PEOI Board of Directors March 6, 2004

Dear board members,

The agenda items for March 2004 online board meeting are presented below. The supporting material is indicated for each. A board vote bulletin is supplied for board member voting.

Item #1- executive director's report and strategy update:
For March 2004, executive director's report is essentially contained in PEOI's 2003 Annual Report. There are just a couple of matters that the Board of Directors should be aware of and/or may have already noticed.

First, PEOI's web site menus have changed to allow quicker links between sections and languages on the web site. The intention is to embed additional shortcuts, even on individual pages of courses (so that a student can view a chapter of a course in a given language and switch instantly to the corresponding chapter in another language). PEOI web site improvements are only possible if suggestions are forwarded to the webmaster (i.e. John Petroff). Members who sign up to the Web Site Improvement Committee are urged to discuss among themselves and forward such improvement proposals.

Second, a new procedure in "Volunteers recognized" part of "Support" allows to list a "Complete record of PEOI registered volunteers". If a registered board member (or any other volunteer) is logged in, he/she can view the email address, background, education, comments, group affiliation and work record of every other volunteer registered as instructor, author, translator, staff volunteer or board member. Note that no volunteer can now register with a factitious email address. This is intended to protect the private information made available to other registered volunteers, and safeguard the files to which volunteers have acess. The "Complete record of registered volunteers" is intended to be a vehicle for showing the outstanding merits of individual volunteer contributions (in addition to provide a volunteer's information). Members of the Volunteer Recognition Committee are urged to make recommendations for improvement in the procedure and for entries of specific merits for individual volunteers. (See for instance, entry of merits for Sandrine Cortet.)

Lastly, see further aspects pertaining to PEOI's annual report, and board members are invited to propose and/or participate in other forum discussions.

Item #2- appointment of new board members:
Resolution proposal 2004-3 #1 appointment of Donald Henry Ah Pak as board member
Resolution proposal 2004-3 #2 appointment of Johannes Glas as board member
Resolution proposal 2004-3 #3 appointment of Mihai Caramihai as board member
Resolution proposal 2004-3 #4 appointment of Abidin Yildirim as board member
The links to applicants' CV's will appear in the board member's vote bulletin.

As in November 2003, if all the applicants are appointed, the Board of Directors will have more members than the statutory number of 12 provided in Article 3 Section 1 of PEOI's Bylaws. And, as in the past, it is recommended to allow this to happen, so that the natural process of attrition (as some members no longer can devote time to PEOI) will bring back the composition of the Board of Directors to its desirable size eventually.

Item #3- removal of non-participating board members
Resolution proposal 2004-3 #5 removal of Ayan Battacharia as board member
Resolution proposal 2004-3 #6 removal of Bonnie Bracey as board member

Item 4- making the most from PEOI's 2003 Annual Report:
PEOI's 2003 Annual Report has turned out to be a most impressive document and an evidence of a large community devoting considerable efforts to a common, unique and worthwhile cause. It contains a powerful story that justifies PEOI's existence. It should be used to secure current volunteers' commitment and attract new volunteers and resources. Board members are asked to make specified recommendation on how to make the most of this important document. Please visit the "Forum" procedure (after logging in as board member) and make an entry in board discussion pertaining to PEOI's 2003 Annual Report.

Item #5- volunteer recognition:
Nomination for UN 2004 volunteer of the year to be considered by the Volunteer Recognition Committee
- Yanan Zhang from Beijing, China for translating entire Macroeconomics course
- Kalyani Suresh from Chennai, India for writing 9 chapters of Mass Communication course
Recommendations for additional nominations are invited from all board members, and should be discussed by the Volunteer Recognition Committee. The Volunteer Recognition Committee is mandated the task of reviewing the listing of merits in PEOI "Volunteer recognition" procedure, as mentioned above.

Item #6- next online board meeting:
July 2004

You are reminded that discussion of online board meeting agenda items can be conducted by exchange of emails addressed to all board members, or by placing an item as subject of a forum discussion (other than the one pertaining to the Annual Report). If you do place an item for forum discussion, you may choose to restrict access to board members only. Board members are free to express their opinions and participate in discussions or not. However, board members are required to submit their votes to the executive director by filling the board meber's attached vote bulletin. Failure to return the vote bulletin properly filled out by March 31, 2004, will constitute a non-participation in board meeting that may lead to removal from the board. Board members do not have to wait until the end of the month to submit their vote bulletin: this can be done anytime, but must be before March 31, 2003.

Thank you all very much for your participation in the discussions, for you vote and
for your support of PEOI.

John Petroff
Chairman of the board