-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Elizabeth Stark wrote: >> On 10/3/07, *Nelson Pavlosky * <[EMAIL PROTECTED] >> <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote: >> >> Conor Schaefer wrote: >> > I didn't understand that students at foreign universities were >> > unilaterally excluded from membership. Is this true? >> >> No, that is completely false. Students are welcome to form SFFC >> chapters at their school no matter where in the world they are located. >> >> SFFC was started in the USA, and therefore most of our experience is >> with the US education system, so we may not be as helpful to >> students in >> other countries. However, if more people join from other countries then >> they can bring that foreign experience with them, and we'll get better >> at serving students worldwide. > > > We currently have chapters in Peru and Egypt (at least), and have had > inquiries from Mexico, Brazil, Philippines, Germany, and beyond.
I remember inquiries from China, Canada, South Africa, and India, as well. We've certainly had more success organizing in the U.S., but we've always been open to students in other countries. Fred Benenson wrote: > > On 10/3/07, *Christina Xu* <[EMAIL PROTECTED] > <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote: > > > The best way to help small chapters is to build an organization that > can help them effectively, which is why we wrote the bylaws. > > > I brought this up at the by-laws meeting and am willing to do so > again: many of the problems that chapters face are not necessarily > able to be fixed by Deus ex Machina. A lot of the problems involve > lack of interest on a certain campus (see below) and, sometimes, a > particular chapter head's lack of leadership ability or > organizational skills. No amount of throwing money or tickets to > conferences or even resources at them will necessarily help. > > > Totally agree -- the only thing that helps chapters is themselves. That's just wrong, in most cases. * Being able to use the name and brand FreeCulture.org, and ride its coattails, is worth something -- it brings at least some small measure of credibility. * Getting a free subdomain at freeculture.org is worth something -- it's a short, simply Web address, without having to pay for your own domain. * Being able to network and share ideas with other chapters ought to be worth something. Back when we did it more frequently, it was. * Being able to collaborate with other chapters is worth something. * Free Web space, blog hosting, wiki hosting are worth something. * A free box of swag from our partners is worth something. * If we had more resources for chapters -- how-to guides on common topics -- it would significantly reduce the barrier to entry. * If we had a mentoring network where established chapters could help newer chapters, that would be worth something. I could go on. Maybe some chapters can pull themselves up entirely from their bootstraps; kudos to them. For the rest of us, a little help goes a long way. If our mission is to spread the word to as many students as possible, we should be serious about helping people who need a little help. To address Christina's more substantive points, it's true that you can't always guarantee a chapter will succeed. But to adapt an adage, when you fail to help, you help chapters to fail. I just came back from the Universities Allied for Essential Medicines conference, and many of the attendees where starting new chapters -- it was an enormous help to them. Just because our conferences have been less-than-helpful doesn't mean they have to be, and they shouldn't be. With due respect to the significant work that's gone into organizing past conferences, we can do better. We have a lot to learn, and plenty of room for improvement. Saying that failed chapters were destined to fail is extremely counter-productive and misses the point of having an (inter)national organization at all. If we're not here to help each other succeed, why are we here? Christina Xu wrote: > Alumni are not students. People between college and grad school are > alumni, and not students. > > > If this is the case, then why was somebody who was not a student > running this organization that is focused on students? I'll leave this question to Nelson, but I presume the answer is: because nobody else was around. (I'm sure Nelson would have happily ceded to you, Christina, if you'd volunteered -- or if anyone had.) At any rate, under these bylaws we have new standards for the organization -- standards for the present and future. It's not terribly useful to try to apply them to the past. The past is the past; let's go forward. - -- Gavin Baker Students for Free Culture http://freeculture.org/ [EMAIL PROTECTED] -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.6 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFHBBRntLXQdLhFpekRAvR+AJ9qhjm9OB7lc6GuaDxh4udHWgLz7gCfWnBN nZ4PvZLbBUkZQrsrBbmVqF4= =KmHa -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
