[Evergreen-governance-l] FW: Be sure to do this

[Galen Charlton]

Hi,

On Sep 1, 2010, at 3:40 PM, Watson, Sylvia wrote:
> Also, what if someone was on the conference planning committee for one year, and was very active.  They would then be awarded membership based on that, even if they never do anything again.  Now that I think about it, we could have this issue with some of the other criteria as well.  I wonder if membership should be periodically evaluated to ensure 2,3,5 years down the road, the member is still contributing???  Is the thought that once a member stops contributing, they will stop participating in voting and committees, on boards, etc?  Does contributing once earn lifetime membership? 

This is a good point.  The language from Sugar Labs that we've based the eligibility criteria on mentioned by significant and *sustained* contributions.  If, for whatever reason, somebody wanders away to do something else, I don't think there should be an expectation of lifetime membership.  The Sugar Labs model has a membership committee evaluating the members list for currency every year; to adapt it to our needs, I would propose that the Nominating and Membership Development community be tasked with checking the membership rules every two years and submitting a list of inactive members, who will be dropped unless a member on the list appeals.

I would say, though, that somebody who is actively serving on committees but who isn't engaging in other forms of contribution is still contributing - we all know that for the most part, committee work is often a thankless task, so hanging on to people willing to do it is a good thing.

Regards,

Galen
--
Galen Charlton
VP, Data Services
Equinox Software, Inc. / Your Library's Guide to Open Source
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