Minutes of the board of Directors
28th June 2006, Tartu, Estonia

Present: Ligia Ribeiro (Chair), Bas Cordewener, Jean-Francois Desnos, Yves Epelboin, Markku Kuula, Viljan Mahnic, Martin Price, Andrew Rothery and Kristel Sarlin.

Apologies: Andres Salu, Ivan Vrana

New members joined since 24 March 2006.

The following were formally admitted to EUNIS membership by the Board:

 

Letterkenny Institute of Technology (Ireland)

Universitat Jaume I de Castellon (Spain)

Universidad Politecnica de Valencia (Spain)

Framework Solutions  – Corporate member

 

Total: Full – 84; Corresponding – 3; Corporate – 11

Elections
a. to Council from General Assembly

Potentially there will be ballots for the institutions ‘chambers’ in Netherlands (16 members), Norway (4) and Spain (3). It is understood colleagues from the Netherlands have already elected their representative on Council. In both Bulgaria and Sweden there are 2 institutional members, so they will be invited to choose their respective representatives if they are present. There is 1 member only in each of the following national body ‘chambers’ :- Norway, Spain, Sweden: and the following institutions ‘chambers’ :- Georgia, Germany, Lithuania, Serbia. In each of these cases the representatives will be automatically elected to Council if they attend the GA meeting.

 

b. to Board from Council

There are 3 three-year positions to replace Jean-Francois Desnos, Ligia Ribeiro and Andrew Rothery. Jean-Francois Desnos and Andrew Rothery are elected members of Council and eligible to stand for re-election to the Board.

Ligia Ribeiro felt it was important for Board members to be elected according to the Statutes and as she is not an elected member of Council she would not be eligible to stand for election to the Board. She also felt it would be good for EUNIS for there to be new members of the Board. Despite standing down from the Board, Ligia intended to continue to be actively involved in EUNIS. The Board reluctantly accepted Ligia’s decision.

There will also be 1 one-year position on the Board to replace the late Jens Dørup until 2007.

Finance

The Board approved the Treasurer’s Statement of Accounts for 2005-6. This would be forwarded for ratification by the General Assembly.

The Board approved the proposed Budget for 2006-7

The Board agreed to recommend to the General Assembly that the annual fee for Full and Corresponding Members should be increased from €150 to €200, and the fee for Corporate Members should be set at €1000, both with effect from 1 September 2006. There would be an appropriate increase in discounts for members at EUNIS events.

Proposed “Jens Dørup Elite Award for E-Learning”

The Board agreed that a new Award for E-Learning, named in his memory, would be fitting way to commemorate the immense contribution of Jens to EUNIS activities. The first competition will be held in 2007. As far as possible the terms of the Award would reflect the views of Jens on how E-Learning should develop. Therefore we should be looking for simple, open solutions, and it would not be appropriate to invite sponsorship from any of the large corporate players in the field of E-Learning.

EUNIS Elite Award for Excellence

There were 7 entries for the Elite Award for Excellence in 2006 and the judges felt a worthy project had won the Award. The winner will be announced at the final session of EUNIS2006. At the last minute SAP had kindly agreed to sponsor the prize of €2000. In the course of judging the Award the panel raised the question of the eligibility of one of the entries because it was a commercial software product developed for the higher education market in collaboration with a university. The Board agreed that the rules of the Award should be changed in future to make it clear that such a project would not be eligible to compete.

EUNIS2007

The Board confirmed that EUNIS2007 will be hosted by Jean-Francois Desnos in Grenoble, France from 26 to 28 June 2007

Proposal for EUNIS Task Forces

The Board approved a proposal by Ligia Ribeiro, Andrew Rothery and Martin Price that EUNIS should create a small number of Task Forces of active volunteers within the organisation working on topical issues of interest to our community. Each Task Force will agree brief terms of reference with Board and be responsible to the Board, but will be run with the minimum of bureaucracy. The leader of each Task Force will be appointed by the Board. Task Forces will hold meetings during the EUNIS Annual Conference and in addition they will hold one other meeting during the year with meeting costs met by EUNIS. The rules for Task Forces will be posted on the EUNIS web site.

The Board agreed the existing E-Learning Task Force will be the first EUNIS Task Force, led by Andrew Rothery.

EUNIS Task Force on ICT support for the Bologna Process

The Board agreed that a second EUNIS Task Force would be set up to focus on ICT support for the Bologna Process. It was hoped Pierre Ageron would agree to lead this Task Force, with support from Ligia Ribeiro. An informal meeting of interested parties will be arranged during the conference in Tartu.

 

Martin Price , EUNIS Executive Secretary 23.9.2006