EEB2 APEEE AGM 2023 – a glimpse of hope that times are changing

I follow the Woluwe valley down avenue Oscar Jespers
Listening to the wind of change
A February warmish night, youngsters passing by
Listening to the wind of change…

So where shall I start? In 2022, as much as I wanted to get down to work, there was almost nothing to do. But let’s look back at how it all started.

What was it like in the AGM 2021?

In the 2021 AGM, the president of the electoral office shared negative voting recommendations on the candidates with her section,  the chair muted speakers and the controversial resolution on “Written procedure” was rejected.

This was also the meeting where the chair orally accepted to revise the text of the resolution on the Code of conduct but by not putting the revision in writing got the AGM to adopt the unrevised text. On top of all this, there were serious issues with the voting system due to which voting on several resolutions had to be repeated. Contrary to Belgian law, none of these technical issues were reported in the minutes of the 2021 AGM.

What was it like in the AGM 2022?

In the 2022 AGM, history repeated itself. During the day, the voting recommendations flew like kites on a windy day in Oostende. Unable to decide who (not) to support, the French Board members sent several emails despite the past election violations at the AGM 2021.

At the meeting itself,  the participants were not only muted, but the chat was disabled most of the time. Class reps who had technical issues with voting or connecting problems could not express themselves and parent related chat groups were full of outrage. The AGM was delayed nearly 30 minutes due to these technical problems.

Once again the APEEE Board decided to walk around the Belgian ASBL law on written procedure with resolution 2, which tried to incorporate a waiver in the statutes. Despite not having enough quorum, the chair wrongfully announced during the meeting that the resolution passed and insisted on his view until the end of the meeting. Only after the meeting, thanks to numerous class reps challenging the decision, the APEEE announced that resolution 2 on the written procedure was not adopted. This was the subject of one of our past articles.

How was it in 2022?

The rest of 2022 was a far less dramatic year that established some good practices the APEEE board should keep for the future.

Reform of Brussels schools
an example of transparent communication

Much of 2022 was dominated by the discussion on the future reform of Brussels schools. The newly elected chair informed the parents community on a regular basis of the draft proposals. The documents coming from the Office of the Secretary General were even shared in their entirety. The board members were openly allowed to consult their section on the draft proposals. The sections openly voiced their concerns to the Board of Governors.

The cherry on the cake was the famous Town hall meeting with the Secretary General of the European Schools Mr Andreas Beckmann that was held on 19 October 2022 at the school premises. The event was well attended and parents wholeheartedly appreciated this effort from APEEE for having organised a moment of direct democracy.

These transparent practices were in stark contrast with how the process was done in 2020 when the decision on population of Evere site was made. Back in 2020, all the documents surrounding the discussion were confidential, the parents were not informed in a timely manner and the two board members who tried to have a more transparent communication with the parents were persecuted by the APEEE board. The subsequent plea for transparency was ignored and silenced by 2020 and 2021 APEEE Boards.

Board minutes in 2022

The drafting of APEEE Board minutes have improved. As the year progressed the minutes became clearer and comprehensive, voicing different views in discussions and dissenting opinions. Minutes of the meeting of 24 October and 15 November 2022 demonstrate serious discussions on the IT project, financial report and the next year’s budget. I was particularly impressed by the board minutes of 24 October 2022 which include statements for the record of four board members, a practice that was not allowed by the previous chair.

If you do not understand my astonishment with this new professional approach to recording board meetings in the minutes, take a look at the Board minutes of 4 November 2020 that are now missing on the APEEE website. You can ask the APEEE secretariat to send you a copy or you can read them right here. 

What was it like in the AGM 2023?

What were the highlights?

• It is the first AGM truly for the parents without any special guests. A real meeting where a decent amount of time was dedicated to present Board members and discuss resolutions. This reflects the legal purpose of the AGM: to discuss the financial reports of the previous year, adopt the next year’s budget and replace the outgoing Board members.
• At the beginning of the meeting an intervention was made asking for a declaration of impartiality and absence of conflicts of interests of the Electoral office because of the precedent in the AGM 2021 where the president of the electoral committee gave negative voting recommendations on the day of the elections to all class reps of her section. The chair requested the Electoral office to make a declaration. 
• Discussion on important topics was allowed and went on very well in a constructive and relaxed manner.
• There were no long, boring and repetitive speeches.
• All questions were replied without censorship.
• The Annual report was presented in a structured manner and the chair indicated briefly what to expect as activities in the annual report.
• The APEEE sent an email to all parents with the slides of candidates and the slides were published on the website.
• There were not a lot of voting recommendations, although I have heard of some WhatsApp messages and emails. This is hopefully a sign of maturity or at least embarrassment to openly promote such childish practices that were commonplace in the past.
• Candidates were not cut off when going a bit overtime in their speeches as it happened in the past. 
• Enough time was allowed to repeat voting when there were technical issues.
• Overall there was very transparent reporting – in particular for financial matters.
• There was a promise of real and more comprehensive minutes of the meeting. 

A minor hiccough

During the elections all went well, except for two unprofessional moments:

• When a member of the APEEE staff stepped forward to present a candidate & 
• When a board member presented a candidate and advocated for her election. This was clearly not in line with the Board meeting minutes of 21/11/2018 proposal number 3 on Presentation of the candidates for the Board at AGM. An outgoing board member responsible for having introduced this proposal was sitting on stage but did not seem to notice that procedure was not followed.

Important discussions that should not be forgotten

The IT project

There was an extensive discussion about the IT project of the APEEE and the cost overrun of it. From the discussion it appeared that the IT project lacks definition. This in its turn leads to continuous and uncontrolled growth of the project. Moreover it seems that the project lacked well defined and timely financial controls, leading to financial overruns. It also seems that there was no project management in place, and the role of the APEEE Board monitoring the project and implementing the project was blurred. As one IT expert parent put it at the General meeting, concluding the discussion: the project bears all hallmarks of being bound to fail from the start. Board members acknowledged that the APEEE lacks solid financial procedures. The most amazing thing during the AGM was that these points were discussed in an open and transparent manner. It is not that the APEEE had financial procedures in the past and that they disappeared. Rather, there were never solid financial procedures and during this AGM, this was for the first time acknowledged & discussed. 

During the discussion it turned out that some Board members were not aware of the financial responsibility of projects and who is responsible for them. The board has the collective responsibility of all actions of the APEEE – that monitoring is the principal job of the Candidate board members who sign up  at the election. Therefore, this sense of “liability” and “accountability” still has room for improvement. 

The conflict of interest, again

There was reluctance from an outgoing board member responsible for Periscolaire WG to accept that there was a conflict of roles regarding the role of IT Coordinator who also had a role in managing the IT project instead of monitoring it. This was particularly a delicate issue since The Woluwe Diaries had already pointed out the “Conflict of interest” in two blog posts from April 2021 and July 2021 regarding the former Perischolaire instructor being the Coordinator of the WG Perischolaire.

This was already an issue from 2021 and the APEEE Board never responded to these assertions. While the former Coordinator of Perischolaire had changed roles while his company still gave services to the APEEE Perischolaire activities, he was now the Coordinator of the IT WG and the Transport WG. These are WG’s that are responsible for a sizable amount of APEEE budget expenses and there should be clear procedures in place for procurement and monitoring the implementation.

A class representative emphasized that it is high time the APEEE applied the same standards expected from EU institutions where most parents work regarding “conflict of interests” even if there were no procedures in place at the moment. 

The structure of the next board

At the end of the AGM, the results were announced. This was indeed a moment of celebrations as the electoral committee did an impeccable job. However, what was of concern for me was the return of  the two  former Board members that are a part of the old establishment that was responsible for detaching the board from the parents and for unprofessional practices. 

These two senior Board members had both sent voting recommendations in the AGM 2021 while being part of the Electoral Office. 

Do you know why I remember all this? Because my name was also one of the names that were crossed out in the negative voting recommendations sent by the president of the Electoral Office who is also a former President of APEEE Board. What is surprising for me is not the fact that she had no shame to use her office email address to send such negative voting advice to over 50 class reps while being a part of such a honorable office of the AGM. What was also shocking for me was that class reps who had received that negative voting advice, continued to elect her knowing how she was violating fundamental values that we stand for in the European Union. 

The future

The APEEE board 2022/23 demonstrated that there is a clear difference in leadership qualities of the APEEE chair. The 2022/23 chair is known for his calm approach, for taking a distance & looking for dialogue with school and not continuously searching for conflicts. 

2022 has been a year that brought winds of change to The Woluwe Diaries readers. The APEEE president allowed a transparent AGM to happen after many years and acknowledged that procedures are not in place. He has acknowledged that changes must happen to prevent the mistakes of the past. The board of 2022 seems to respect dissenting voices and minority voices do not seem to be repressed. This is a welcome change. 

There is now a new Board in 2023. Congratulations to all of you! 

These winds of change can only reach the magic moment if the new Board supports the current direction. One could help things to improve, plan projects, tighten controls and understand liabilities & responsibilities. Or one would welcome the return of the old ways. We count on the new Board to make the right decisions for the parents association, especially to support those who would put procedures in place and take ethical decisions. The parents are counting on your integrity and your willingness to ask for help. Let this be a word of caution to not damage the progress that has been made.

To conclude, I would like to propose the second Woluwe Diaries Transparency Award to the APEEE President for his dedication to transparent communication. I would like to remind the readers that his predecessor only received the Cork medal award.

So it is with pleasure that I announce that The Woluwe Diaries Transparency Award Silver medal is awarded to the 2022/2023 APEEE President for his efforts to make our association a more transparent organisation and – in an unprecedented move – a second Gold medal is also awarded for sustaining criticism with grace. I wish the 2023/24 APEEE president the same excellent result.

“Take me (take me) to the magic of the moment
On a glory night (a glory night)
Where the children of tomorrow dream away (dream away)
In the wind of change (the wind of change)”