Young Adult Round Table – Executive Board Meeting
April 11, 2014
TLA Conference
Those present: Natasha Benway, Shelly Landreth, Megan Mills, Amanda Gaylon, Robin Gunter, Renee Dyer, Robin Cashman, Meredith Layton, Rebecca Dunham, Tuan Nguyen, Jennifer Demas, Dana Hutchins, Jen Bigheart, Jennifer Smith
Meeting was called to order at 10:15am. The Board introduced themselves and their YART role.
Renee Dyer presented the 2015 TLA Conference theme; Sync Up! Renee read the conference goals to the group and submitted a list of what the program committee would be looking for.
The Board reviewed the Executive Board meeting minutes from our virtual meeting in March. Robin Gunter moved to accept meeting minutes, Tuan Nguyen seconded, minutesapproved.
Natasha Benway presented the election results. Chair elect is Robin Cashman, Shelly Landreth & Megan Mills are councilors, Secretary is Stacy Wells.
Natasha Benway asked that everyone think of how TLA went, write notes, and think about ways to improve for 2015. She will start an email discussion in the next few weeks.
Lone Star Committee – 31 nominations, averaging about 10 per month.
Maverick Committee – over 100 attendees for their TLA program.Nygen moved that the Children’s Round Table consider a task force for a Maverick list for a younger audience- Little Mavs. Robin Gunter seconded, motion passed.
Tayshas Committee – 21 nomination, 1 committee member did not attend TLA and she has not nominated a single title. Natasha Benway let the chair know that she has the authority to ask her to step down from committee and to find another seat while there is still time to nominate books for the list. There was talk about adding information about how a committee member can participate in a vote while they are out sick or homebound. This will be discussed at our July meeting in Austin.
SPoT Middle School – 3 community nominations, 1 from committee.
SPoT High School – 3 community nominations, 1 from committee. Rebecca Denham moved that the program timeline be changed to voting in November, announce in December, and launch program in June. Megan Mills seconded, motion passed. Denham and Natasha Benway will work together to come up with the language and update the policy.
Webmaster – Jennifer Demes filled in the group about our web problems with SPoT and Drupal. It will cost several thousand dollars to fix the site and write new code. Demas also discussed how we need to archive our content on the website and the limitations we have due to working with the TLA site and its margins. Natasha Benway will contact Cindy Boyle about possibly drumming up donations or sponsorships to fix our website and to archive our content.
Social Media – Jen Bigheart said that she has received most of the videos for each reading list. She asks that when gathering the information we send in a Dropbox link because not all videos can be converted (Animoto, for example). Bigheart is still waiting on some book quotes – please keep in mind they should be short. Bigheart also mentioned that we should compose a social media policy. Natasha Benway moved that we compose and adopt a social media policy, Robin Cashman seconded, motion passed.
Natasha Benway discussed our financial budget. Right now the spreadsheet is not an accurate representation because of the conference and scholarship stipends sent to TLA for Tall Texans and Legislative Fund. TLA withdrew an inaccurate amount ($6,000) for these two funds and Natasha Benway and Robin Gunter will find out how to be reimbursed. Jennifer Demas pointed out that we had agreed in our February Executive Board meeting to give $500 to Legislative Day and $500 to Tall Texans. Robin Gunter motioned that YART increase its amount Tall Texans to $1000 and $500 remains for Legislative Day. Megan Mills seconded it.
TLA Counselors – Meghan Mills explained that TLA will be raising their dues by $20 next year because they are currently struggling. They have not raised dues since 2001. Shelly Landreth will go to TLA with our vote that we support TLA and the dues increase.
New Business – Tech Camp was successful and had 400 registered attendees. They will hold another Tech Camp at TLA in 2015. This will be headed by outgoing chair so Robin Gunter will be our representative. It was suggested that the sessions have the description of the intended audience – school or public, for example. Jen Bigheart reported back on the YART meetup that she hosted. It was a great turnout and she proposed that we do something for breakfast instead of competing with publisher parties in the evening. Bigheart will look into locations and food trucks. Jen Bigheart explained that we had an instance of a crazed fan and that we should the TLA security contact information to the confirmation emails to publicist and authors in the future.
Natasha Benway moved to adjourn at 11:18am.