AGM & Elections
New and updated info on the AGM! Very cool! - Mat
AGM INFO STUFF
What happens at an AGM?
An AGM, or Annual General Meeting, must be held in Term 2 by every society. It's not always called that, but it's meant to be an event where the society looks back on the year's events, and looks forward to how it wants to plan things in the future.
This is a great event, and can be quite entertaining. At the AGM we do 4 things:
- the annual report (exec talk for a really long time about all the events we ran)
- run society elections (hopeful exec talk for a really long time about events they want to run
but won't get round to) - vote on motions (
idiotsmembers request normal things of a computing society and there is NO joking about) - spend all of our sponsor money on pizza
Why are we doing this? Because we're a Warwick SU society and have to follow Regulation 9, and also because it would also be really nice to have an exec for next year.
Where and When is our AGM?
Place: OC1.07
Date/Time: 7pm Feburary 29th
Who can take part in the AGM?
Any member of the society! Even if you're not standing, how you vote or what you say could drastically affect the direction the society takes in future.
Elections
Eligibility
Any standard member of the society can stand or vote in the elections. You need to have been a society member since at least 14 days before the AGM (that's 7pm on February 15th) to vote. You can stand for a position at the AGM itself, if you want.
Roles Available
| Role | Slots* | Responsible for: | Recommended if you: |
|---|---|---|---|
| President | 1 | Giving the society a sense of direction for the academic year, and doing what’s needed to make stuff happen. | Can adapt to a wide range of situations. Aren’t afraid to shake things up a little. Have previous exec experience. |
| Treasurer | 2 | Managing the society’s budget - by negotiating with sponsors and approving purchase requests. | Have good professional communication skills. Can handle company bureaucracy via email. Want to handle society funds. |
| Secretary | 2 | Making sure things go to plan. Organising meetings, writing the weekly newsletter, and chasing people up. | Are generally organized and on top of things. Can write in a fun and engaging style. Aren’t afraid to chase up other exec. |
| Academic | 3 | Courses, Workshops, Student Talks, Industry Talks, Progcomps, CTFs, CompCafe, and Revision Sessions. | Want to make quality resources and challenges. Enjoy the wider field of Computer Science. Can explain things pretty well. |
| Gaming | 3 | Setting up and packing down Friday Night Gaming, hosting termly LANs, and helping our charity event WASD. | Want to help get people together and have fun. Enjoy a wide variety of games and consoles. Are used to staying up pretty late. |
| Social | 2 | More than just the pub meals! Hosts a bunch of cool, one-off events for members throughout the term. | Can organise events people want to come to. Enjoy both sober and not-so-sober socials. Want to collaborate with other societies. |
| Tech | 2 | Maintaining our Linux servers and member services, and looking after our open-source projects. | Want to get hands-on experience with servers. Accept things aren’t going to go to plan. Can quickly pick up new technologies. |
| Inclusivity | 2 | Creating a welcoming environment for members, regardless of background. Hosts Wildcards (women & NB) events. | Represent an under-represented group in CS. Want to improve outcomes for similar students. Can be pretty confident, but also friendly. |
| Publicity | 2 | Making sure people know what we’re up to, whether that be through social media, or something more unique. | Can make publicity graphics (preferably Figma). Know what makes social media platforms tick. Are creative, but can be concise. |
| Welfare | 2 | Ensures the safety of members at events/in the society as a whole, and should be the first point of contact for any issues. | Approachable, comfortable talking about sensitive issues and will be active at events. |
*This is in accordance with our new and improved shared office clause 6.3. There is also the possibility of running in groups, e.g. two people can run as one candidate.
Voting
We use the STV, or Single Transferable Vote system. For each position, you can rank as many candidates as you want in order of preference. The system works in elimination rounds. If your preferred candidate is eliminated, your vote will be transferred to your next non-eliminated preference until a single candidate remains.
You can also vote to Re-Open Nominations, by selecting a candidate affectionately labeled as RON. Note that RON is an active vote against any candidates below that option, so you should only use RON if you feel the alternative really is that bad.
We'll be using our online voting platform, UWCS Vote. This will be open for 72 hours from the end of the AGM. Quorum is 40, so that many people need to vote on each position's election for it to count.
Shared Office
Introduced in the 2022 AGM and promptly updated in the 2023 AGM (might happen again this time, who knows), Shared office is a clause in the constitution which reads as follows:
6.3 Shared Office
6.3.1 All positions will be filled up to a maximum of 2 for all available positions, with
exception of the ‘President’ role which has sole occupancy as well as Academic and Gaming
coordinators which can have up to 3. Additional positions should be filled in accordance with
6.3.2
6.3.2 Further officers shall be selected by taking subsequent positions in the STV process,
until the required number of officers is reached.
6.3.2.a This selection cannot pass a vote to Re-Open Nominations.
6.3.3 Should a position not reach it’s quota as defined in 6.3.1, the incoming exec should treat
the empty position as a vacant slot in accordance with Warwick SU’s regulation 9 on vacant
slots.
6.3.4 If multiple members run together, they will be considered as 1 candidate in regards to
shared office and as such each member will be considered 1/nth of a full vote where n is the
number of people running jointly.
In other words: the top 2 candidates will be taken for all positions, with the exception of president (1 candidate) and gaming/academic (3 candidates).
I WANT TO STAND
Send an email to president@uwcs.co.uk with the subject line "UWCS Elections" and the following information:
- Your student ID
- The position(s) you're standing for
- Whether you'll be there in-person or online
- Description (optional, max 100 words, per position)
Or send the same information to the President on discord (username: .mat.k and appears as MAT).
On the day
Each position will be discussed in turn:
- A final call will be made for candidates to stand, before closing nominations for that position.
- All candidates will have the opportunity to give a 1-2 minute speech, without any other candidate in the room. You can say what you'd like, but we'd recommend talking about why you'd be a good fit for the position, and what you'd like to do. Slides are allowed, but aren't really necessary.
- We will then open the floor to a Q&A. At first, the questions should not be targeted at any particular candidate, so all candidates can answer in turn. We estimate the Q&A for most positions to take around 5 minutes, but obviously the ones with more people are going to take longer.
Motions
Constitutionally changing motions can be submitted until Thurs 22nd Feb, and any other motions right up until the AGM (but please send them in good time so we don't have to look through our emails for them at the meeting).
Send the completed motion documents to president@uwcs.co.uk or to the President via discord. Motions require a seconder who is also a member of the society, so you can't just submit them on your own.
On the day
Each motion will be read out by the returning officer (Mat), and time will be given for members to:
- Ask questions to the proposer/seconder
- Voice support for or opposition to the motion (general discussion of the motion)
Voting
You can vote to support a motion, vote against a motion, or vote to abstain. If more people vote to support a motion than vote against, and at least 50 people have voted on it, the motion passes.
We'll be using our online voting platform, UWCS Vote. This will be open for 72 hours from the end of the AGM, and results should be announced soon after.