WBAA Extraordinary General Assembly - Online
This year’s regular WBAA General Assembly in Belgrade opened many important topics for the future functioning of the organisation, which, due to insufficient elaboration and numerous comments from WBAA members, was not voted on in Belgrade. In the meantime, the topics were elaborated in detail, presented to WBAA members, and during the virtual Board Meeting (July 1st, 2023) defined in the final form, ready for voting at the Extraordinary WBAA General Assembly. The Extraordinary GA took place online, on 2nd of July 2023 with a beginning at 05:05pm (CET).
At the start of the meeting (05:05pm) a total of 26, while after the introduction (05:30pm) a total of 29 participants were presented.
Regional Board member, Milan Stojanovic, opened the GA, presenting himself and welcoming WBAA members.
From 05:15pm to 05:30pm Board members presented four voting topics:
- The 3rd mandate for Board members (presented by Board member Andrija Tomić),
- Formalisation of WBAA, (presented by Board member Milan Stojanović),
- Updated membership criteria (presented by Board member Adnan Rahimić) and
- Restructuring of WBAA teams (presented by Head of Research Team Renata Petrevska Nechkoska).
At 05:25pm, the agenda allowed the presented WBAA members to have an additional 5 minutes to ask the Board anything regarding the four voting topics.
The next 60 minutes (05:30pm - 06:30pm) were scheduled for voting on the presented topics, exclusively by using the WBAA Community Portal. All registered WBAA members could express their opinion on the proposed topics with simply “yes” or “no” to the following questions:
- Are you in favour of the option that WBAA Board members can be elected for a third mandate?
- Are you in favor of creating a task force which will deal with the next steps for the “Formalisation of WBAA”?
- Are you in favour of the updated membership criteria (students with a confirmed grant for an Erasmus+ mobility programme are able to apply for WBAA membership)?
- Are you in favour of creating a task force to change the current WBAA teams structure to WBAA clusters (WBAA teams 3.0)?
While the 60 minutes of voting lasted, the members of the regional Board used it to talk with the present WBAA members and answer the many questions asked through the application.
At 6:30pm, the closing of the election and publication of the results by the Service Provider took place:
1) 3rd mandate for Board members:
Are you in favor of the option that WBAA Board members can be elected for a third mandate?
Yes 24 – No 16 (40 voters in total), the necessary quorum of 2/3 was not reached, therefore this amendment to the WBAA statutes was not approved by the GA.
2) Formalisation of WBAA:
Are you in favour of creating a task force which will deal with the next steps for the “Formalisation of WBAA”?
Yes 39 – No 2 (41 voters in total) the necessary quorum was reached, therefore there was an approval of creating the task force for the “Formalisation of WBAA” by the GA.
3) Membership criteria:
Are you in favour of the updated membership criteria (students with a confirmed grant for an Erasmus+ mobility programme are able to apply for WBAA membership)?
Yes 29 – No 11 (40 voters in total), the necessary quorum of 2/3 was reached, therefore approval for changing the membership criteria in the WBAA statutes by the GA.
4) Restructuring of WBAA teams:
Are you in favour of creating a task force to change the current WBAA teams’ structure to WBAA clusters (WBAA teams 3.0)?
Yes 40– No 1 (41 voters in total), the necessary quorum was reached, therefore approval for creating the task force for changing the WBAA teams’ structure by the GA.
3 out of the 4 proposed topics were voted for favourably by the WBAA General Assembly. We have the elections for national chapters coming up in the fall, and after that, a lot of work on further elaboration and implementation of the voted decisions. The fourth topic was not voted for by only a few votes short of having 2/3 of the total votes, which gives us the motive to further elaborate on it, but also to continue working on proposing new ideas, all for the benefit of all WBAA members and the improvement of our organisation.
Finally, on this occasion, I would like to invite all WBAA members who want to be actively involved in decision-making not to miss the chance to run for regional Board representatives in an invitation that was sent to all WBAA members and that will last until Monday, September 4.
Therefore, please open your WBAA Community Portal profile, get ready to either send your application for joining the WBAA Board or the upcoming voting process, follow our webpage and stay tuned.
At your disposal,
Regional Board Member
Milan Stojanović
Edited by Service Provider
Serbia, Novi Sad, August 31st, 2023