Feel like a number

I'm not sure why I feel the need to be informative today, but you take it when you get it.

If you've ever been to a nature centre, a park, a museum, or another place like that and you've talked to an interpreter, ranger, or docent, have you ever considered that you were probably being written down somewhere afterward? It's true, especially if you were talking to someone who works for a non-profit agency. Everyone -- well, nearly everyone -- I give interpretive information to gets recorded as a stat. If I meet you on the trail and point out an interesting plant, or if I'm out on a viewing deck and tell you about the beaver lodge, or even (as happened today) if I pop into a room just to check on the animals and you ask me if your children can touch a snake, I'll be listing you as an interpretive contact. If I've actually taken out the snake, that is. If I say no because the snake's shedding (or whatever), then I'd only write you down if I found something else to talk about.

Stats are a pretty big part of the business, you see. There comes a time in almost every interpretive organisation's life when it has to prove that there's a reason for it to exist, and program revenues are only a part of the picture. We need to show that we're getting the message out (whatever the message may be), and contact stats are a major way to do that.

So should you be worried that you're just a stat to me? Should you avoid talking to interpreters or asking questions because you're just a number?

No.

Of course not.

Because the fact is, really, that you're never just a stat. Those of us who get into this business get into it for reasons other than the numbers. Some of us are passionate about the message, some of us like teaching and sharing knowledge, some of us just genuinely like people, some of us are all of the above. We don't do it for the numbers, but we need the numbers to show that we are, in the end, doing it.

It's all a bit of a pain in the ass, to be honest, but it's necessary.

It also means that if you see an interpreter wandering around the trails (we call it roving) or doing some kind of work that looks interesting, or just kind of standing around in the park apparently doing nothing, you should approach him or her. We're supposed to be talking to people. We do have information to share. We know things that we'd like to think would be interesting to you. And if you're interested, and if we can share something that might make things a little more meaningful or memorable to you in the long run, then we all win. Your visit becomes a little more special, we've enjoyed doing our jobs, and, because you've become a number, you count.

Ok, that last bit was a little forced. But you know where I was going, I hope.

Numbers matter, and there are much worse things in the world than feeling like one.