Minutes of the Australasian Association for Theatre, Drama and Performance Studies

Executive Meeting

Victoria University of Wellington, Tuesday 29 July 2004, 7pm

1. Attendance

John Downie, Bill Dunstone, Adrian Kiernander, Paul Makeham, Geoffrey Milne, Ben Payne, Delyse Ryan, Joanne Tompkins

2. Apologies

Maryrose Casey, Helena Grehan, Veronica Kelly, Ray Goodlass, Jenny Leong

3. Membership

* Membership is going well and is steadily increasing.

* We are considering the possibility of introducing a membership card which would include information such as the web address.

* Members definitely need a receipt when they pay their fees.

* Is it possible to standardize the time when renewals are expected? (and possibly set up a pro-rata catch-up?). We spoke about the wording of the card and we agreed that "Membership for 2004" would be good.

* We should include a note on the Membership renewal form that goes out with the April ADS. It could say something like "According to our records, you have not paid your membership for 2004. If this is incorrect, please contact us..."

* Another avenue for reminding members could be Paul's first e-bulletin of the year. Something which says "don't forget that everyone's membership is due".

4. President's Report

* It has been a good year for ADSA.

* The major concern at the moment is ADS.

* The proposed re-structure of the Executive will be put forward at the AGM. One weakness might be that everything is portfolio based and there are no general roles for people to do.

* E-bulletin seems to be making an impact.

* It might be to have more e-meetings and we should investigate having a hybrid system. It might be worth having a trial chat session. There was general agreement that face-to-face communication sorts issues out better than e-meetings.

* The planning day was a success.

* Alternative Conference Models-eg. 1-day conferences, thematically specific or geographically specific.

5. Treasurer's Report

* ACU returned a profit

* It looks like New Zealand is financially sound.

* We are going to have to increase fees. Currently the student membership does not contribute to ADSA at all-it only covers the journal. Our financial commitment to ADS means that we need to increase the fees:

* Academic: $100

* Unwaged: $65

6. Executive Structure

* Adrian Kiernander suggested that there could be an Executive position responsible for Publications (additional to ADS) whose role would be to help people be published as well as promoting the existing publications and encouraging others to set them on courses.

7. AusStage Report

* Finished for the moment

* It is currently in a holding pattern of recording new information but there is very little retrospective data collection.

* The future depends on LERN.

8. Conferences:

2005 Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga (Winter)

2006 University of Sydney

* We need to contact Ian Maxwell to see if this is still possible.

9. Prizes:

* Philip Parsons Prize report

* An award will be made at this conference.

* Marlis Thiersch Award report

* An award will be made at this conference.

* Rob Jordan Award report

* An award will be made at this conference.

* Veronica Kelly Prize for Best Postgraduate Conference Paper

* An award will be made at this conference.

* Special ADSA Award for Outstanding Research Achievement

* The executive felt uncomfortable about awarding Rob Jordan his own award. It was agreed that the more appropriate action would be to give him a special honour so ADSA will create the inaugural Special Award for Outstanding Research Achievement.

10. LERN

* At the AGM we need to inform the membership of the current position of LERN

* LERN is officially a part of ADSA because it is on our agenda.

* We have currently got the application in and we're confident about our chances. There have been some suggestions which lead us to believe that it hasn't been thrown out.

11. CHASS

* Council for Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences

* This could potentially be really good for us.

12. ATHE Report

* The last ATHE conference was in New York.

* The next ATHE conference will be in Toronto.

* Peta Tait has been taking the lead on this.

13. Publications Report

* Paul will ask Veronica Kelly about this.

14. Postgraduates' Report

* Could the post-graduate report be moved to an earlier position on the AGM agenda?