Minutes of the MassCUE general business mtg. 10-22-1988

Following Fall conference in Milford, Massachusetts

Meeting called to order by Alan November at 4:10 PM

Board members present: Alan November, Lucille Harper, Jim :Modena, Algot Runeman, Martin Huntley, Gail Ross-McBride, Laura Nash

The main topic of the meeting was elections. Alan asked the members to consider proposed bylaw changes to reorganize the structure of the governing board to make it more responsive to the organization. The main intent of the proposals is to make the board larger by electing four more members "at large" in addition to the officers currently elected.

The bylaw changes were considered carefully by the members at the meeting. There were many pointed and useful questions about the bylaw proposals. Several wording changes to the proposals were approved and the following changes were voted.

Moved to change by-law 4, section d as follows:
Current wording: 'd. Membership of Governing Board;
i. regular, life, and student members may serve
ii. duration of Governing Board membership is 2 years
iii. members are the President, Vice President, Treasurer, and Secretary.
iv. after elections, the board may appoint additional members to balance representation geographically and by educational responsibility. These appointments are made in collaboration with the Elections Committee, and give preference to candidates who were not elected.

Proposed wording:
i. regular, life, and student members may serve.
ii. duration of Governing Board membership is 2 years.
iii. elected members are the President, Vice President, Treasurer, Secretary and four members elected at large.
iv. the four officers shall be elected in alternating years to the four at large members of the Governing Board except in 1989.
v. after elections, the Board may appoint additional members to balance representation geographically and by educational responsibility. These appointments are made in collaboration with the Elections Committee, and give preference to candidates who were nominated but not elected.
vi. a majority of the Governing Board shall be elected by regular membership vote. (Suggested Wording changes included)
Passed unanimously

Moved to change by-law 4, section e as follows:
Current wording:
e. Election procedures:
i. Elections committee will prepare a slate of candidates for the offices of President, Vice President, Treasurer, and Secretary, as well as for membership on the Elections Committee.
ii. nominations from the floor will be accepted at the general business meeting.
iii. nominations from the floor must be seconded.
iv. other acceptable forms of nomination are a phone call or letter to the chairperson of the Elections Committee, which must be seconded, a petition.
v. nominations committee oversees tabulation of results
vi. in case of tie, the election will be re-run.
vii. nobody running can be involved in tabulation.
viii. elections may be held by mail, with the agreement of both the Governing Board and the Elections Committee.
ix. vacancies on Board are filled by election among Board;
x. if presidency becomes vacant, vice president assumes job

Proposed wording:
i. Elections committee will prepare a slate of candidates for the Governing Board.;
ii. president and vice president shall run as a team.;
iii. a vice presidential candidate may be teamed with more than one presidential candidate.
iv. nominations may be made by self nomination, nomination by another member, or nomination by the elections committee.
v. elections committee oversees tabulation of results.
vi. in case of tie, the election will be re-run.
vii. no candidate can be involved in tabulation.
viii. elections may be held by mail.
ix. vacancies on Board are filled by election among the Board.
x. if the presidency becomes vacant, the vice president assumes the presidency. (Wording changes suggested are included)
Passed unanimously

Move to change by-law 4, by addition of section k as follows:
Current wording: none
Proposed wording:
k. the duties of the four at large governing board members shall be determined by vote of the governing board after elections are completed.
Passed Unanimously

Move to change bylaw 8, section a as follows:
Current wording:
a. Two-thirds of the governing board constitutes a quorum.

Proposed wording:
a. A quorum of the governing board shall consist of a majority of the board and must include at least one of the following officers: President, Vice President, Treasurer, or Secretary.
Passed Unanimously

Alan discussed the elections committee procedures:
1. Collect and distribute board job descriptions.
2. Solicit for and compile slate of candidates by Dec. 15
3. Collect and publish Personal Statements from candidates.
4. Tabulate mail vote.
5. New board takes office at spring Business Meeting.

Alan made a personal statement. The board and organization need leadership. He urged the members to run for the board or serve on committees such as the elections committee. Alan stated that he would only run for office if he felt that a qualified candidate had not appeared in the slate compiled by the elections committee. Alan pointed out that the nice feature of working on an elections committee is that it has a short run responsibility and is a good job to break the leadership role ice. No other board members expressed their intentions to run or not run.

The board and general business meeting congratulate and heartily thank Mary Pavento, Peg Bondorew, Lelia Richardson and all the others who worked to make the Milford conference a success.

Martin Huntley suggested that we begin preparing for the spring Statehouse day. The team that forms should think in terms of a two year commitment, carrying the preparations forward with continuity from the prior year's event. Joanne Robinson and Lucille Harper :volunteered to jointly lead the preparations for the 1989 Statehouse day. Others who expressed an interest in helping were Charlie Schiller, John Marsula, Marylin Gardner, Jane Manzelli and John Marion.

Jim Modena suggested that there should be some symbol of office passed from the outgoing president to the next president. The idea will be pursued. Is a gavel appropriate?

Conference feedback: Comments recorded as much as possible by individual speaker with no personal identification, but each comment marked by dash. (bullets added in html for Web page version)

-Make sure there is DECAF coffee available.
-What about a Friday dinner? Requires a non-board group of volunteers of 20 or more people to prepare the conference site. There could be a keynote speaker to draw participation by those who want to begin thinking in terms of a two day conference. (Sheraton hotel at rte. 9 and Massachusetts turnpike suggested for location. It is only 5 minutes from Westfield.)
-Vendor location worked fairly well, though some felt that the vendors shut down too early. During the last session, there were few attendees at the vendor tables. The amount of income from vendors was actually down at this conference from the last one. Consider adding more vendor access time between presentations. One possibility might be to hold a post conference dinner though that might mean too much of a weekend drain on participants.
-The beginners strand of presentations had very good feedback from those who attended.
-Approximately 1/3 of the lunch count were new to a MassCUE conference.
-Consider a two-day conference next fall with the first day composed of long sessions in afternoon and evening with a dinner in between. This "long" conference would be only once a year. Consider holding such a conference in a central location like Worcester or Springfield which would allow a potential for multi-state involvement.
-Consider joint sponsorship with another organization.

a. within state like mass media specialists or
b. with another state CUE group or
c. would we "lose control" of our conference and how would we share fees, etc. Remember, too we are a teachers" group first of all and should not dilute that context of our conferences.
d. would we need to raise fees and find another kind of site if we use a two-day format with either Friday or Monday. Currently 300 people pay for conference costs. Beyond that, the income is mostly a benefit to the organization.

-Note that a hotel site might attract more people. School sites attract those who want close (local) flavor.
-SIGs may now provide some of that "local" flavor.
-Maybe conferences should no longer try to do what SIGs and our former conferences did.
-Take care not to lose teacher orientation of conference.
-Teacher produced presentations are on the decline.
-SIG meetings should provide forum for training and give encouragement for colleagues to present at conferences.
-Maybe hold two conferences a year, one school based and SIG like, the other a big regional conference.
-There have been recent breakpoints. At 100 person level, there was a sense of "loss" of closeness. This level, too, may seem to be a maximum.
-MassCUE conferences should be, in part, a ramp to build teacher abilities to develop professional level of performance before others in either/or both written form or conference presentation.
-We have gone past just helping teachers to learn for the sake of their own classes. We may now teach teachers how to better teach, but also help them learn how to present (SIG level activity).
-We are working on our organizational "mission statement".
-We should encourage SIGs to do a special interest conference within our conference.
-Change program design to have several strands of workshops each gathered by a separate person rather than having only one program development person.
-Offer a new type of workshop, full day, Friday evening before, all day Friday before.
-Remember that a conference should be a special day, not just part of the "after school routine"
-Full day workshops need to be handled carefully, avoid showcasing, real learning. 1 on 1, hands on, separate day from multi-session day of conference.
-Full day workshops need not be part of a conference "weekend". We could consider paying a school to have us on a weekday.

Alan thanked all the members who attended the general business meeting and we adjourned at 5:47 PM.