Mensa \| USA \| Region 10 \| RVC Column

American Mensa Region 10

RVC Column

June 2023

I am writing this column before the May 20, 2023 meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC), but it will not make it into Local Group newsletters until after the meeting has occurred. The best I can offer is the agenda.

Beyond the announcement that the site of the 2026 Annual Gathering will be the Omni Fort Worth Hotel, we needed to start with the unfinished business of the vote to remove the National Ombudsman. This is a moot point because the National Ombudsman resigned and the election for a new National Ombudsman is underway, but as a technical matter the original motion must be resolved, hence its inclusion here.

The next order of business will be held in Executive (closed) Session in order to discuss the AMC appointees for next year. This must be done at this meeting in order to invite the approved members to the AMC meeting in July at the Annual Gathering. Although we've heard some complaints that Executive Sessions have been overused, it would be unfair (not to mention legally questionable) to discuss the applicants' qualifications in open session, and out of respect for those members who might not want it known that they had applied and been passed over, we will not be providing that information, just as we did not release the names of all the applicants for the Second Vice Chair position when we filled it at the December 2022 meeting.

The last formal motion on the agenda is a housekeeping motion regarding the timing of updates of AMC Job Descriptions. The ASIEs specified that the job descriptions be reviewed every two years, which aligned with the terms of office for those roles. But since the terms were increased from two to three years in the last bylaws referendum, this needed to be updated as well (or it needed to be decided to leave it every two years -- I don't know what the decision will be yet).

To end the meeting there will be a discussion/presentation by Executive Director Trevor Mitchell and AMC Chair Lori Norris on potential changes to our governance structure. This was alluded to in the last meeting, and this is where we'll start working on it in earnest. This is not a new discussion, and in fact a consulting team had been hired in 2007-2008 to review our governance structure. A Governance Task Force was then established to review the information received and offer recommendations for future action, and a 53-page report was submitted in November 2010 (which can be found in the reports from that meeting at the link below). But at that point all momentum stopped, and very little action came from it.

Now once again there are suggestions coming from various directions: Should we have fewer or more members on the AMC? Should all AMC members be elected nationally? Are Regions and Local Groups obsolete? And so forth. But none of these suggestions are coming with analysis, and since we already have data to work with, we should probably start from there, with updates to take into account technology and cultural changes in the intervening 13 years.

Although minutes will not be posted yet, the recording of the meeting should be, along with mini-minutes. You can check it out at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/.

Until next month (or until I see you online),

Thomas George Thomas
Email: RVC10@us.mensa.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thomas.g.thomas
Mensa Connect https://connect.us.mensa.org/communities/local-groups/region-10
Region 10 Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/

May 2023

As noted in my previous column, the American Mensa Committee (AMC) passed a motion to remove the National Ombudsman at our March 2023 meeting, in the first of two votes required in order for the motion to take effect. On March 31, 2023, R. Edward Lomas resigned as National Ombudsman, rendering a second vote moot. An election for a new National Ombudsman will be held starting in May and ending in June. Per our current Bylaws, only Local Group Ombudsmen are eligible to run, and only current Local Group Ombudsmen may vote for the National Ombudsman. Candidates have until May 6 to submit their information to the Election Committee. Additional information is available at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/elections/2023-ombudsman-election-portal/.

In earlier columns I had mentioned motions that I was putting forth to modify some of these procedures, but they won't be applicable for this election. At present, Regional Ombudsmen are not eligible to run for or vote for National Ombudsman, which is unfortunate as there are some fine members serving in those roles. And the National Ombudsman, once elected, may not run in the succeeding election, because they are not eligible according to the current bylaws. The motions are currently pending further review to ensure there are no unintended consequences, so that we can achieve the two-thirds vote of the AMC that a Bylaws referendum requires. I hope we can have those ready to present to the membership for a vote during the 2024 election cycle.

Four of the positions on the AMC are appointed at the meeting held at the Annual Gathering each July. One of those -- the Director of Science and Education -- is nominated by the Mensa Foundation. This year, in a change from prior practice, the other three positions have been opened up to member applications through the Volunteer Marketplace (https://connect.us.mensa.org/volunteeropportunities). Those positions are National Communications Officer, National Marketing Officer, and National Membership Officer. This is not meant to imply dissatisfaction with the current volunteers holding these positions, but since the roles call on specialized skills, we want to make certain any interested candidates with outstanding credentials are considered, and that they can let the Chair know their availability and willingness to take on the role. Applications close on April 30, but I did not know about this process in time for my previous column. I've posted more information on the Region 10 Members Community on Mensa Connect.

Speaking of the Region 10 Members Community, all members of this Region are automatically added to the Community, but you may not see messages -- such as the announcement of volunteer opportunities or events that may be happening near you -- if you are not set up to receive emails. If you wish to receive these messages in a timely fashion, please log in at https://connect.us.mensa.org/communities/local-groups/region-10, select the Region 10 Members Community link, and click the green Settings button next to the Community name. You can set your email preferences to Real Time, Daily Digest, or No Email. Even if you choose No Email, you can always log in to this community to see the discussions, but then you might miss time-sensitive announcements.

For those concerned about receiving too many messages, non-Mensa related discussions have been moved to a Subcommunity which may also be joined by clicking the Subcommunities link at the site above. Since the Region 10 General Discussion is opt-in, members are not automatically added -- they will only see these messages if they are interested. This helps to focus the topics in the main Community to relevant topics.

Until next month (or until I see you online),

April 2023

The latest meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) was held on Saturday, March 11, 2023 at the National Office in Hurst, TX. Every year in March, the AMC has to approve a budget for the coming year, so that was the second order of business after the appointment of the Auditor, which we do every three years. The budget is too detailed to go into in a short column, but American Mensa Treasurer Taz Criss hosted a half-hour webinar on the topic which can be viewed at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/amc-webinars/2023-24-amc-budget-webinar/ . We also voted to increase the fee to review Prior Evidence to $49. In the final motion, the AMC voted to remove the National Ombudsman from office due to repeated violation of confidentiality of Executive Session meetings. Because it involves confidential matters, the details about the violations cannot be discussed, which can be frustrating. Per the American Mensa Bylaws, this motion must be passed at two separate regular meetings of the AMC, so we will be voting on this again. If it passes, a new election will be held for a replacement.

There were also four presentations at this meeting. One was "Education by the Treasurer", which is a regular presentation at our meetings, and which can be heard on the recording to be posted at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/. Another provided preliminary results of the February Membership Survey, with a full presentation to come at the July meeting at the Annual Gathering, after all the data has been analyzed.

A third presentation involved the International Board of Directors (IBD). Because Mensa International Ltd (MIL) is comprised of 40 full national member countries, the IBD Meeting moves around the world each year. This year in October American Mensa will host the IBD meeting in Texas, the first U.S. meeting since 2006 in Orlando. More information will come later, but this will be an easier opportunity for those interested to see the IBD in person.

The fourth presentation was about future potential governance changes. Periodically questions are raised about the structure of the organization: Do we have too many officers? Too few? Is the Local Group/Region structure appropriate? Are the groups distributed properly? Should they be divided demographically as well as, or instead of, geographically? There are lots of questions, and no consensus on the answers to any of them. As it happens, this topic has come up before, and in 2007 a Planning Committee was formed to handle some of these questions. A consulting firm was hired that produced an analysis for American Mensa, a Governance Task Force created a report in November 2010, a Blue Print task force was created to create an implementation plan, and a Strategic Plan was created to address actions going forward. But then entropy set in, and the original purpose of the Strategic Plan was forgotten, since the AMC was almost fully reconstituted with new members (and a new Executive Director) by the time the review of the Strategic Plan came up again in 2016 and 2021. Now we've been asked to think about next steps. At this point, I want to review all the prior documentation before starting from scratch -- and as usual with a group this size, others have different opinions. More to come later.

The next regular meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) will be held virtually on Saturday, May 20, 2023.

Finally, a reminder: National Volunteer Week is April 16-22, 2023. Some local groups had problems entering their events online, and the email links were broken, but those issues have been addressed. To see current events (such as Feeding Tampa Bay) and past events (such as Boynton and Delray Beach Cleanup), or to submit your own, please visit https://www.us.mensa.org/volunteer/community-service/. Make sure your local group gets credit for any community service you provide!

Until next month (or until I see you online),

March 2023

The next meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) will be held at the National Office in Hurst, TX on Saturday, March 11, 2023. The agenda has not been finalized at this writing, but will be available by clicking the dropdown item "2023-03-11 -- Hurst, TX" at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ by the time the March newsletters go out.

National Volunteer Week is April 16-22, 2023, and many Local Groups have already begun putting together projects for Mensa Cares. Mensa Cares is the name of the Community Services initiative for American Mensa, established in 1997 for the purpose of community welfare and generating positive images of and for Mensa through Community Service.

In our Membership Surveys, Community Service is consistently near the top of activities our members say they want available. Last year Palm Beach Area Mensa filled all their volunteer spaces for their Beach Cleanup event, and this year Tampa Bay Mensa has filled all their available spaces for the Feeding Tampa Bay project. Other groups have already started setting up projects, so contact your Local Secretary/President for information on any projects your Local Group is participating in, or if you want to head one up yourself.

Another aspect of volunteering is at the Local Group level, and American Mensa is facing the same sorts of challenges as all social organizations across the country regarding decreased participation. Without volunteers to run local groups, they eventually risk failure. When I started as Region 10 Vice Chair, there were 134 Local Groups in American Mensa. Today there are 124, with two groups in other Regions in the process of merging into other groups due to lack of volunteers. Up to now, Florida has been spared this reduction, but in the last couple of months Space Coast Area Mensa was unable to find anybody to run for their board, and the two remaining board members of SouthWest by South Florida Mensa announced in their newsletter that they've begun the process to consolidate into one of the neighboring chapters.

There aren't any easy solutions, though some groups

continue to thrive because their members are hosting more events. But in a social organization such as Mensa, that's the key -- members hosting events. The boards of the groups are there to support members in creating activities, but cannot be solely responsible for filling the calendars. The health of a group can't be taken for granted; it takes a continuous flow of new energy from members to keep it going. If the same people run a group for too long, they burn out, and so does the group.

If you're interested in the health of your local chapter, reach out to the leaders in your group and find out what you can do to help out. They'll be happy to hear from you, even if it's just for encouragement.

Until next month (or until I see you online),

February 2023

In my previous column, I mentioned that the next meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) would be in January or February, but schedules among the AMC members didn't align, so the Spring meeting will be held at the National Office in Hurst, TX on Saturday, March 11, 2023. The Late Spring meeting will be held remotely on Saturday, May 20, and the Summer meeting will be held at the Annual Gathering in Baltimore on Thursday, July 6. Details on all of these meetings will be posted in advance under their respective dropdowns at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/

In my December column, I mentioned that there would be a change coming to the Region 10 Members Community on Mensa Connect. All members of Region 10 (Florida) are automatically enrolled in this Community, with a choice on how to see messages (Real Time, Digest, or Online (No Mail)). Some members were using it for open discussion, yet while some of these discussions were interesting, they drove other members to turn off all notices from this Community to avoid unsolicited email. The result was that members were missing information directly related to Mensa events, such as local group Zoom meetings or the Regional Gathering in Central Florida.

A new Subcommunity called Region 10 General Discussion has been created to accommodate those who want to have open discussions. This is an opt-in Subcommunity, which means members will have to request to join. Members of Region 10 will automatically be accepted upon request. To join this list, please visit https://connect.us.mensa.org/communities/local-groups/region-10 and click Region 10 Members Community, then click the Subcommunities tab on the far right. There will be a link to Region 10 General Discussion that you can select. Alternatively, you can log in to https://connect.us.mensa.org/home and type General Discussion in the search box, which will provide links to General Discussion (all American Mensa members have access to this community) and Region 10 General Discussion (open only to Florida members).

Now that this Subcommunity has launched, topics in the Region 10 Members Community will be limited to Mensa matters only. It will continue to be open automatically to all Florida members, but no off-topic discussions

In prior odd-numbered years, this is the time when the American Mensa election season would be kicking off. But in 2019, a Bylaws referendum was passed to change the term length from two years to three, and the election won't be happening until 2024.

I don't expect to be running for RVC again next year, since I'm in my fifth term and that's the longest anyone has ever served as RVC in American Mensa. It's important to have leadership volunteers preparing for the next cycle so you don't wind up having me appointed again. Ideally, there would be a nominating committee to seek qualified candidates, but another Bylaws referendum in 2015 removed the Nominating Committee, so candidates are self-selecting. From both personal experience and observation, most newly-elected members of the AMC are unprepared for the difference in process from serving at the national level as opposed to the local level, and an RVC is not a "Super-LocSec", as one person thought it was. It has, however, been a gratifying experience to serve in the role, and I recommend it for anyone who is willing to put forth the commitment.

I would suggest that anyone interested in serving at the national level get their feet wet by checking the Volunteer Marketplace (https://www.us.mensa.org/volunteer/volunteer-marketplace/) to see if there are any positions that interest you. At this writing, there are six positions available on the National Membership Committee, and other positions open up throughout the year, especially in July. Additionally, I will be posting information on various roles on the Region 10 Members Community to give people a better sense of what is going on, so make sure you're set up to get those messages.

Until next month (or until I see you online),

January 2023

The most recent meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) was held on Saturday, December 3, 2022 at the Grand Hyatt in Denver, CO, in conjunction with Denver Mensa's holiday party. Several housekeeping items were addressed, including approval of the September 2022 AMC minutes and various officer appointments (Taz Criss as Meeting Chair for the 2023 International Board of Directors (IBD) meeting, Angie Christie joining the Name and Logo Committee, and Beth Anne Demeter as 2024 Annual Gathering Chair). There were also three appointments made in Executive Session, which were not announced during the meeting until all the candidates for the positions could be notified. Those appointments were Baker Ring (former RVC 5) as Second Vice Chair, Lora Mitchell as Risk Management Chair, and Thomas G. Thomas (hey, that's me!) as Community Service Committee Chair.

There were six motions in regular business, four of which addressed potential referenda for the 2024 election cycle. The simple ones were to remove the Gifted Youth Committee Chair from the list of Professional Appointments (which passed), and to prevent Regional Ombuds from being forced to review their own decisions (which was rejected). I went into detail on the first of these in last month's column, but the Regional Ombud motion was new.

As for the Referenda items, these once again involved the Bylaws proposals for the Ombud positions. Unfortunately, there were reasonable changes requested to the wording on these, but because Article XII, section 2(d) of our bylaws states that the referendum must be included "in the written agenda circulated prior to the meeting", no changes could be allowed during the meeting. Therefore the motion to give Regional Ombuds a vote for the National Ombud was withdrawn in order to change "Ombudsperson" to "Ombudsman" for consistency with the existing Bylaws, and the motion to deal with a potential vacancy in the role of the Ombud was withdrawn in order to specify the number of days between the declaration of a vacancy and the election of a new Ombud (it was "MMM days" in the motion with the expectation that we could set that during our discussion, not realizing we had to have it in place before the agenda went out). A third Ombud motion to amend the previously passed referendum to change the term of office for the Ombud was withdrawn until we could submit another motion to withdraw the previous referendum (we couldn't amend the previous motion -- see Article XII (2d) again -- which means two competing referenda which mostly say the same thing would be competing on the ballot).

A fourth referendum was proposed to prevent the National Ombud from being forced to review their own decisions, which was similar to the Regional Ombud motion, and which was also rejected. There were two major issues with these proposals. First, they required that an Ombud would not be permitted to serve in multiple levels (the National Ombud could not be a Local Group Ombud or a Regional Ombud, and a Regional Ombud could not also be a Local Group Ombud), because this means that potentially a Local Group Ombud could issue an opinion, and if escalated to the Regional Ombud, they would be reviewing their own opinion. But since an ethical Ombud could recuse themselves and refer the matter to a different Ombud, this shouldn't require a Bylaws change. Second, without saying so, it set a term limit for the National Ombud to a single term, since at present our Bylaws state that the National Ombud is elected by the Local Group Ombuds "from among their number". If the National Ombud is not also a Local Group Ombud, they would not be allowed to stand for re-election.

These motions did raise a different issue, which we didn't resolve at this session. While an Ombud is not required to review their own opinion, there's also nothing that requires them to recuse themselves in the event of a conflict. We would expect that an Ombud, whose job description states they are supposed to be impartial, would do so without it being required, but there are unexpected instances where someone behaves unethically. We did not address requiring an Ombud to recuse themselves, though this may come up in a future meeting.

The mini-minutes and six presentations from the meeting (including Executive Director, Annual Gathering 2023, Marketing, Volunteerism, Treasurer/Finance Committee, and Strategic Planning) have been posted at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ under the dropdown "2022-12-03 -- Denver, CO". The next meeting of the AMC will be in late January or early February 2023, although the exact date has not yet been set. Once it is, the agenda will be posted at the link above.

Until next month (or until I see you online),

Inquiries: Dan Tobias, Webmaster - webmaster@palmbeach.us.mensa.org

These pages and all content Copyright 2005-2023 by American Mensa, Ltd., all rights reserved. Mensa® and the Mensa logo (as depicted for example in U.S. TM Reg. No. 1,405,381) are registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office by American Mensa, Ltd., and are registered in other countries by Mensa International Limited and/or affiliated national Mensa organizations. Mensa does not hold any opinion or have, or express, any political or religious views.