Butex Annual General Meeting

BUTEX ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

Friday 11th December 2009 The University of Westminster, London

MINUTES

Present: Elizabeth Harris, Alanah Cullen Ruth Sheret

Lynne Alvarez, Anne-Marie Bruner Tracey; Rachel Buckley; Sue Bunney; Bridget Carey; Ruth Casey; Robert Carthy; Roxanne Cavanagh; Hilary Colvey; Tim Conway; Alison Cooper; Duncan de Silva; Christina Fairhead; Sue Fidalgo; Claire Fiumana; Allison Handley; Elizabeth Harris; Adrian Hawksworth; Michael Hughes; Lorraine Kirby; Hazel Lander; Chughtai Laviza; Sarah Leach; Julie Leverett; Amanda Mason; Rebecca Mathers; Rose Matthews; Jackie Maudsley; Stephanie Nixon; Mark Pickerill; Tim Rudd; Veronica Speiser; Dorte Stevenson; Annette Strauss; Christine Sullivan, Jo Turner; Angela Turton; Maaike van der Heijden; Val Vassallo; Lauren Welch

Apologies: Erica Arthur, Valerie Horwood, Isobel Child, Tony Emmerson, Paul Beavitt

1. Matters Arising From The Last Meeting

There were no matters arising.

2. Annual Report 2009

The Annual Report 2009 has been distributed to the BUTEX membership by e-mail.

3. Membership Update

BUTEX welcomed the following new members during 2009.

University of Plymouth University of Greenwich Liverpool Hope University University of East London Edge Hill University St Mary's University College Twickenham London The Arts University College At Bournemouth The Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London IFSA Butler Scotland

4. The First BUTEX Symposium

The first BUTEX Symposium ‘Twenty-First Century Challenges for Study Abroad’, held at the University of Manchester, was very succesful with over 100 delegates participating in the day-long event.

Following very positive feedback from this event, the committee proposed that BUTEX host a symposium bi-annually in non-conference years. The membership approved this proposal. 5. The BUTEX Exchange Fair Circuit

As in previous years, BUTEX provided a platform for member institutions to coordinate their 2009 exchange fairs with a view to increasing attendance from partners overseas. The committee proposed to continue with this initiative and the membership approved the proposal.

The committee reported that it had found that members were gernally unable to commit to a specific regional week when timing their fairs. The membership agreed that this had been difficult and it was proposed that a generic month for all institutions will be used in future years.

6. The BUTEX Scholarship

Following two years consideration, the Executive Committee made the decision to change the scholarship application criteria. The existing question - “Why should every student study abroad?”- yielded too many generic responses, in many cases simply regurgitating the promotional information that study abroad staff themselves disseminated. To make the selection process easier and the submissions more relevant, the committee have decided to run two competitions for 2010:

 A Poster Promoting Study Abroad The dimensions of the poster must not exceed an A3 sheet of paper (297 mm x 420 mm). In the US this is equivalent to Ledger / Tabloid sized paper (11” x 17”). Applications should be sent by post to: BUTEX Scholarship Competition, c/o Isobel Child, University of the Arts London, 65 Davies Street, Mayfair, London, W1K 5DA

 Answer the following question: Five Things I Wouldn’t Study Abroad Without Maximum number of words: 250

All applications should be sent as an e-mail attachment to: [email protected]

The value of each scholarship will remain £500 and will be paid to the winners once they have arrived and registered at their host university.

Applications will be accepted from January 2010 and the deadline for all applications is the 31st May 2010.

The committee are hoping to exhibit all poster entries during the 2010 conference.

7. The BUTEX Working Groups

The BUTEX membership is currently represented by nominated BUTEX members in the following working groups and initiatives:

 The BUTEX Working Group  The Interorgansiational Student Mobility Group  UKCISA Continuing Professional Development Group  The BUTEX Sponsored Wellbeing Bid

Details of the work of all of these groups is contained in the BUTEX Annual Report 2009. However the Chair brought members’ particular attention to the following:

The BUTEX Working Group

The BUTEX response to the Green Paper on Learning Mobility has now been submitted and the group urged BUTEX members to also make an institutional response using the web response facility.

Inter-organisational International Student Mobility Group

A paper will be put forward for consideration at the Post-HESA Implementation Review Group in 2010 relating to the student data collection. The group are currently reviewing the paper and consultation with BUTEX member institutions will take place at the next stage. Planning Officers and other members of staff involved in the return of HESA data will be particularly targeted at this stage of consultation.

BUTEX Sponsored Student Wellbeing Bid

A presentation of this bid was made to BUTEX members before the AGM. Members approved the continuation of this bid.

8. The 9th BUTEX International Conference

The 9th BUTEX International Conference at the University of the Arts will take place Monday July 5th – Wednesday July 7th. Alanah Cullen from the University of the Arts made a brief presentation to members about the venue, a beautiful new conference venue recently restored by the University of the Arts and located on the river Thames steps away from the Tate. This event is always popular, but the committee are hoping that next year we will attract a larger number of North American delegates than usual BUTEX conferences; the extremely central position of the venue hopefully proving to be both attractive and logistically convenient to overseas staff. The committee hope that members will be able to forward adverts for the conference to their North American partners and encourage them to attend.

The committee announced that Penny Egan, Executive Director of the Fulbright Commission, and Professor Colin Riordan, Vice Chancellor of the University of Essex and the new Chair of the UUK International and European Policy Committee, will be our plenary speakers.

Accommodation for the conference is currently being arranged with Imperial University who own accommodation venues slightly superior and closer to the venue than the University of the Arts.

The committee have received a number of session proposals, but are still looking for additional sessions. If any members are interested in submitting a proposal and need assistance in finding a co-presenter, please let Ruth know ([email protected]) and we will do our best to match you up.

The conference has one potential sponsor, but other sponsorship options are still available. Details of sponsorship options can be found at the end of the Annual Report 2009. For further information please contact Erica at: [email protected].

9. The BUTEX NAFSA Reception, Kansas City 2010

The Booth

As usual, BUTEX will host a double booth at the NAFSA conference, with a special area for BUTEX members to use for private meetings. Booth details will be forwarded to members shortly.

The Reception

24 member institutions responded to our call for event sponsors and a drinks and dessert reception for 300 people will be hosted at the Tudor Room, The Clubhouse on Baltimore on Tuesday 1st June 2010.

Participating members have been asked to provide images for the reception slideshow, and a reminder e-mail will be sent again.

The committee will ask participating members to nominate their guests in January, and the final guest list will be confirmed in March.

10. Any Other Business

Lauren Welch from the Fulbright Commission asked members if there would be any interest from member institutions if the Fulbright Commission were able to organsie web based seminars with the US Embassy regarding US Visa issues. Members confirmed that they would potentially be interested in such events, and the committee will liaise with Lauren in the new year regarding this matter.