Hello!!

My name's Nicole Sparkmn, and I am a Junior at California Lutheran University. I am currently conducting a research project on online social networking in the Christian Church, with emphasis on the use of facebook, memberconnect, mychurch, and ning. I am trying to get input from various churches web admin that use these sites, and am running into a roadblock with response rates, etc. I developed a survey to make collection of responses easier, but as you all probably know, surveys aren't always the most popular research tools... Do any of you know of any web admin that would be willing to give me input on the topic, whether through interview or the survey?

Any info would be GREAT! Thank you!!

Sorry, new to this whole deal. All of these posts are mine, but the last one has my account attached. As stated...Woops!

Thanks!!!

Hi Nicole,

I replied to your request weeks ago (see below), but the email wouldn't go through.

Please reply when you get this email.

Thanks,

God bless,

Chris Tiews
Vicar
Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church
Tulsa, OK

***

Dear ladies and gentlemen,

We are trying to respond to your student Nicole Sparkman who contacted us regarding a CLU research project. The email address she asked us to write to does not work: nsparkma@clunet.edu

Could you kindly forward this email to her?

Thanks!

Chris Tiews
Vicar
Grace Lutheran Church
Tulsa, OK

* * *

Dear Nicole,

This is Vicar Tiews of Grace Lutheran Church, Tulsa.

We feel privileged that you are including our data in your project.

We are currently retiring our Member Connect site. The much more attractive and interactive www.gracelutherantulsa.org (based on a wordpress application) is now our Web presence.

You might be interested to know that our new video, "Stability in an Unstable World," has already attracted 2,000 visits (it was posted only last Thursday). [Now almost 4,000 hits, June 29]

You can access this video from Youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qo0V57INpA or also from the Grace website.

Many of our members use Facebook as well and we will possibly be creating a Grace Facebook Group for more intra-church interaction.

Our average Sunday attendance is in the 190s, up from about 70 just four years ago. Two thirds of our new members are in their 20s.

Please feel free to get back to me if you have any more questions.

May the Lord continue to bless you and your studies.

Chris Tiews
Vicar
Grace Lutheran Church
Tulsa, OK