One of the most frequent problems for EVO moderators is how to manage emails

You will probably experience an avalanche of email in the first 2 weeks of a session. You should read every email, and you really need to respond in a warm and welcoming manner to your new group and help make it cohesive, but you don't want to add to the flood in everyone's box. In our chat this morning, two main methods of handling mail were discussed, as well as some general ideas to ease the load.

Please add to this list if you have some more ideas!

General Suggestions

• Share the burden with your co-moderators: 2-3 days for each to respond to all mail, then switch. (Use the >Daily Digest when it's not your turn.)
• Get your guest speakers to respond to email on their topic for a few days--meanwhile, you handle more general queries and comments.

• Reply to a group of emails on the same topic, rather than to each individually. Mention names directly in your response.

• Be welcoming and responsive, but you don't have to answer every email--that just adds to the flood.

• Encourage participants to respond to each other and not simply wait for the moderators to respond--this encourages participation, too.
• Switch your mail reception options around, depending on how heavy the flood is-- >Individual Email when it's heavy and >Daily Digest when it's light
• Make sure your Subject heading is accurate before clicking >Send

Suggestions for >Individual Email

If you opt to receive messages individually in your mailbox:

• Answer individually, reading from most recent to older daily (you'll see which ones have already been replied to). Delete as you read.

• Or, scan the whole list first, flagging those that need attention/response. Print the ones that present complex problems.

Suggestions for >Web Only

If you opt not to receive messages, but read them at the YG website:

• When it is your turn to respond, go faithfully to the MESSAGES area daily. Use the >Daily Digest option to receive mail in your inbox at the same time, as a back up. 

• When you click on a message, all the messages in that thread or group will be displayed above and below it in chronological order, so you can quickly see what messages have already been replied to already. Your reply will show up immediately in the list, so you can glance at it to see if you have covered everything.

After finishing a thread, click on >Next (left side of window). You will see the next message, whether you read it in the summary or not. Or you can >Return to Message List  and select another message to read and follow that thread. Read messages will appear in purple, so you can keep track of what is already viewed.

Suggestions for >Daily Digest

• If you set your mail to >Daily Digest, use the >Reply by web post option. Otherwise your reply will be humongous!
• Don't use >Daily Digest when the mail traffic is heavy, e.g., in the first few weeks while you are sorting out problems.

For a description of how to set your email options in YG, see Editing Email Options (Participants) in this wiki.

Sorting Mail

You can keep mail from your EVO session separate from your personal or school mail in several ways:

• Yahoo allows you to have several different addresses. Use a separate Yahoo Identity just for EVO.

• Yahoo allows you to refer mail with a particular header or subject to a separate folder automatically. You can set up a folder to receive messages from your EVO.

• Use a mailer like Outlook Express which can also sort your EVO mail into a separate folder.