Yet more about the Pagan Campus Organization. (For the stuff about what's already over, it's just hard to get over some of this stuff, you know? I just gotta get it out somewhere
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non studentsichijoji_chanNovember 29 2007, 18:55:10 UTC
Look, I went through all this with Sean in anime club. This was all before you. Sean wanted to eliminate anyone from the club who would vote against him. One guy, Scott Charlton, was going to School in the U Maine system, but at another campus...Tomaston or something like that. Anyway, no one had ever had a problem with Scott voting, in fact, since he had First Class and all the other trappings of a student, what with being a student and all, no one even thought there were rules blocking him from voting. Anyway, it all got hidiously complicated, and I learned a lot: In U Maine's OWN rules, non-students CANNOT vote in elections for officers or on things like the charter. This includes graduate students, even. They can vote, if the club wants to let them, on things like "What day shall we have the party?" and such. Scott Charlton was in such a grey area, not even the people in charge of this stuff seemed to know where he qualified. Eventually, I contacted someone, I forget her name, who said he could vote in elections if our charter said he could vote. We were re-writing the charter at the time. (Sean had forced us...he wanted more rules. John, the president at the time, wanted to rewrite it as well, to try to add a way to get rid of disruptive members (read:Sean) ) anyway, people were confused and mostly just wanted the politics over with so voted that only students going to the Orono campus could vote in elections...there were more qualifactions added to our charter, to make sure nothing really crazy happened, but my point is, yes, the university does have a rule that non-students can't vote in elections or do certain official type things...they can go to meetings, showings, parties, and such, that's about it. There's also some technical funding stuff having to do with how many undergraduate students you need to get money for things...it's complicated.
Re: non studentscatgirlpinkNovember 29 2007, 20:02:20 UTC
Actually, it wasn't very complicated at all. It was rather quite simple.
The people from Student Government and Student Orgs came to our meeting, and told us directly that the University's policy was that, if the "recognized voters", meaning, the undergrads whose names were put on our last Club Update Form, voted to allow the non-student members to vote in the elections, then they could.
So they did. And then in two weeks we voted. And then we were done.
It only took us about 5 minutes to vote for new officers. I'd say we had a total of 10 minutes worth of voting and politics that needed to be taken care of. The shame is that Michelle made it take three weeks, when it should have been done so much sooner. She kept bringing in Student Government people, and insisting that we talked every detail to death. We were pretty much just re-hashing the same shit over and over and over.
I had told Alora and Emily, the week before the election, that since we'd already covered the election the meeting before, that I thought we'd talk about it for maybe 5 minutes and then have a regular, possibly even fun meeting that week. But surprise, Michelle had dragged in Gustavo Burkett, and made us talk about the same election stuff again for another hour and a half. We didn't need that. I apologized to Emily for thinking that the meeting would be something it should have been, since she had to sit through all that.
It was ridiculous. We knew what the issues were. Two, very simple votes. And no amount of their scare tactics to make everyone think the issues were really about some bizarre conspiracy theory that would somehow miraculously hurt PaCO in the future was going to change that. We knew the simple issues, and we voted, and the voting was over quickly. There was no reason to be forced to wait it out for three weeks while PaCO suffered because of it.
I don't know why she dragged it out so badly. Maybe she thought that if she did that, the people she didn't like would give up and go away. Luckily, we have some great new members who wouldn't be scared away. They stuck with the group to see it free of this bullshit so it can be what it's meant to be, and people can enjoy it again.
Re: non studentszeussimeoniDecember 5 2007, 19:33:41 UTC
Fear. She dragged it out because of fear. She did a lot of things out of fear, and a lot of those things had some pretty bad side effects. But Michelle isn't exactly good on her feet, and when she got nervous she panicked and... well, kind of burried herself further, quite honestly.
Anyway, it all got hidiously complicated, and I learned a lot:
In U Maine's OWN rules, non-students CANNOT vote in elections for officers or on things like the charter. This includes graduate students, even. They can vote, if the club wants to let them, on things like "What day shall we have the party?" and such.
Scott Charlton was in such a grey area, not even the people in charge of this stuff seemed to know where he qualified. Eventually, I contacted someone, I forget her name, who said he could vote in elections if our charter said he could vote. We were re-writing the charter at the time. (Sean had forced us...he wanted more rules. John, the president at the time, wanted to rewrite it as well, to try to add a way to get rid of disruptive members (read:Sean) ) anyway, people were confused and mostly just wanted the politics over with so voted that only students going to the Orono campus could vote in elections...there were more qualifactions added to our charter, to make sure nothing really crazy happened, but my point is, yes, the university does have a rule that non-students can't vote in elections or do certain official type things...they can go to meetings, showings, parties, and such, that's about it. There's also some technical funding stuff having to do with how many undergraduate students you need to get money for things...it's complicated.
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The people from Student Government and Student Orgs came to our meeting, and told us directly that the University's policy was that, if the "recognized voters", meaning, the undergrads whose names were put on our last Club Update Form, voted to allow the non-student members to vote in the elections, then they could.
So they did. And then in two weeks we voted. And then we were done.
It only took us about 5 minutes to vote for new officers. I'd say we had a total of 10 minutes worth of voting and politics that needed to be taken care of. The shame is that Michelle made it take three weeks, when it should have been done so much sooner. She kept bringing in Student Government people, and insisting that we talked every detail to death. We were pretty much just re-hashing the same shit over and over and over.
I had told Alora and Emily, the week before the election, that since we'd already covered the election the meeting before, that I thought we'd talk about it for maybe 5 minutes and then have a regular, possibly even fun meeting that week. But surprise, Michelle had dragged in Gustavo Burkett, and made us talk about the same election stuff again for another hour and a half. We didn't need that. I apologized to Emily for thinking that the meeting would be something it should have been, since she had to sit through all that.
It was ridiculous. We knew what the issues were. Two, very simple votes. And no amount of their scare tactics to make everyone think the issues were really about some bizarre conspiracy theory that would somehow miraculously hurt PaCO in the future was going to change that. We knew the simple issues, and we voted, and the voting was over quickly. There was no reason to be forced to wait it out for three weeks while PaCO suffered because of it.
I don't know why she dragged it out so badly. Maybe she thought that if she did that, the people she didn't like would give up and go away. Luckily, we have some great new members who wouldn't be scared away. They stuck with the group to see it free of this bullshit so it can be what it's meant to be, and people can enjoy it again.
Reply
Zeus - god of funerals
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