digital World.” ASOR Annual Meeting, November 18-21, Atlanta, GA.
    4. Gardner, C.A.M., K. Solberg, L. Tweten, H. Bertram, E. Hilliard, & M. Côté-Landry. “From Stone to Screen: Putting the Squeeze on Digital Epigraphy” Archaeological Institute of America Annual Meeting, January 8-11, New Orleans, LA.
    5. Gardner, C.A.M., K. Solberg, & L. Tweten. “From Stone to Screen: Squeezing into the World of Digital Archaeology” Society for American Archaeology, April 15-19, San Francisco CA
    6. Solberg, K. & C.A.M. Gardner. “The From Stone to Screen Project” Past Matters: Teaching History Through Material Culture, March 6, Vancouver, BC.
    7. Assaf, D. K. Solberg, H. Bertram, L. Tweten & C.A.M. Gardner. “From Stone to Screen: Bringing 21st-century access to ancient artifacts” Biblical History Daily, Biblical Archaeology Blog, August 20.

Our very own #FSTS Media Director @Ksolberg presents Squeezing Onto a Map: Plotting the Reach of the Athenian Empire pic.twitter.com/nox8Jl7SIf

— From Stone to Screen (@CNRS_Squeezes) April 21, 2015

The best part about working with Kat, for me, was the level of commitment she had to this project. Just like Lisa and I, she spent far too much of her free time stressing about the so-called ‘little things’, which provide the crucial framework for any non-profit: the charming wording of her posts, the professional tone of emails, and the beautiful aesthetic design of each and every product, web page, and promotional advertisement. These qualities, this passion, this level of investment only comes around once and awhile, and we intend to hold on to Kat as tightly as possible and not let her go until some very smart, powerful company (we’re talking to YOU, Google!) smartly snatches her up for themselves.  

Kat's excavating in Italy and wearing her FSTS swag #Orvieto #Italy #whereareyouwednesday #isthatatrowelinyourpocket pic.twitter.com/3NLqLVmEwa

— From Stone to Screen (@CNRS_Squeezes) May 27, 2015