It feels like a lifetime ago that the event organizers’ request to become an official working group was approved by the Drupal Association at DrupalCon Amsterdam. Since then, 2020 has been a year that no-one will forget—from a global virus to social justice demonstrations—the world as we know it has been forever changed. 

Lessons We Are Learning in 2020

So far in 2020, we have learned some valuable lessons that we think will help us be a better working group moving forward. 

Organizing Events is Hard. Organizing volunteer-led events is difficult already, let alone during complete uncertainty. Many event organizers have had to make very difficult but swift decisions by either canceling or trying to pivot to a virtual conference format. 

Finding the Right Time is Hard. Organizing a global group of volunteer event organizers is also hard. As someone who has had little time on international teams, I admittedly thought of finding a meeting time a breeze. I was completely wrong. 

Global Representation is Hard. One of our top priorities was to have global representation to help foster growth and collaboration around the world but unfortunately due to either the meeting times or not enough focused marketing on international event organizers the participation was just not where the board felt it should be.

Changes We are Making

After a few emails and some friendly debates, the board looked for opportunities for change that can help solve some of the lessons we have learned. 
 
Alternating Meeting Times in UTC Format. To help foster more international participation, all scheduled meetings will alternate times all marketed and posted in the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) format. Public meetings will now be at 12:00 pm UTC and 12:00 am UTC.   

Increase Board Membership to 9. The group decided to expand the board members to 9. We are highly encouraging organizers from around the world to submit their names for interest to increase our global representation. 

Maintain and Recruit Advisory Board Members. Succession planning is critical for any operation, and our advisory board provides more flexible commitment in participation which we hope will be our number one resource for new members down the road. 

Board Members Nominations. In addition to expanding the number of board seats, Suzanne Dergacheva from DrupalNorth (Canada) and Matthew Saunders (DrupalCamp Colorado) have accepted their nominations from advisors to board members. 

Current Board Members

• Camilo Bravo (cambraca) - DrupalCamp Quito - Ecuador / Hungary
• Baddý Sonja Breidert (baddysonja) - DrupalCamp Iceland, Germany, Europe, Splash Awards - Europe
• Kaleem Clarkson (kclarkson) -DrupalCamp Atlanta  - Atlanta, GA, USA
• Suzanne Dergacheva (pixelite) - DrupalNorth - Montreal, QC CANADA
• Leslie Glynn (leslieg)  Design 4 Drupal Boston, NEDCamp - Boston MA
• Matthew Saunders (MatthewS) - Drupalcamp Colorado - Denver, CO, USA
• Avi Schwab (froboy) - MidCamp, Midwest Open Source Alliance - Chicago, IL, USA

Things We are Working On

There are so many things that all of us organizers would like to get working, but one of our goals has been to identify our top priorities.

Event Organizer Support. We are here to help. When volunteer organizers need guidance navigating event challenges, there are various channels to get help. 

• Join Monthly Zoom Meeting: https://tinyurl.com/eowg-calendar (12am and 12pm UTC)
• Join the Event Organizer Slack Community: https://drupalcamporganizers.herokuapp.com

Drupal Community Events Database. In collaboration with the Drupal Association, the EOWG has been working on putting together a new and improved event website database that will help market and collect valuable data for organizers around the world.
Submit your event today: https://www.drupal.org/community/events

Drupal Event Website Starter kit. To help organizers get events up and running quickly, an event website starter kit was identified as a valuable resource. Using the awesome work contributed by the Drupal Europe team, JD Leonard from DrupalNYC has taken the lead in updating the codebase. It is our hope more event organizers will help guide a collaborative effort and continue building an event starter kit that organizers can use. 

Join the Event Organizer Slack here and Join #event-website-starterkit

Seeking Event Organizers Board Members and Advisory Committee Members - Submit Your Nomination Today

The Drupal Event Organizers Working Group is seeking nominations for Board Members and Advisory Committee Members. Anyone involved in organizing an existing or future community event is welcome to nominate. 

EOWG Board Members. We are currently looking for nominations to fill two (2) board seats. For these seats, we are looking for diverse candidates that are event organizers from outside of North America. Interested organizers are encouraged to nominate themselves. 

EOWG Advisory Committee. We are looking for advisory committee members. The advisory committee is designed to allow individuals to participate who may not have a consistent availability to meet or who are interested in joining the board in the future. 

Nomination Selection Process: All remaining seats/positions will be selected by a majority vote of the EOWG board of directors. 

Submit Your Nomination: To submit your nomination please visit the Issue below and submit your name, event name, country, territory/state, and a short reason why you would like to participate.  

Issue: https://www.drupal.org/project/event_organizers/issues/3152319

Nomination Deadline:  Monday, July 6th, 11:59 pm UTC