Dear policy colleagues,
The ACUPA Board of Directors (Board) is excited to update you on its recent progress: drafting of the ACUPA Bylaws! The Bylaws provide the rules and framework that will govern ACUPA’s management of our association. Key components of the attached document include membership structure, meetings, the ACUPA Board of directors’ and officers’ roles, as well as committees and indemnification, to name a few of the parameters addressed. The six of us began the work, with assistance from Bob Schur of Colorado State University, about four months ago. We had a rough draft in hand when we met in Austin in July. The first major draft came together after two intense days of discussion (with very little fist thumping or gnashing of teeth!) We passed the draft by members of the Newsletter Committee, the 2014 ACUPA Conference Committee, and the Organizing Committee. Thanks to their sharp eyes and great ideas, the document is better than it was before. *Requesting your assistance!* Now we are coming to all of you to help to put the final touches on this document. We would appreciate it if you reserved some time before September 19th to review the Bylaws and respond to the following: 1) Is the content logically organized? 2) Is the information clear? 3) Are there are critical sections that are missing from this version? The Board will gather your feedback and meet to discuss the recommendations, and make revisions as needed. We will provide the final adopted Bylaws at or before the ACUPA conference in Orlando in October. *Key Components* We thought it might be helpful to provide some background around particular sections of the Bylaws. *Membership Eligibility and Rights* Policies exist everywhere: universities, colleges, corporations, and government. While tackling this section, we discussed how open this organization might be to individuals outside of colleges and universities. All of us have been contacted by large companies or other agencies seeking assistance in setting up, maintaining, or just reorganizing their policy function. After much discussion, we opted for having five types of members, and determined the voting rights and annual fee for each member type. Only individuals in higher education, other education, and governmental entities would be eligible to vote on matters specified within the Bylaws. While students and other members, such as corporations, may be granted membership, thereby entitling them to ACUPA resources and conferences, they would not drive decisions through voting nor be eligible to hold director positions. We also agreed that using the ACUPA list for solicitation purposes would be prohibited. *Annual Dues* You may recall that a survey was sent out last fall, after our ACUPA 2013 conference in Chicago, to all ACUPA members, seeking support for ACUPA becoming an official, incorporated organization, and preferences for annual dues associated with membership. One hundred fifty dollars, the amount now specified in the Bylaws, for every member type except student, comes as a result of that survey. At survey time, there was also discussion about offering an institutional membership rate, granting membership to more than on individual from an institution. Our draft does not provide for an institutional membership, because: · Voting rights are granted to individual members, not an organization · The individual membership rate is low enough that registering two people individually is still less expensive than the proposed institutional rate · A small percentage of current institutions have more than two people registered in ACUPA Individuals who do register for ACUPA may, as they are able to now, submit questions through the e-list to aid units throughout their institution and to then share responses. *Timing* The “when to do it” discussion came into play as we were discussing the annual election of directors and the collection of dues. It was determined that it would work best to conduct these two activities at different points of the year. Dues will be collected by December 31 of each year. New directors will be nominated and elected each spring, with the start of their terms beginning July 1 of that year. *Board of Directors* The Bylaws provide for a board comprised of 11 members, with two-year appointments. Each year, one half of the board positions will be up for election, so that both senior and junior board members will be in place at any given time. Currently, there are six directors who are serving as the founding Board of Directors. Five more directors will be nominated and selected this spring (2015) by eligible voting members, which will round out the first full Board. The original six directors will end their terms on June 30, 2016 in order to ensure continuity as we move into an established structure and election calendar. *************************** Thank you for your continuing involvement in ACUPA! Joshua Adams, Cornell Univ. Candice Fischbach, Univ. of Texas, Austin T Michael Ford, Indiana Univ. Heather Foster, Univ. of Texas, San Antonio Michele Gross, Univ. of Minnesota Donna Meeks, Old Dominion Univ. -- Michele Gross, Director University Policy Program University of Minnesota 356-1 McNamara, 200 Oak street Minneapolis, MN 55454 612-624-8081 http://policy.umn.edu/
ACUPA Bylaws-22_TO_FULL_GROUP.docx
Description: MS-Word 2007 document
