Board Secretary

The Board secretary is responsible for creating the agenda and sending it out to the Board members, ex-officio members and Committee chairs.

1. Monday, two (2) weeks prior to the Board meeting, work with the Board President to set the agenda items for the meeting.
2. Create the initial Board agenda.  A template for the meeting agenda can be found in the BoardMeetings/Templates folder on Wild Apricot.  See Working with WA Files for information on how to access the templates.
3. Send the draft Board meeting agenda to the Board President for approval.

The secretary gathers together documents that will be reviewed at the Board meeting, such as the financial report, membership report and any committee reports.  A request is also made for any addition agenda items from the Board members, ex-officio members and Committee chairs.

1. Upload the draft meeting agenda to the Wild Apricot website by following the instructions in Working with WA Files.  The agenda should be stored in the WA BoardMeetings/Agenda folder. 
2. Ten (10) days before the Board meeting, the secretary sends out an email blast to all Board and committee chairs asking them to submit any agenda items and/or committee reports.  This is done by using the Email blast procedure that can be found at Email blasts and distribution lists. The "Call for Board Meeting Material" template is used for this email.  Use the ASURA Board Meeting distribution list. The draft copy of the meeting agenda is included as a link within the body of the email.  All material should be submitted to the secretary at least five (5) days prior to the Board meeting.

The secretary puts together a packet of information that is sent to the Board members, ex-officio members and Committee chairs 2-3 days prior to the Board meeting. The packet should include:

• Upcoming Board meeting agenda which includes the Zoom link for the meeting
• Draft minutes from the previous Board meeting
• Any Committee or other reports that were received

1. Create the packet of information into a combined PDF document. Use whatever tool you have access to that creates PDF documents and combined PDF documents (such as Adobe Acrobat Pro, Corel PDF Fusion or any other software that is capable of creating a combined PDF file.)
2. Upload the PDF packet to Wild Apricot following the instructions in Working with WA Files.  Save the file in the BoardMeetings/Agenda folder.
3. Send out an Email blast to the Board members, ex-officio members and Committee chairs using the "Meeting Agenda" template and the "ASURA Board Meeting" distribution list.  Include the link to the PDF packet created with the final Board agenda and supporting meeting documents.

ASURA Board meetings are held as hybrid meetings - in-person and via Zoom.  Attendance via Zoom is only if the Board member/Committee chair/Ex-Officio member cannot attend in person.  The Zoom link is provided to those that request it. 

A  Zoom meeting will need to be scheduled so a link can be generated.  ASURA has their own Zoom account that is used for virtual seminars. For help in logging into Zoom, see the Meeting technology page.

Provide the ASURA Office Staff the Zoom link in case someone needs to call in the day of the meeting.  They can get the link from the office staff.

The Zoom meeting should be started about 15 minutes prior to the start of the Board meeting.  Login to the ASURA Zoom account and start the meeting.  For help in logging into Zoom, see the Meeting technology page.  It is not necessary to record the meeting in Zoom.  

The secretary is responsible for taking the minutes of the meeting.  The Bylaws require that the minutes include "the time and place of holding, the notice thereof given, the names of those present ... and the proceedings thereof."  

• Note any changes to the previous month’s minutes so corrections can be made.
• Take attendance of all Board members, ex-officio members, and Committee chairs (absent or present) and any guests present.

A copy of the Board minutes template and Board attendance template can be found in the BoardMeetings/Templates folder on Wild Apricot.  See Working with WA Files for information on how to access the documents.

Within a week of the last Board meeting, the minutes of the meeting need to be created.  Typically Word is used to create this document.  Add the "Draft" watermark so all will know these minutes have not been approved by the Board. The file should be saved as

YYYY-MM DDBoardMinutesDraft.docx, e.g.,2022-1-13BoardMinutesDraft; this naming convention matches what is contained in the directions for uploading the file to the ASURA website.  The final step is to create A PDF of the minutes

The secretary posts the minutes and any supporting documents from the meeting to the ASURA website. ​​​​​​

1. Prepare a PDF file that includes a draft copy of the meting minutes and any reports/documents that were distributed in support of the meeting.
2. Upload this file to the ASURA website and create a page to post the minutes following the procedures defined in Add-edit board minutes.  A brief summary of the meeting should be developed to add to the page.. 

The secretary updates the minutes from the prior Board meeting by making any corrections and removing the "Draft" watermark.  A new PDF version of the minutes is created with the name

YYYY-MM-DDBoardMinutesFinal. The file is uploaded to the ASURA website following the procedures in the Upload-delete a document and the new document URL is noted. 

The last step is to update the minutes webpage which is done following the procedures defined in Add-Edit Board Minutes (Revise or delete minutes).  The only edit needed is to replace the link to the minutes document with the link of the updated version of the minutes.

Sample documents have been created for the Board agenda, meeting minutes and Board meeting attendance.  These documents should be kept up-to-date with the current Board members, ex-officio members and committee chairs.  In addition to the templates, an Excel document has been created that lists the Board meeting dates and when information is due in order to prepare the documents necessary for the Board meeting.  A sample of this document is called "Meeting Dates - Schedule".  A PDF version of this document is also created and a link to this document is included in the button titled "Secretary's Meeting Schedule" in the left column of this page.  A list of the Board meeting dates needs to be submitted to the Website Committee Chair so they can be added to the ASURA event calendar.

The documents are currently kept on Wild Apricot.  See the Working with WA Files under the Tools-Resources tab for more information on how to access the current documents as well as how to upload updated documents. The files are located in the BoardMeetings/Templates folder.

Documents to maintain:

• Board meeting agenda (Word)
• Board meeting attendance (Word)
• Board meeting minutes (Word)
• Board meeting dates (Excel)

The email distribution lists need to be up-to-date by the Board secretary or the appropriate delegate.  Instructions on how to maintain the distribution lists can be found in Email blasts and distribution lists under the Tools-Resources tab.

The Wild Apricot email distribution lists for Board meetings, committee chairs, Ex-officio members, etc. use Wild Apricot's Groups to populate the various lists. As the membership in the various Board groups changes, the Board secretary or the appropriate delegate needs to update the Groups.

The six Groups that need periodic updating are:

• ASURA Board
• Board Support Staff
• Committee Chairs and Liaisons
• Executive Committee
• Ex-officio Members
• Past Presidents - which of the following that needs updating depends on what the Past President wants
  • Past President (no minutes)
  • Past President (who wants minutes)

Most of these updates occur when the new year begins in May with the five new Board members.

See instructions for updating Wild Apricot Groups

The President often asks the Secretary to send emails to various groups or members, e.g., Board Members. The process is the same as the one used to send out agenda information with one important exception. For emails from anyone other than the Secretary, "reply to" for the email should be set to the name of the person requesting the email. Failure to do this results in all replies to the email going to the Secretary who then has to forward the reply to the person requesting the email.

Changing the "reply to" for an email is easily done and is explained in the Creating and sending email blasts webpage (the menu link is located in the Tools-Resources tab).  Look in Step 3, Finish up.