Joseph Plauger - Secretary

[plaugs_golf]

Hello guys! My name is Joseph Plauger and I am currently a freshman here at JMU. I am majoring in Computer Science, although that might be changing soon depending on a few factors. I just recently joined the forums, as you can probably tell, but I have been a decently active member with MM since the beginning of this school year. I will become a lot more active on here as I've heard it's a great place :wink:

My interest in cars didn't really take off until junior year of high school, but once I got a taste for them I was hooked instantly. I do not currently own a car, but I am in the market for one if I can find a cheap enough car for me to afford. When I found out that JMU had a car club, there was no way that I wasn't going to join.

Let's talk about the position and why I feel I am qualified for it... I am running for Secretary to help make this club bigger and better than it was last year. Secretary requires a lot of work with emails and social media, including phone calls and paperwork. I am able to handle emails pretty well and I'm sure a lot of you currently in MM who follow me on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter know my involvement in social media. For those that are unfamiliar, I have been a very active member of Facebook for quite a long time. I also have taken many pictures of MM events as well as random cars I see around and post them to my Instagram account fairly regularly. This leads into something I believe we could do a little better on this coming year... social media posting. I can regularly add pictures of MM events to any social media account we have and keep it updated, especially Instagram. Cool looking car pictures is an essential to any car club, in my opinion.

Any other duties that a Secretary is obligated to complete, such as keeping good notes from all meetings and keeping track of minutes, shouldn't be any problem for me. Helping to order apparel and stickers are foreign to me, but shouldn't be too hard to figure out. I'm sure there are also quite a few other things that I will have to do that I haven't mentioned here, but just like the above... they shouldn't be extremely hard to figure out and do a decent job at.

I would absolutely love Madison Motorsports to become a club that is well known here at JMU. We have progressed so much in that over the years, but I still feel like there is some more that can be done in that department. Through more involvement with social media, I feel like we can grow our audience more and receive better recognition throughout campus and the surrounding areas.

Madison Motorsports is a club very close to my heart and something that needs to stay around forever if at all possible. I am running for Secretary to help make this club bigger and better than it was last year. I will do anything I can to keep MM running on all four wheels. I know this is pretty short, so feel free to bombard me with questions!

[Senor_Taylor]

Hey Joseph. Good job on deciding to run!

You're one of club golfs top dudes, especially looking into the future. How do you see yourself balancing the two? I'd really hate for you to skip a tournament for MM, but at times it may be required. Being an officer in MM is essentially a part time job (10--15 hours a week some weeks). Do you think it's realistic for you to do both? Officers are expected to be at most, if not all (major) events.

Do you think you could do a decent job without a car and living on campus? I understand we have talked about this, but do you think you'd have a car by next year?

Major props on trying to get out to the track and autocrosses even if you aren't driving. Do you have any ideas on how to get students out to these events and lead by example?

Do you have experience with meeting agendas and minutes or any kind of professional writing. (Is it in the CS curriculum?) Being an officer means you're the face of the club and your social media posts need to reflect this in a professional, but fun manner.

Good luck!

[plaugs_golf]

Balancing the two clubs into the future might become a tad difficult when it comes to tournaments, like you said. However, we only have 2 tournaments a semester plus Nationals (assuming we will go). This year I was unlucky that one of them landed on the date of the car show, which sucks quite a lot. If I get this position though, I will do whatever is necessary to fulfill my job status as Secretary. If that means missing out on a golf tournament so that I am able to attend our huge car show event, I will do that.

Since being Secretary is mostly about doing things with social media and emails... things like that... I should be able to get along just fine without a car of my own, assuming I am not able to get one this summer. In order to get to events, I should hopefully be able to grab a seat with someone. I didn't have any problem with that this year, and I am just a tiny little freshman. As far as having a car by next year...? Ehh at best. I probably won't earn enough money to be able to afford one... but it's not out of the question. If at all possible, I will get a car for next year. It's pretty much a waiting game at this point.

I absolutely love going to those autocross events, even if I am not able to drive in them. Haven't made it out to the track yet this year, but one day soon I would just tell people that look... it's such a blast, even if you don't get to drive in it. You get to meet some great people, become closer to the person you ride down with, and see some amazing cars... even ride in some of them.

I do not have too much experience with minutes and things like that... no. I am willing to research techniques though and ask previous members about what it all entails. I consider myself a great student of things I really care about. MM is one of those things, so my motivation to learn how to do it the right way, and do it at a high level is pretty high up there.