Wednesday April 18 2012
Folks are currently hotly debating many topics on the AERC forum and Ridecamp on ways to save AERC money, including budget cuts and expanding membership. I'll create a few polls people can take.
The last poll,
"Would you be willing to pay for your year-end AERC awards, such as jackets, vests, blankets?"
so far runs 68% yes, and 32% no. Some of those opposed are rather fiercely so, and have left some very good, thought-provoking comments. The poll will continue - take it if you haven't, and feel free to leave your own comments.
Check out both the poll and comments here:
http://merritravels.endurance.net/2012/04/aerc-cost-of-awards-poll.html
Now let's look at another way of cutting costs: weight divisions. To be sure, it would be a small expense reduced, but it's an expense to consider nonetheless, if that's the way we choose to start trimming the AERC budget.
Currently, not counting the Junior division which, in my opinion, should always exist, there are 4 weight divisions: featherweight, lightweight, middleweight, and heavyweight. Cutting one of those divisions would make it harder for some people to get the year-end points and awards. (For example, eliminating one weight division over 9 regions, where first through tenth place are awarded - if there are that many riders in the standings - would eliminate roughly* 90 year-end awards).
*see the first comment
Take the poll:
surveys & polls
5 comments:
It may not be 90 awards as many regions do not have 10 placings awarded in each division.
You're right - I looked at the 2011 standings and it varied quite a bit. However, I neglected to mention the Junior division - which I personally think should not be touched - so I'll correct the above to "roughly" eliminated 90 year-end awards. (thanks for pointing out)
I ran a similar poll about 2-3 years ago with most wanting to leave it as is.
The number of placings is almost never ten - sometimes as small as 3.
It's 10 or 5% of the number of wt division members in the region whichever is smaller.
The number of awards decreases as our membership decreases.
It seems to me that a tremendous amount of money could be saved by not funding some of the research projects that are interesting to a few intellectuals, but never seem to apply to the rest of us.
Awards are a goal that many can strive for; the research, not so much.
Last commenter: what kind of research projects do you mean, and are you sure some of them aren't taken on voluntarily by the researcher?
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