mission/founding statement

[devvyn]

I think it'd be nice to have a slogan, mission statement, or perhaps even a charter that represents the goals, attitudes and freedoms comprising the group's consciousness. Something that can be discussed and shared. I think we should come up with this before settling on a name, because a name might be able to encapsulate the group's essence. If interest in developing a charter picks up, we can open a wiki or CMS to go alongside the forums.

[DigitalOSH]

Although I agree that this is important, a name is probably a good #1 goal so we can get a centralized website etc. going...


In my opinion the #1 most important directive is that everything we do is democratized, as long as it's legal. This will be binding only to paying members, once we get to that point. Specifically this should refer to:

• Buying equipment or anything else to do with the money of the group
• Membership and dues
• This very charter/statement
and any other decisions that affect the whole group

[Odemia]

Having experience reworking condo board, a non-Proffit and iEEE student branch constitution/by-laws I would say that the mission is as important as the specifics regarding finances and everything else as the mission is a guide where the rules aren't and can't possibly be specified ahead of time. That said without a simple constitution describing some kind of procedures for who is in control of the day to day stuff and how to conduct meetings/take votes the mission is also pretty useless.

Basically we should be able to take the standard not-for-profit constitution and bylaws from corporations Canada and slap on a mission on it plus maybe a few tweaks to suite the groups needs.

I think that the mission statement needs to include:

• The promotion of the exchange of information (ie teaching one and other)
• The promotion of self exploration (learning by doing)
• Boundaries as to the type of interests that fall in scope (computers, electronics and related skills)
• That the group is inclusive and zero tolerance for harassment, bullying etc.

Corporations Canada should layout the following but just incase we should include:

• How to elect a board
• How to dissolve the board and group should it reach that state
• Who controls the finances ie how many signatures to pay the day to day stuff vs how many to pay to make big purchases
• How to set and collect dues
• Required meetings and meeting rules

If no one gets to this before the weekend I will try to do a quick first draft then.

[Odemia]

We don't have to register as a not-for-profit but the basic constitution and by-laws are a good guide.

http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/cd-dgc.nsf ... 03450.html