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American Mensa Region 10

RVC Columns: 2022

December 2022

The next meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) will be held on Saturday, December 3, 2022 in Denver, CO. The agenda has not been finalized at the time this column is being written, but is scheduled to be posted at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ under the dropdown "2022-12-03 -- Denver, CO" after November 18 -- two weeks prior to the meeting.

I confess to some frustration about the timing of the agendas. Looking at my prior columns, I have not been able to provide an accurate agenda prior to a meeting since December 2018, because the lead time necessary for the newsletters is longer than the lead time provided for the meetings. I can at least say what I think we will be discussing, though, because I made some motions this time around.

Due to the resignation of past Chair Timmy King, there are some shifts in responsibility for other members of the AMC, which must be approved at the meeting. Roles that new Chair Lori Norris held must now be filled by another AMC member, especially when those committees require one or more voting members. Those assignments will probably be made via the Consent Agenda towards the top of the meeting.

I've presented a motion to remove the requirement that the Chair of the Gifted Youth Committee be included among the "Professional Appointments" of the AMC. At the time the list was created in 2007, all of these positions were held by members with professional degrees, either in law (for the Counsel positions) or doctorates in their fields (Research Review, Risk Management, and Gifted Youth). However, in the case of Gifted Youth, the last Chair with a doctorate left in 2008, and none since then have had any defined professional credentials. Rather than have a rule we're not following, and for which no rationale was given at the time the rule was created, I'm proposing we remove the rule. We currently have a professional consultant advising on Gifted Youth matters, and the Chair has been working in a management capacity over the committee, which doesn't require an advanced degree in whichever field wasn't stated in 2007.

Now that the Bylaws Committee has had a chance to review them, I'm also bringing back two of the proposed referenda for the Ombud that had originally been proposed for the July meeting and withdrawn at the September meeting: giving Regional Ombuds a vote for the National Ombud, and how to address a vacancy or recusal in the National Ombud role. I also brought back a slight revision of the referendum that was approved at the July meeting (changing the term length of the ombud from six years to three) which removes a potential conflict with one of the other referenda.

These are the only items I can speak to at this time, since the rest of the agenda is still being reviewed.

There has been encouraging use of the Region 10 Member Community on Mensa Connect by some of our members, which have resulted in some interesting discussion topics. But because it is a new platform, modifications are coming which will probably annoy some early adopters.

At this time, every member in the Region is automatically subscribed to the Region 10 Member Community. This makes it an effective platform to let every member know about Mensa matters throughout the Region and beyond. However, when the other discussions are going on, many of our members tune out (I've already had one person state that they send all messages to their junk folder). In order to address this, the general discussions will be moved to a new Region 10 subcommunity that every member of Region 10 may join by request, but no one will be unwittingly subscribed to those discussions without their knowledge.

I hope this makes the platform more useful for Mensa matters such as announcements of events, while still providing an outlet for other discussion -- just not in the same space.

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/

November 2022

The quarterly meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) was held on Saturday, September 17, 2022 at the American Mensa National Office in Hurst, TX. There was a short agenda consisting of five unfinished motions from the previous meeting and four items of new business.

The unfinished business consisted of five proposed bylaws referenda concerning the Ombud role. When the first of the five motions was taken off the table, a motion was made to limit debate, which would have taken us directly to a vote without discussion. This motion failed, and consequently the mover withdrew the referendum motion from consideration. The remainder of the referenda motions were likewise withdrawn. The Bylaws Committee is continuing to look at these proposed referenda, and will be presenting them again at a future meeting.

The new business included a motion to appoint the Co-Chairs for the 2024 Annual Gathering. This motion was withdrawn, but will be revisited in a different form in a later meeting. The next motion was to set the location for the 2026 Annual Gathering in Fort Worth, Texas, and was approved by acclamation. The third item of new business was to amend the Membership Data Agreement (MDA) adopted at the July meeting to address unintended limitations on how data is transmitted to local group officers, and clarifying that member data may only be provided in hardcopy form for membership rosters. This motion was approved by acclamation, and the new MDA must now be agreed to by all officers before they can get their monthly reports. The final motion was to appoint a new Election Committee, which was also approved.

The meeting also included quarterly reports by the Executive Director and Treasurer, with an additional "Education By The Treasurer" presentation which are included in the meeting reports. There was also a presentation by the Ombud, but there was no document to provide.

The reports and mini-minutes can be found at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ under the dropdown "2022-09-17 -- Hurst, TX".

The next meeting of the AMC will be held in Denver, CO on Saturday, December 3, 2022.

Eight days after the AMC meeting, Timmy King resigned as Chair of American Mensa for personal reasons. Per our Bylaws, First Vice Chair Lori Norris became Chair, and Second Vice Chair Angie Christie moved into the First Vice Chair position. Second Vice Chair is now vacant, and the AMC will be electing a replacement for that office from applicants in the Volunteer Marketplace (https://www.us.mensa.org/volunteer/volunteer-marketplace/ ). Applications are open through October 31, at which point the AMC will review all applicants and discuss them at the AMC meeting in December.

On a local note, Florida was hit hard by Hurricane Ian, and the National Office reached out via email to our members in the path of the storm asking them to check in safe. The email went out on the morning of Thursday, September 29 from Communications Director Charles Brown with the subject line "Severe Weather Safety Check-in" but only a few members responded. The messages went to members in Southwest by South Florida, Manasota, Tampa Bay, Central Florida and North Florida Mensas. I sincerely hope that the light response was mainly apathy, and that our members are all safe from harm.

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

October 2022

I am writing this column a few days before the quarterly American Mensa Committee (AMC) meeting, held on September 17, 2022 at the National Office in Hurst, Texas. While I cannot tell you what happened for the October newsletters, I can let you know what was on the agenda, which was relatively brief.

In each meeting, the first action taken after opening remarks and comments is the approval of the Consent Agenda. These are items that are approved without debate. (If any item from the Consent Agenda needs to be discussed, it is removed from the Consent Agenda and moved to the end of New Business.) This time around this includes the approval of the minutes from the July 28 Special Meeting (which I reported on last month), the acceptance of officer and committee reports, and the appointment of the three voting members of the Bylaws Committee, of which I am one.

Before any further actions are taken, the AMC receives reports from the Treasurer (Taz Criss) and the Executive Director (Trevor Mitchell), and then moves into Executive Session (closed session) to discuss confidential volunteer personnel and legal issues. I hear occasional complaints about this last piece, but most legal issues really shouldn't be discussed publicly, nor should discussions about individuals which in some circumstances may be construed as defamatory should the discussions become public. After we come back from Executive Session, the Secretary reads any pertinent information from the session into the record.

The next section is to address unfinished business, which in this meeting are the five motions that were tabled from the July meeting. These are the proposed referenda regarding the Ombud role, which needed further discussion and review by the Bylaws Committee (as required by ASIE Article 2 Section C.1.b.ii and b.iii). I referred to these referenda in my August column but due to space limitations in my column did not go into detail.

There are three items of New Business to be dealt with:

Appointment of the 2024 Annual Gathering Co-Chairs
Setting the location of the 2026 Annual Gathering
Amending the Membership Data Agreement (MDA)

(This last motion is to clarify the MDA motion passed at the July AMC meeting, which could have been interpreted as preventing the sharing of member data among local group officers in order for them to fulfill their roles. This corrects that misunderstanding.)

Finally, there will be two presentations: Education by the Treasurer (Taz Criss) and an introductory presentation by our newly elected Ombud (R. Edward Lomas).

The agenda for the meeting is posted at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ under the dropdown "2022-09-17 -- Hurst, TX". By the time the October newsletters come out, this link should also include the mini-minutes from the meeting.

On the Regional side, I would like to commend Jim Fitzgerald of Space Coast Area Mensa on organizing one of the most ambitious cross-region events in years, with an outing to the Brevard Zoo on September 17, together with logistical and publicity assistance from Debbie Freeland of Central Florida Mensa. With over 160 members and guests from at least five local groups attending (including North Florida Mensa, Tampa Bay Mensa and Mensa of Jacksonville), this is the largest single-day event in Region 10 in my memory. Kudos to all involved.

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

September 2022

On July 28, 2022, a special session of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) was held via teleconference to review a Hearings Committee report recommending the expulsion of a member who had engaged in persistent harassment and intimidation of another member during authorized Mensa activities. The AMC concurred with the recommendation, considering the situation serious enough to authorize only the 10^th expulsion from American Mensa over the past quarter century.

In order to preserve the privacy of the individuals involved, the discussion was held in closed session, so there will be no recording or detailed minutes available, although the charges, recommendation and decision can be found in the mini-minutes posted at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ under the dropdown "2022-07-28 -- Teleconference".

I was asked why this special session was necessary so soon after the previous AMC meeting just three weeks earlier. Unfortunately, the Hearings Committee did not provide the AMC with their report and recommendation until the day after the quarterly meeting, but the seriousness and immediacy of the charges required that the matter be addressed as quickly as possible, and our Bylaws required a minimum 14-day notice to the membership that a special meeting would be convened.

One of the pillars of Mensa held in its Constitution is that we provide a stimulating intellectual and social environment for our members. Such an environment cannot be maintained when personal boundaries are deliberately, persistently, and dangerously crossed, and such behavior must be dealt with decisively if the society is to continue. Such actions are not taken lightly, but when threats to our members are brought to our attention they cannot be ignored.

The next meeting of the AMC will be held at the American Mensa headquarters in Hurst, TX on September 17, 2022.

[There was originally some information here about the Tampa Bay High Seas RG, but that was canceled at the last minute.]

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

August 2022

The quarterly meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) was held on Thursday, July 7, 2022 at the Nugget Casino Resort in Sparks, NV. There were eleven motions on the published agenda, plus one additional motion added at the meeting. Six of the motions passed, while the other six were referenda to be passed to the membership at the next election.

The first motion was the Consent Agenda, which covered the routine business of accepting quarterly reports and appointing action committee members. Following this was the motion for the AMC to confirm certain Committee Chair roles and other individual appointments, as required by our ASIEs (Actions Still In Effect, AKA ongoing policies).

The next motion was to accept the Audit. This is routine business, required before the financials may be published to the membership at large. Since the motion passed, the audited financials can now be found online at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/financials/

After the acceptance of the Volunteerism Task Force report, a motion was presented to add Volunteerism to the 2020-2025 Strategic Plan. This is now the fourth Key Initiative Focus under the Value priority. The Strategic Plan can be found at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/planning/strategic-plan/

At the March 2022 AMC meeting, the revised Information and Privacy Policy (Appendix 15 of the ASIEs) was adopted. Subsequently, a housekeeping motion to amend the Membership Data Agreement was passed at this meeting to bring it in line with Appendix 15. This is the agreement all local group officers have to sign in order to protect member information.

In response to the requests of several members for clarification on the matter, a Statement of Member Rights and Responsibilities was compiled from the existing ASIEs and other governing documents. The full text of this Statement was included in the Agenda, which included bracketed references to each of the existing policies. At the meeting, some amendments were made, allowing for this Statement to be updated as needed when policies change, along with a couple of other minor changes. These are outlined in the Mini-Minutes of the meeting, which can be found along with the Agenda at the 2022-07-07 -- Sparks, NV dropdown at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/

Not included in the published agenda was a clarification on Testing Sessions for minors, which stated that while parents could accompany their children to a testing session, they could not be in the room while the testing took place unless they were also taking the test. This policy was already in place in the Proctors' Handbook, but had not been adopted in the ASIEs until this motion was passed.

There were six Ombuds referenda being considered, but because the election is still almost two years away, there was no urgency in getting these passed at this meeting, and in order to get it right the first time it was decided to table these motions until September to spend more time working on the wording. One of the referenda did pass to ballot, to shorten the term of office for the Ombuds from six years to three. As our previous National Ombuds stated at the meeting, six years can seem a very long time for a single term.

In addition, the Treasurer and Executive Director gave presentations before the business of the meeting, and the Treasurer gave additional "Education by The Treasurer" following our business. The two bookended Treasurer presentations were provided to address some misunderstandings that a few members have expressed about our financial position. These presentations will be available at the meeting reports link provided above, along with a recording of the meeting for members to review.

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

July 2022

At this writing, the agenda for the American Mensa Committee (AMC) meeting in July has not been finalized, so I cannot provide details. However, I will post notices on the Region 10 Mensa Connect community and the Region 10 Facebook group once the agenda has been finalized. By the time you read this, the agenda for both the AMC meeting and the Annual Business Meeting (ABM) plus the quarterly reports from officers and committees should be available at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/.

The AMC meeting will be held on Thursday, July 7, 2022 in conjunction with the Mensa Annual Gathering (AG) at the Nugget Casino Resort in Sparks, NV, and the ABM will be held the next day, on Friday, July 8. I expect that members who are not in attendance at the AG will be able to listen in on the AMC meeting via a link to be provided in early July, or via a recording posted after the meeting. At this time, I do not know if the ABM will be similarly recorded (it was not last year).

Before each AG, the Mensa Foundation presents a full-day Colloquium on a single major topic, with this year's topic on July 5 being "Giftedness Across The Lifespan: A More Complete Picture". Speakers will present on topics ranging from emotional and social lives of gifted youth, careers and work environments of gifted adults, aging and support for gifted elders, and more. For the first time, the Colloquium will include a livestream option, so members who cannot attend in person can still participate, both in observing the presentations and participating in the question & answer sessions. There is a (discounted) fee of $99 for virtual registration, or $79 for Mensa members, with an additional $20 discount for students. More information can be found at https://www.us.mensa.org/attend/colloquium/.

Over the past year the Volunteerism Task Force has worked on examining volunteerism in social organizations in general and providing recommendations to improve volunteer levels and satisfaction in Mensa, with a final report to be included for the July meeting. This report will be included with the committee reports at the link referenced above. The report is comprehensive, and will be valuable at the local group, regional, and national levels.

One of the places I need to improve upon in this area is getting more volunteer involvement at the Regional level. While I have focused on attending Local Group business meetings when I could, I have not been able to put as much time into the various project-level positions in the Region. For instance, all local groups should have some sort of Gifted Youth program, but I'm not fully qualified to help with that. A better approach would be to have a Regional Gifted Youth Coordinator to help the local group Gifted Youth Coordinators with advice and support. While I have been managing the Region 10 social media, having an individual serving as a Region 10 Social Media Coordinator to advise and support the local groups would be more efficient. There are a significant number of young adult Mensans, but I'm not in that demographic anymore (however much I wish I were), and having a Regional Young Adult Mensan (YAM) Coordinator to help encourage and develop YAM programs in local groups would be invaluable. And so forth.

To this end, and to help identify leadership beyond the local group level, I will be posting Region 10 Coordinator positions on the Volunteer Marketplace (https://www.us.mensa.org/volunteer/volunteer-marketplace/). In addition to the positions already mentioned, I'll be looking to appoint a Regional Ombudsman, Regional Testing Coordinator, Regional Membership Coordinator, and more. I'll announce these on the Region 10 social media platforms (links below) as I complete each posting. If you're interested in any of these, or have any feedback to offer, please read up on the descriptions and let me know.

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
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/
Twitter: @FardleBear

June 2022

The next meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) will be held on Thursday, July 7, 2022 in conjunction with the Mensa Annual Gathering at the Nugget Casino Resort in Sparks, NV. The Annual Business Meeting will be held the next day, on Friday, July 8. The agendas are not yet available, but will be posted at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ in June.

For those who attend the Annual Gathering, I will be hosting a Region 10 Meet and Greet on Wednesday, July 6 at 3:00 p.m. Come and meet other Region 10 members and discuss topics of interest -- I look forward to seeing you there!

In last month's column, I mentioned the clean-up of the Actions Still In Effect (ASIEs) Appendix 23: Policy and Guidelines for Administrators of Internet Communication Services. Following that, Mensa Connect was updated on May 10. This did not have a large impact on the Communities, but did require that users logging into Mensa Connect sign a one-time agreement to the Terms of Service before they may post or reply to comments (they may still receive posts from their respective Communities).

Included in the Terms of Service were limits to content and behavior for participants in the Communities. Unfortunately, there were some members who immediately tested these limits, but fortunately the moderators were on top of it and blocked and removed the offending comments. It is hoped that this will make the national discussions less toxic and more inviting to our members. I am pleased to say that we have had not any similar problems in the Region 10 Community, or any of the Local Group Communities in Region 10.

To view the Terms of Service, visit https://connect.us.mensa.org/termsandconditions294. It may require that you log in to read them. As thorough as they seem, they do not address all possible circumstances but provide guidelines for how the communities may be used. The moderators have broad discretion, since every bright line rule we may provide tends to invite some gamesters to look for ways to get around them, which only leads to endless arguments about rules (which is not conducive to a friendly environment for the rest of the membership).

In last month's column I also mentioned that the proposed Criminal Acts Task Force was committed back to Beth Anne Demeter (RVC 7), who was to be the Chair of that Task Force, for revisions to the charter. I was not persuaded that the original charter as provided addressed the broader concern of member safety that I had been hearing from several members. I am fully in favor of a Member Safety Task Force, because it has become clear that some members have been threatening to others, without clear recourse on how to deal with the issues. We already have a process for addressing member complaints (Appendix 3 of the ASIEs), but it is not well-understood or implemented, and that needs to be corrected and enhanced as necessary. The ASIEs can be found at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/policydocuments/actions-still-in-effect/, and can be easily navigated via the table of contents.

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
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/
Twitter: @FardleBear

May 2022

The quarterly meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) was held on Saturday, March 19, 2022 at the American Mensa/Mensa Foundation headquarters in Hurst, TX. There were ten motions on the agenda, plus some housekeeping items in the Consent Agenda. All but one of these motions (the establishment of a Criminal Acts Task Force) passed. Full details of the motions and the accompanying documents can be found at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/

The first motion, carried over from the November meeting, clarified changes to the use of membership lists. Due to concerns with the rollout of the Oral History Project, it was deemed necessary to place additional controls around the way member communication preferences are observed. This motion ensures that a member's third-party communication preferences are carried over to any new communication categories, such as the Projects category that was created for the Oral History Project. There will also be communication efforts to advise members of such novel programs before they begin, so members have a chance to opt in or out of the program as they choose.

The next three motions were finance related. The budget for the upcoming year is always voted on at the spring AMC meeting, and the draft budget, which was approved, can be found at the link above. Next was the appointment of the Auditor, to audit our financial statements and tax filings, which is also done each year. Thirdly, a Three-&-Five Year Membership Fund was officially established. This is similar to the Life Member Fund, and has existed for many years, but we have not had formal documentation of this fund until now.

The next two motions concerned the establishment of new Task Forces. Due to some process issues, the Volunteerism Task Force and Criminal Acts Task Force were created at the beginning of this term without the approval of the AMC, as required by our ASIEs (Actions Still In Effect). While the Volunteerism Task Force was approved by acclamation, the Criminal Acts Task Force was debated at length (as can be heard in the recording at the link above). Because of some of the concerns about the charter for this task force, it was committed back to Beth Anne Demeter (RVC 7) until the next meeting in July for further refinement.

The last four motions were all Communications related. First was a housekeeping motion to remove the Communications Officer as the administrator for AML Forums, which no longer exist as originally defined, and which currently extend beyond the Communication Officer's responsibilities since they encompass Regions, Local Groups, Special Interest Groups (SIGs) and Committees. The administration responsibilities are covered in more detail in Appendix 23 of the ASIEs (Policy and Guidelines for Administrators of Internet Communication Services), so ASIE 2006-019 is no longer needed. Second was an amendment to the Release of Information section of Appendix 15 of the ASIEs (Information and Privacy Policy). Because members can change their communications preferences at any time, it is important that Local Groups do NOT maintain their own separate directories, as these can almost immediately become inaccurate. Third, the Online Services section of Appendix 15 was amended to be brought up to date with changes since it was established over 12 years ago. Fourth, Appendix 23 was replaced in its entirety, since it was also established over 12 years ago, before many changes to social media that are now commonplace took hold.

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
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/
Twitter: @FardleBear

April 2022

I am writing this column before the American Mensa Committee (AMC) meeting so won't have anything to report until next month's column, but you can find the agenda and mini-minutes for the meeting at https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ and selecting 2022-03-19 -- Hurst, TX from the drop down menu.

When I first started as RVC in 2013, my primary stated focus was to improve communication between members, and even before that I had been serving on the national Communication Committee since 2009. At the time, the main method of communicating for the membership was through the local group newsletters, which for the most part included reports from local events and from the local officers, notices of upcoming events, and feature articles and puzzles from members. Although newsletters are still the only communication avenue enshrined in local group charters and bylaws, organizational entropy has set in over time, and newsletters have become smaller, and/or have gone from monthly to bi-monthly or quarterly (and in a couple of cases local groups have ceased to produce them entirely, in violation of their charters). Since we still have members who do not or cannot engage online, local group newsletters are still required, and National Communication Officer Robin Crawford has indicated that this will not be changing anytime soon.

Nevertheless, time marches on, and technical and societal changes continue to take place despite the reluctance of or resistance from some members. Online member-to-member communication has evolved from old Bulletin Boards and IRC chats, through Usenet and online forums (including Yahoo Groups, which shut down in 2020), and on to social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. While these still hold on for some Mensa communities, they have been fading for a variety of reasons that would be too involved to go into here. However, a couple of reasons worth noting is the lack of security and accountability with these platforms, and the necessity to opt in to use them, which many members simply never did.

So American Mensa launched its own platform with Mensa Connect, which is automatically open to almost all members. Every adult member who has an email address who does not opt out is a member of the Mensa Connect platform, and all but one local group in Florida has a Community in which all members are enrolled. Many members are not aware of this, however, because the default setting is Daily Digest, and unless someone posts to the group, members don't see any messages. Local Groups that have been making good use of the platform to communicate with their members include Palm Beach Area Mensa, Northwest Florida Mensa, Tampa Bay Mensa, and Miami Mensa, and I have been working with Ruth Danielle in Manasota Mensa over the past couple of weeks to get the members of that group more engaged as well.

There is also a Region 10 Members Community which you can find by searching the available communities in https://connect.us.mensa.org/communities/local-groups/region-10.

All members may post to these Communities, so they can be used for interactive discussions, but a member may not initiate a conversation unless they agree to the terms of use by logging in for the first time at https://connect.us.mensa.org/home.

The Communities have certain advantages that members like, such as being able to participate without sharing their private email with the other users of the community, since all emails are sent through the platform with names but no email addresses included. Only other Mensa members may participate, and real names are used, so there is no anonymous trolling.

Let me know if you have any questions. I hope that more members will make use of this tool now that we have it available.

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
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/
Twitter: @FardleBear

March 2022

The next meeting of the American Mensa Committee (AMC) will be held on Saturday, March 19, 2022 in Hurst, TX at the American Mensa headquarters. At the time I'm writing this column the agenda has not been finalized, but it's scheduled to be posted to https://www.us.mensa.org/lead/amc/meeting-reports/ by the end of February.

That said, it appears that the agenda will be packed. Because it's been a while since the last meeting in November, a lot of committee work has been underway in the interim. I expect there to be motions to create a pair of Task Forces which have already started working in anticipation of being approved (these being the Volunteerism Task Force and the Criminal Acts Task Force). The Communications Officer has been working on a number of motions regarding Internet Communications Services (which includes websites, email services and social media). The Gifted Youth Committee has been working on their Gifted Youth Coordinator (GYC) handbook, which hadn't been updated for many years. The Finance Committee has been working on the budget for 2022-2023, which will be presented for approval by the AMC along with a motion to clarify our investment policies. A motion has been prepared to address concerns about the use of our membership lists. And these are just the ones I know about; others may be coming in over the next few days.

Aside from business to be conducted at the meeting, committees have been working on their projects. The Gifted Youth Committee kicked off their quarterly GYC roundtable in February. Simone van Egeren (Chair of the AML History Committee) posted an article in the February Mensa Bulletin discussing the work of the committee. The Events Planning Committee has been working on site selection research for the 2026 Annual Gathering. The Bylaws Committee has started to receive new updates for Local Group Bylaws. And there are many others I'm not aware of yet, but I expect that they will be reporting their progress via their quarterly reports at the link above.

Moving to Regional activity, I attended the Central Florida Regional Gathering ("It's All Sun ‘N' Games") over Martin Luther King Jr. Day weekend, this year being held at the CoCo Key Hotel and Water Resort in Orlando. As usual, Debbie Freeland did an excellent job of pulling it together after locating a venue on short notice, with the great assistance of Hospitality Chair Jennifer Keating and Speaker Chair Bill Keevan, along with the many speakers and game and tournament chairs.

I've noticed that several local groups have already started pulling together their CultureQuest® teams, but there's still time if your group hasn't joined in -- or if your group has enough interest in a second team! Registrations can still be taken up to March 31.

Local Groups have slowly started to hold in-person events again, although many members are still wary of group activities. As a reminder, the official position of American Mensa is to recommended that groups follow all CDC, federal, state, local, and venue requirements when hosting an event. As an aside and as a matter of courtesy, guests should follow the wishes of the host of an event, and conversely, hosts should make it known in advance whether or not they are requiring masks or vaccinations, especially for events to be held in private homes.

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
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/
Twitter: @FardleBear

February 2022

Now that January is behind us, it's time to start looking at some upcoming events that I hope your Local Groups are working on.

First, CultureQuest® registrations open on February 1 and runs through March 31. This year CultureQuest® will be held on Sunday, April 24. It is considered a trivia contest by many, but the questions are usually more grounded in cultural literacy, based on the 1987 book by E.D. Hirsch, Jr. The idea is that our culture has certain common knowledge that everyone knows, even if they aren't familiar with the original source material -- for instance, almost everyone knows what is meant when someone is referred to as "Sherlock", whether or not they've read any of the Arthur Conan Doyle stories.

Each CultureQuest® team may have up to five members and two alternates, but are not required to have that many (there have been years when a single individual participated as a "team" and scored in the money). All team members must be members, and must have renewed their membership before March 31 or their team will be disqualified. A local group may have more than one team if they wish. The top 20 teams are recognized on the Awards page on the national website, as well as sharing in monetary awards for their Local Group.

More details can be found at https://www.us.mensa.org/attend/culturequest

Also coming up: April 18-24 is National Volunteer Week, which is when most Mensa Cares community service projects are run. Since these take some lead time to organize, February is a good time to start.

The Community Service Committee recognizes service contributed towards the local community or society. Recognition requests may be submitted by any member who organizes a community service event by providing the name and date of the event, the number of member and family participants, the percent of group participation, the total of contributions (either in time or value), and a brief essay on the positive effect or result for the community. LocSecs will be asked to confirm or ratify the submission by a local group member, but need not be the one to submit it.

If you have a community service project that you would like to run, you can register it at https://www.us.mensa.org/volunteer/community-service/

A number of nominations either begin or are due in February. Nominations for National Ombudsperson open on February 1 and close on March 31. Per our Bylaws, the National Ombudsperson is elected by the Local Group Ombudspersons every six years. Although a Local Group is permitted to have more than one Local Ombudsperson, each group gets a single vote -- but only if they have an Ombudsperson. So, if your local group does not have an ombudsperson, this is a good time to volunteer!

Finally, Gifted Youth Coordinator of the Year nominations are due by February 20, and nominations for Mensa Foundation Awards (Copper Black, Distinguished Teacher, and Intellectual Benefits to Society) are due by March 1. Information on all of these can be found at https://www.us.mensa.org/recognize/group-awards/gy-coordinator-of-the-year and https://www.mensafoundation.org/what-we-do/awards-and-recognition/

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
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/
Twitter: @FardleBear

January 2022

Happy New Year to everyone in Region 10! With the holidays behind us, there wasn't much activity to report on from the National front, although various committees have been hard at work.

I've been working with the Communications Committee to update the Internet Communications Services policy (Appendix 23 in the Actions Still In Effect, or ASIEs). There hasn't been a substantial overhaul of these guidelines since they were first established in 2005, so it's due for review. Some of it covers regulations that we are required to observe with our websites and social media, such as the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 (Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography And Marketing Act) (don't you just love government acronyms?), both of which are still in effect, but there are other topics to cover with the proliferation of social media sites since then, such as how to maintain ownership of Facebook or Meetup groups if the person who established them is no longer available for whatever reason and the passwords are lost. Much to think about on that topic.

I have also been working with the AML History Committee to pull together a history of officers and committee members over time. In 1997, Vincent Bonzagni compiled a "Book of Lists" from the beginnings of Mensa in 1946 through the establishment of American Mensa (then "North American Mensa" in 1965) and up to November 1997, but no comprehensive lists have been maintained for member perusal since that time. The charge of this committee includes formatting and setting up the information so it will be viable for online viewing, but the first step is to collect the data.

Other committees have been moving along as well, such as the Gifted Youth Committee, which is almost finished updating its Gifted Youth Program Handbook. And the Community Services Committee is getting ready to announce Mensa Cares Week in April, soliciting community projects from Local Groups to show that Mensa is fulfilling its Constitutional purpose to use our intelligence for the benefit of humanity.

That's just four committees, out of 25 that were identified in a list provided to the AMC members by Executive Director Trevor Mitchell (not including the AMC, or American Mensa Committee, that oversees all of them). We're always in need of members to serve on these committees, so of COURSE we are setting up a new committee, with the Volunteerism Task Force charged to generate recommendations to improve volunteer levels and satisfaction in Mensa at the local and national levels. The intention is that this committee will complete its charge by this coming December, so we don't permanently add to the list of committees.

That said, there isn't enough room in this column to outline ALL of the committees, so I'm going to provide a breakdown to Dan Tobias, our Region 10 webmaster, so you can see if there are committees that you might like to help with. I also hope to find more Regional assistants to help our local groups with their projects. We already have Julie Warriner serving as Regional Scholarship Chair, but we also need a Regional Ombudsman to assist with the gap between Local Group issues and National issues, and some groups have been looking for assistance from a Regional Young Adult Mensan (YAM) Coordinator. I will be posting job descriptions for these and more on the Region 10 website (region10.us.mensa.org) as well as to the Mensa Region 10 Facebook group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/).

Finally, I will be holding an RVC Chat session at the Central Florida Regional Gathering ("It's All Sun ‘n' Games") on Friday, January 14^th to Monday, January 17^th. If you have any questions about these topics or anything else, I hope to see you then, or as always you can reach me at RVC10@us.mensa.org.

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
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MensaRegion10/
Twitter: @FardleBear

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