Working with the other conveners to organize the conference was a great experience. For the last year, my main project was organizing a water symposium for BC that was held in August in three locations simultaneously. As you can imagine it was a lot of work, worked with a lot of great people, and together we delivered a great symposium. There was a sense of team work but I wouldn’t say we were self-organizing. At the start I sent out a committee org chart, roles and responsibilities, and time lines. This worked but I wonder how efficient it was.
For the OGW BC conference, I saw a lot of dedicated people looking for ways to contribute and be helpful without a set structure. Everyone’s time was limited as everyone was volunteering yet by the day of the conference all the details fell into place. There was definitely huge effort on the part of some (hooray for Donna and Bowen) and the conveners seemed to be self-organizing. The principles of Open were used throughout the planning process (google docs for everything) and I’m wondering, is a shared sense of purpose and openness the only ingredients for self-organizing communities or are there others? -Angeline Tilllmanns