If you could change three things about Carolingia (or Carolingians as a whole) what would they be?

ii) That we learn to forgive the mistakes of people new to the barony and the society and, instead, foster and encourage newcomers even more than we do.

iii) That we remember that we are here as part of an educational society. We'd like to see Carolingia, and the SCA at large, do more with schools of all age levels, and to help untarnish the SCA's reputation for poor scholarship.

• Paying more attention to the people around us. Our events tend to be *so* large that it's rather easy for someone to get lost in the crowd. Folks tend to congregate with those they know, so someone who doesn't fall into an established group can simply slip through the cracks. (This is why I usually recommend that new folks -- especially non-borough ones - -- start with something like a guild meeting, so they can get to know a few people in a more intimate environment before their first event.)

• Having more courage of our distinctiveness. I've noticed in recent years that Carolingia has been picking up a lot of the SCA's more "generic" habits. Personally, I think one of Carolingia's greatest strengths is in thinking outside the box: coming up with ideas that are new, innovative, and often better than the established way. (And then propagating those ideas out into the wider Society.) There are some boundaries to the Society, but I think we're at our best when we're probing at them, and seeing whether there are better ways to do things.

• More cross-generational crossover. While I don't think our problems with generational stratification are anywhere near as bad as some groups', I think we still are exhibiting some signs of that. While the "middle guard" tends to know both the younger and older generations fairly well, the older members tend not to know the younger ones all that well. To some degree that's natural, but I think it's worth encouraging some generational mixing when possible, to avoid any serious stratification.

2. Space events more evenly. (I know we are working on this.)

3. More explicit appreciation of the work we do for each other.

1. The scheduling of events: We've made a deliberate effort over the past several years, and still we seem stuck with a boom-and-bust cycle. This makes it harder for us to retain new members ("Events are what it's all about; our next one is four and a half months away, and it's not a typical event") and for other groups to schedule around us (like one or two years ago when between Festival of Storytelling, Legends of Chivalry, and Falling Leaves Carolingia basically booked the month of September), and most important, makes it harder for us to put our best effort into every event and still have fun. I would get us onto a more evenly paced calendar if I could.

2. More cross-communication and interaction between groups: I am concerned by the tendency for some guilds (and other activity-based groups) to turn inward, to turn their participants into specialists. To a very real extent it's a natural consequence of factors which themselves are good things: having so very many activities going on, each being done at such a high level of proficiency. No one can do *everything*, and doing your own thing takes so much time. But it comes at a cost in community and fellowship, and if I could change the cost without losing the benefit, I would.

3. Recognition of achievement: There are more Carolingians than ever doing more cool stuff than ever, and our means of recognizing them are not keeping up. I want to find more ways of showing the barony's appreciation of the things that make us so great. See the question on the awards system for fuller development of this theme.

1. If I were Emperor, I would make everyone wear hats.

2. I would encourage Carolingians to get out more. I know that we have so many great events here than one doesn't need to travel in order to have a rich and happy civic life, but we deprive others of learning what nice people we are :).

3. I wish we had a dojo where fighters and fencers could practice (and if this was a first rate fantasy, thrown weapons and even archery). I know Vis was trying to organize something like this, but affordable real estate in central Carolingia is very hard to find.

(The Hotline... The process for the last election... etc.)

We appear far more distant and unaproachable than we are.

We are usually quite well dressed and scurrying from one group of friends to another trying to say hello to all the people we know at an event and sometimes miss the new people who we have already intimidated due to the quality of many of the local outfits, foods, activities, etc. We need to make a bit more effort to notice and welcome new and out of Barony folk.

I would like to add a bit more of visual pomp and flash to events.

More and bigger banners, well dressed courts, better disguising of more modern features of halls. We have been improving for years and we still have a way to go.