Anarchist Free University - MINUTES from MEETING 14 March 2004

Present: Marika, Catherine, Rob (minutes) , Dwayne, Possum, Tim, Alan, Charlie, Janis, Rick.

1. Proposals

2. Flyer

3. Email -- media

4. Party

5. Retreat

6. Fundraising/Outreach

7. Compensation

1. Proposals: Alan proposed a course on the "Anarchist 80s" for the Fall Term. The course was accepted with some suggestions to expand the content to include: anarchist affiliated movements for the Move-9 and Mumia; ALF (Animal Liberation Front) and Earth First!; and the Lesbian Avengers.

2. Rob will make a flyer. The flyer will list upcoming courses for the summer. At our next meeting we will look at course proposals for the summer courses.

3. Email -- A reporter from Toronto Life wants to include the AFU in its educational supplement. Charlie and Dwayne will be the contact.

4. The Party was confirmed at Alan's house: 196 Manning Ave--confirmed for April 3rd, (Saturday). Marika proposed that we do a joint party with the Anarchist Bookfair folks. We agreed. Any proceeds will be split.

5. Discussion ensued about what to do for a weekend retreat. Suggestions included the Dragonfly Farm and Kimbercote. Dragonfly is more like camping and Kimbercote does not have that much sleeping space. We decided that Tim and Possum will form a working group to research and coordinate the logistics of the proposed retreat. We were leaning toward Dragonfly.

6. In principle the collective decided that fundraising is important. After some deliberation we felt that the fundraising idea could be tabled for another meeting due to poor interest in getting it off the ground at the present time. Rick and Dwayne signalled interest in doing it. Some ideas that were floated are getting bands, videos, speakers to make it an interesting event that people will want to come out to. No set time for the fundraising effort was set although early Sept as a Fall Term kickoff and December were mentioned. OUTREACH: Tim will look into getting free ad space in sympathetic publications like Ontario's own anarchist journal, Kick it Over (a new issue due out soon).

7. Compensation: We discussed the issue of compensating facilitators for the cultural work they do by teaching at the school. This was a preliminary volley of this admittedly sensitive and complex issue. People who are activists and cultural workers have been chronically under-compensated for work that is socially valuable. Issues of equity and how this may change the nature of AFU were mentioned. There was no agreement reached but there is a desire to look at the issue in more depth at a later time.

NEXT MEETING: TUESDAY APRIL 13, 2004 - 7PM

LOCATION: THIS AINT THE ROSEDALE LIBRARY--481 CHURCH STREET (upstairs)

That's all folks!