Robin Johnson
The Equal Opportunities Conference was held on October 18-20, 2013 and from the evaluations that were received was a great success. There were 112 delegates and 27 observers that attended the event.
Some of the positive feedback received was for the panelist discussion, the dance troupe the Dandelion Group, the vignettes shown, the Karaoke, the bartender, the caucus meetings and the dinner.
Some of the negative feedback received was for CRA not to be there, the Terms of Reference workshop and persons with disabilities caucus was far away from the main plenary.
Some suggestions for the future included opening the UTE store for the event, coffee in the hospitality suite, food served at breaks and suggestions for future workshops.
The majority of the delegates that attended were first time participants to the event or at least filled in the evaluation form.
I hoped that everyone learned something from the event.
A big thank you goes out to all the committee members who worked so hard and to Sylvie Bastien, Pierrette Labrie and Erik Gagné from the National office. One of the hardest parts of this conference was to ensure that everyone was properly accommodated and participated in the groups that they identified with.
Cost was of the utmost importance to the committee as we wanted to deliver a good conference within our budget.
On October 25, 2013 I attended a 2 hour long conference call with the National Equity and Diversity Committee (NEDC). Attached you will find minutes of this meeting and of the inaugural meeting in June of 2013 when we were not part of the committee. How the diversity part of the committee is going to be included is up to each Regional committee. Please pay close attention to your Regional committees in the next year to see how they are going to include Diversity.
Respectfully submitted,
Robin Johnson
Chair of the Committee