2010 AFS-USA National Volunteer Assembly Highlights

From AFSWiki

From April 9-11, 2010, the second annual AFS-USA National Volunteer Assembly took place in Nashville, TN.

This year’s NVA included the election of three new National Council members – Al Russell (DelMarPa Team), Jane Howard (Mass Bay Team), and Frank Johnson (Carolinas Team). All three of them will take office on July 1. Susan Rowley and Damian Pisanelli will rotate off the National Council at that time. Susan and Damian were both recognized at the NVA for their years of service on the National Council.

The NVA delegates voted to have the 2011 National Volunteer Assembly in St Louis, MO. The other two cities considered were Charlotte, NC and Phoenix, AZ. The date of the 2011 NVA will be finalized by the National Council by June.

In addition, five separate agenda items were discussed, debated, amended, and approved. Background papers for the five agenda items can be found here 2010_National_Volunteer_Assembly. Decisions that were made, as well as the next steps for them, are as follows:

Area Team and Unaffiliated Chapter Co-Support Payments A motion to tie future increases to the team co-support amounts to percentage increases in the average transfer price AFS-USA receives from our partners (for hosted participants) or to the average program tuition (for sending participants) was approved. In the coming months, the National Council will be reviewing the base co-support payment amounts, as the first step in implementing this change to the process for reviewing and changing co-support payments.

Team and Chapter Quality Assessments The NVA delegates voted to begin implementing the compliance-related components of the annual team assessment, in the fall of 2010. This implementation will be done by the Volunteer Development Department. The other pieces of the Healthy Team Assessment document will be referred back to the Volunteer Structure Committee for more work before the 2011 NVA.

NVA Delegate Selection Process A change to the NVA by-laws, regarding the NVA delegate selection process, was approved. Section II, Paragraph C, “Assignment of Delegates to a Team” has had the following wording added:

“Once delegate participation numbers are determined and announced, teams with representation have four weeks to confirm their attendees. All unused delegate spaces will then be made available to volunteer groups in AFS who are not already represented at the NVA. Acceptance of those candidates will be confirmed by the National Council based on their assessment. It is not required that all NVA delegate spaces be filled.”

The newly revised NVA by-laws are available here National Volunteer Assembly by laws.

Creation of a Standing Committee on Diversity The NVA delegates voted to approve the creation of this Committee. As we have no procedure for creation of NVA Committees, it will be referred back to the sponsors to establish a proposal on how their committee will be created. The proposal will be reviewed by the Volunteer Structure Committee and the Nominations and Governance Committee. The proposal will be presented for National Council action at the June face-to-face meeting.

Volunteer Service Day The NVA delegates voted to begin having a national AFS Youth Service Day, beginning in April 2011. The sponsors of the motion are being asked to recommend an implementation plan. The target date for the recommendation is the June 2010 National Council meeting.

Overall Evaluations The evaluations that were completed by NVA delegates and participants were very positive, with the NVA receiving a 4.46 (out of a possible 5), when participants were asked to rate the “overall value and effectiveness” of the NVA. Comments were generally quite enthusiastic about the agenda, the structure, and the format for discussions throughout the weekend.

Thank you to the NVA Planning Committee, the National Council, and the staff who participated for making this year’s NVA such a success!