It’s GV board elections time once more!
The Global Voices board has three positions reserved for community representatives: one chosen from the group of current annually-contracted GV Contractors, and two from the current group of GV Volunteers.
Our community representatives to the Global Voices board end their three-year term of office at the end of March 2020, so the time has come to elect three new representatives.
Here are the details in FAQ form (UPDATED ON MARCH 30, 2020):
Voting will take place on April 10-15 11-16, 2020. Here’s a timeline of all activities:
The board has appointed GV’s Executive Director, Ivan Sigal, and GV’s Managing Director, Georgia Popplewell, as the elections officers. As a result, Ivan and Georgia will not vote in the board election.
In the Contractors’ election, the candidate receiving the largest number of votes will be considered the winner. In the Volunteers’ election, the top two candidates receiving the largest number of votes will be considered the winners.
Like all nonprofit foundations, GV is governed by a board of directors. You can see the members of the current board here.
The current Global Voices board of directors comprises nine seats. Two of these seats are reserved for the founders of GV (Ethan Zuckerman and Rebecca MacKinnon), three for members of the GV community and four for other individuals of the board’s choosing. The four external board members are nominated and selected by the existing board. The GV community board representatives are elected by the GV community.
The GV board meets once each quarter, i.e. four times a year. Most meetings take place by conference call.
In March 2017 the GV Community elected Laura Vidal as the Contractors’ representative and Marianne Diaz and Annie Zaman as the Volunteers’ representatives.
With the exception of the co-founders, the term of office for all GV board members is three years.
The role of GV’s community board representatives is to ensure that the best interests of GV community members are served by the organization by doing the following:
Yes. Global Voices board members have a two-term limit.
To run for a board seat, a person must be a member in good standing of the 2020 GV Community Council.
The Contractors’ Representative position may be contested by any GV Community Council member in good standing who meets the following criteria:
1) heads a GV section (i.e. Newsroom, Rising Voices, Advox, Lingua), an editorial or translation team (i.e. Newsroom editors, Translation Managers), or holds another annually-contracted position at GV.
2) has posted to a GV website at least four times in the last calendar year (i.e. since March 2019).
The Volunteers’ Representative position may be contested by any GV Community Council member in good standing who meets the following criteria:
1) does NOT head a Global Voices’ department (i.e. Newsroom, Rising Voices, Lingua), (i.e. Newsroom editors, Translation Managers), or hold another long-term paid position at GV
2) has posted to a GV website at least four times in the last calendar year (i.e. since March 2019).
Any person who has ever published on a GV website can nominate a candidate.
You can submit nominations using this form.
Before nominating someone, please make sure to 1) confirm they are on the GV Council 2020 and 2) ask for their consent.
Yes!
Candidates will respond to a series of set questions in posts and the Community Blog, along with any reasonable supporting materials, including videos, images, audio messages, etc.
Community members will then be invited to ask the candidates questions in the comments section of each candidate’s blog post. If you don't have a Community Blog account, ask your editor or the Lingua Manager.
Yes, candidates may use the GV Community Google Group for campaign purposes, once the communications are clearly labelled “[GV Election Campaign Message]”.
Yes. Any candidate who removes, defaces or in any other way interferes with another candidate’s campaign materials, or who orders another person to do such on their behalf, will face immediate disqualification from the election.
Any member of the Global Voices community who meets the following criteria can vote in the election:
1) has been a member of the community for at least three months
2) who has posted to a GV website within the last five years (i.e. since March 1, 2015)
Eligible voters will receive a message soon confirming their eligibility.
Voting will be done through an online voting platform. We’ll send you more information and detailed instructions for voting closer to the voting date.
Yes. Every eligible voter will have three votes: one to cast in the Contractors’ election, and two in the Volunteers’ election.
In the election for Contractors’ Representative, the candidate receiving the largest number of votes will be considered the winner. In the election for Volunteers’ Representatives, the top two candidates receiving the largest number of votes will be considered the winners.
In the event of a tie, we shall hold a runoff election between the candidates who have received an equal number of votes.
If you have any other questions about the elections, please don’t hesitate to email Georgia.