477 members eligible to vote
56 eligible members voted
Turnout 12%
Proposed change to the maximum number of directors from 22 to 12. Resolution passed with 55 for and 1 against.
11 candidates for director positions. All candidates received more than the minimum required votes (25%). Therefore all candidates are elected to the board.
The votes for individuals are as follows. A = acceptable and U = unacceptable. Not all voters cast a vote for all candidates and positions.
Mike Murphy: a – 40 u – 5
Louise Ambrose: a – 49 u – 1
Jon Cree: a – 51 u – 1
Jane Acton: a – 47 u – 0
Geoff Mason: a – 36 u – 7
Clair Hobson: a – 46 u – 1
Chris Millet: a – 42 u – 1
Chris Brunton: a – 43 u – 1
Beth Gardner: a – 42 u – 2
Aline Hill: a – 42 u – 1
Adrian Goodhand: a – 41 u – 2
The results for candidates standing for specific roles are as follows.
Chair, Jon Cree: a – 48 u – 1
Deputy Chair, Aline Hill: a – 42 u – 1
Company Secretary, Clair Hobson: a – 47 u – 1
I think trainers have a massive part to play in promotion of the FSA (I’m sure they are working hard on students even as we speak). It is a concern that a number of Forest School qualified people that I have come across since qualifying, are unaware of the FSA or not interested. Some are not using their FS level 3 qualification, particularly if they were not sponsored by a FS school (I am one). Hopefully they will find FS employment as FS grows. Some are using their FS level 3, but are happy to remain in isolation. This is not a surprise – most union members, are probably not activists or even bother to vote. Wwe might agree with the views of a given political party, but few of us become members of a party. The challenge to FSA is to make the web site a ‘must go to’ source of ideas etc. This will take time. I think one simple idea is to have an attractive and relevant picture at the top of the home page. A Forest School tip of the month (on front page) might be valuable also. My old laptop only opens the top 8 inches (imperial measures give my age away!) so I didn’t see the conference photos until I scrolled down. Even when I did a motley bunch of characters huddled under a tarp was not the best to hook me, although the fire photos looked great! (a bit of explanation would have helped). I’m a lazy browser I admit, but then so many of us are. I hope that is seen as positive feedback – keep up the good work Gareth.
Further discussion about this is taking place on the FSA website
Hello David, The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Here people did not vote in large numbers and we must consider why this was. All members were notified via email, on the website and in social media about how the vote would be conducted. So, in theory, members did not need to be frequent visitors to the FSA website to know how to vote. However, it could be that because people are not frequent visitors then logging on to the website did present a technical obstacle. Perhaps you are correct that FS people are not natural bedfellow with IT. However, all members have managed to negotiate the registration process to join the FSA on-line. By comparison the voting system was child’s play (pun intended). Log on, go to personal account area, vote. It did require having to find your password and username, go into the website and then navigate to the correct area that is true. But what was the alternative? This is an important question and one that I would be grateful for feedback on. One benefit of the on-line voting system was that it was accessible to all members, as opposed say to only allowing members who attended the AGM to vote (yes – with hindsight running a paper vote at the AGM would have meant that more people would have voted). The only other way to achieve this securely, that I could think of, was to hold a postal vote. Unfortunately there would have been a cost to this and I cannot express just how little money we are getting by on. If anyone has any ideas I should be grateful to hear them. Using doodle poll has been suggested but there are verification issues associated with this, but I will look into it again. Another issue here is that actually we really do need many more members to start frequenting the FSA website. These days most people will search for information about FS on the internet. The FSA website needs to rank highly in searches for related things like ‘forest school’ and ‘forest schools’. The only way to increase our ranking is if more people start coming to the website and other websites start linking to us. Members need to be encouraged to visit the website. I had hoped that running the vote in this way would help people get used to coming here. Of course we also need a critical mass of people coming here to use the social network and so your comment on this news item is most welcome David. I hope that soon we will have people contributing to all sorts of things such as product reviews and discussion around issues. There are a number of regioan groups being developed at the moment and I am sure that local gatherings will start happening under the FSA banner. BW, Gareth
I suspect many members (like myself) do not log on to the web site on a regular basis. This being so, many might miss out on voting. Forest Schooling and IT are not necessarily natural bedfellows (FS is, to some, about escaping the modern world – including IT!), so many members may have no interest with the web site at all and thus not vote. Others not knowing any of the candidates may take the view that “why bother voting?” It is early days yet, but we do need to improve communication with members wherever we can. Local groups like Essex bring members together on a face to face level. Hopefully more groups will develop. Hopefully a conference/workshop in the south of the country can take place soon as those of us south of London, who do not work for an employer prepared to cover the cost of travel/accomodation, can ill afford the costs associated with a Lake District venue. Well done to you guys who have kicked the FSA off and organised the conference.
Some members were not eligible to vote as I understand it for example those of us like myself who have free membership for the first year as students. Had I been able to vote I would have been happy to show my support for the FSA and the journey embarked upon.
Given the overwhelming support at the conference and the amount of comments since the conference, I think that maybe the small turnout for the election may not be indicative of the general views. I think this may well say more about us tightening up the election process and possibly people’s apathy/busyness. Lessons to learn I feel for future elections.
From little acorns oak trees grow:)
Only a VERY small proportion of members voted I see- which suggests only a very small proportion moving forward with the Association, and if this continues, only a very small representation of the Forest School community. I’m not sure that is sufficient to attempt to shape the overall direction of the Forest School community.
I look forward to working with our new board over the coming months. We’ve come so far in such a short time. Loads yet to do but I believe that we are in a good position to move forward with confidence. Our members will help shape the overall direction of travel and this weekend’s conference is helping to highlight and agree the priorities and needs for the Forest School sector as a whole. This will help the board determine our priorities and actions for the next year. Gareth #derwent2013